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LG’s Mobile World Congress line-up could have been prematurely tipped, with two new smartphones, the “LG-P880“ and the “LG-P700“, cropping up ahead of the event later this month. Described by listings at the UPnP forum, as well as profiles on LG’s own site, the LG P880 has a 1280 x 720 display and is likely to be the LG X3 leaked earlier this year.
At the time, a quadcore processor was tipped for the X3/P880, specifically NVIDIA’s Tegra 3, with the display a 4.7-inch panel in a device under 9mm thick. OS is Ice Cream Sandwich, and there are the usual twin cameras - 1.3-megapixels up front and and 8-megapixels on the back – along with 16GB of storage. Up to 21Mbps HSPA+, 802.11b/g/n WiFi, NFC and Bluetooth 4.0 round out the key leaked specs.
As for the LG P700, the UPnP listing confirms Ice Cream Sandwich, though the company’s own XML file suggests a mere 640 x 480 resolution display. That implies a mid-tier device, bringing Android 4.0 to lower price points, which Google needs if the OS is to begin ousting 2.x versions from the mainstream.
The expectation is that LG will be showing off these two new devices at MWC, and we’ll be there to bring back all the details.
[via Android Community and via Juggly]
You hate Web ads, or you ignore Web ads. Ah, but what if those Web ads weren’t boring old Web ads, but they danced or sang or jiggled around?
This is the pitch, more or less, for Spongecell, a startup that helps produce “rich media” Web ads. That’s not a new idea by any stretch, and there are plenty of competitors that do similar stuff. But last year the company’s story still attracted angel investors like Google chair Eric Schmidt.
And now the company has a new funding: Tech investor/holding company Safeguard Scientifics has taken all of a $10 million B round.
The money will go to help Spongecell expand smaller product lines, like video ads, and eventually move into new ones like mobile ads, says CEO Ben Kartzman.
Spongecell is a full-fledged “pivot”: Prior to 2008, it had raised $3 million and was trying to sell some sort of “event management” widget that Kartzman readily admits got no traction. Then it moved into ad tech and things have been humming since. Kartzman says that last year he grossed around $10 million and cleared “seven figures” of profit.
Big picture: Smart people keep telling me that the ad tech ecosystem has too many startups funded with too much money, and that something has to give. But then I keep hearing about another ad tech startup raising another round. Assume we’ll see more of these for a while.
It looks like the end is near for Blockbuster, the company is shutting down even more of its retail locations that aren’t making money and now there will be even less Blockbuster exposure around the country. Redbox has agreed to purchase the Blockbuster Express kiosks that NCR operates around the country. NCR picked up those kiosks after Blockbuster filed bankruptcy. The purchase will land Redbox 10,000 more kiosk locations.
The deal will cost $100 million and will take the kiosk operations away from NCR, more known for ATMs at banks than movie rentals. NCR had previously posted $13 million operating loss, but it’s not clear if that was directly related to losses on its movie rental kiosks or not. The transaction is expected to close in Q3 of 2012.
This has some interesting ramifications in the movie rental industry. Redbox recently refused to sign an agreement with Warner Bros. that would have delayed the rental titles coming to the kiosk locations by 56 days rather than the current 28 days. By refusing to sign the agreement, Redbox will be forced to spend more to purchase the DVDs it places in its kiosks, but it will not have to hold to any delay in offering titles for rent.
“The acquisition includes the purchase of the DVD kiosks, certain retailer contracts, and DVD inventory,” Redbox said in a statement. “In connection with the asset purchase, Coinstar and NCR also will enter into a strategic supplier arrangement where Coinstar will purchase product and services from NCR.”
[via CNET]
Nokia has begun pushing out Nokia Belle to existing Symbian handset owners, bringing phones like the N8, E7 and X7 up to speed with the far-improved upgrade to the OS. Distributed via Nokia Suite – it’s too large for an OTA release, Nokia says - the new platform version consists of aesthetic and functional changes, including a boost to six homescreens now with more flexible shortcuts and widgets, along with 30fps HD video recording.
There’s also a much tweaked and enhanced browser, as we saw on the Nokia 700, with increased support for in-page streaming video. A pull-down notifications menu borrows some of Android’s style and throws in some quick-access shortcut toggles for things like wireless power, and the iconography is updated to the “squircle” style.
Altogether, it’s the upgrade Symbian users have been waiting semi-patiently for, and something we wish Nokia had delivered two years ago. As it stands, although Nokia has been preloading Belle onto its recent Symbian devices for the past few months, it’s arguably too late for the OS overall. Nokia’s focus is resolutely on Windows Phone moving forward, with S40 for the entry-level and developing nations.
You’ll need Nokia Suite v3.3 or above in order to install Nokia Belle, which you can find here. More details of what to expect in the video above, and in our Nokia 700 review. The update is available for the Nokia N8, Nokia E7, Nokia E6, Nokia X7, Nokia C6-01, Nokia C7 and Nokia Oro, with the Nokia 500 getting Belle “within the next few weeks.”
Yesterday, I mentioned that over the weekend a customer survey had surfaced on the Best Buy website that asked customers questions about an Apple HDTV. We wondered at the time if Best Buy had some inside information, or if it was just fishing for answers on what customers thought about the rumored product. If you recall, that survey outlined an Apple HDTV with a 42-inch screen, iOS HDTV with full HD resolution selling for $1499.
Wired got in touch with Best Buy and asked about the survey. The answer was that a research partner conducted the survey. The official response from Best Buy read:
The customer survey was a routine offer effectiveness survey conducted by one of Best Buy’s research partners. Any brand reference was hypothetical. The survey is no longer available.
It’s funny that Best Buy says the brand reference was hypothetical. Apple has been known to come down with an iron fist on partners who leak information about its products ahead of launch. I would bet someone at Best Buy is worried right now. Do you think this was nothing but hype on Best Buy’s part, or did someone have a little information on a coming Apple product and leaked some details without thinking about the consequences?
[via Wired]
This week, Michaels Isaac and Calore discuss Facebook’s looming public stock offering, take a gander at a 3-D printer that outputs to a unique fried-food format, and dig into high-definition alternatives to MP3 audio. But the show, quite dramatically, opens with a big puff of smoke.
That’s right: Mike Isaac starts the podcast by demoing a disposable electronic cigarette. According to Square, the company that makes the device, the e-cigarette is good for 500 puffs — the number of puffs Square reckons you’d get from two packs of tobacco smokes. Each e-cigarette is a $10 purchase, which is less than the cost of two traditional cigarette packs (a commodity that’s heavily taxed in most markets).
Square also says the e-cigarette is legal to smoke on airplanes, a claim that’s met with skepticism by Mike and Mike. The system works by vaporizing what Square calls “E-juice,” a nicotine-laced mixture that produces water vapor but not any tar.
Next up, Mike Isaac riffs on Facebook’s IPO bid. The stock’s ticker code will simply be FB, Mike says, and shares could debut on the market sometime in May for as much as $30 for share — if Facebook gets its way. The big question mark? How Facebook will monetize its mobile traffic, currently a great untapped source of income.
Our two Mikes then toss to a video shot at the Cornell University Creative Machines Lab. We’re shown the amazing talents of a 3-D printer called Fab@Home. Not only can this open hardware platform print 3-D objects made of silicone and stainless steel epoxy, it can also be loaded with food media like peanut butter, cookie dough and Nutella.
In a vivid demonstration of the printer’s talents, the video shows the device crafting an elaborate 3-D model made entirely of corn batter. It’s dropped in a deep fryer, and comes out looking like a crispy, delectable spyrograph design.
In response, Michael Calore shares that he’d like to print lobster in a nacho-like form factor.
The show ends with Calore providing a primer on high-definition digital audio formats, including Apple Lossless, FLAC and Direct Stream Digital. Apparently, veteran rocker Neil Young is no fan of the MP3 format, and he made this very clear at a recent All Things Digital conference. Ever the helping hand, Calore explains what enraged audiophiles can do about the MP3 scourge.
Like the show? You can also get the Gadget Lab video podcast via iTunes, or if you don’t want to be distracted by our unholy on-camera talent, check out the Gadget Lab audio podcast. Prefer RSS? You can subscribe to the Gadget Lab video or audio podcast feeds.
An e-mail exchange been posted to Pastebin that allegedly outlines an attempt by hackers to extort $50,000 out of Symantec. According to the e-mail exchange, a Symantec employee named Sam Thomas was to negotiate payment with hackers who infiltrated Symantec servers and stole the source code to the popular Symantec applications pcAnywhere and Norton antivirus. The hacker/hackers who were conducting the extortion negotiations go by the name Yamatough.
In the e-mail, Thomas wrote that Symantec would pay $50,000 total the hackers to keep the source code from being posted publicly. The e-mails also show Thomas claimed Symantec wanted to use a payment system with $2500 a month for the first three months and the balance once it was convinced the source code was destroyed. Symantec has confirmed the extortion attempt to CNET and says that they were conducting an investigation in cooperation with authorities.
Symantec also says that the investigation is ongoing, and it will not release the name of law-enforcement agencies that are involved. Presumably, the FBI will be included in the investigation and perhaps other agencies as well. Negotiations broke down before the agreement was in place. Apparently, no money was ever sent. CNET now reports that the 1.2 GB file titled “Symantec’s pcAnywhere source code” has been posted to The Pirate Bay.
[via CNET]
Here’s a roundup of recent stories on TechCrunch Europe:
— Internet publishing company Populis is expanding its network operations to South America with the acquisition of Cidade Internet, a popular Brazilian Web portal. Financial terms of the acquisition were not disclosed.
— Moscow-based Heverest.ru, an online retailer of sportswear, leisure and travel goods, has scored $4.3 million in financing from an unnamed “large” Russian investment fund and previous backer eVenture Capital Partners, bringing its total raised to $6.7 million.
— Fits.me, the Estonian “biorobotics virtual fitting room” startup for e-commerce clothing retailers and shoppers, has been around for a while. We first covered them in 2010 when they secured €1.3 million, taking their total cash to €2.6 million.
They’ve now taken another €1.5 million, taking their funding to €4.1 million. Fits.me lets customers “try on” clothing before buying from online clothes retailers.
— Israeli startup Appoxee has raised an undisclosed amount of funding from early-stage investment firm Cyhawk Ventures, and has opened its gates to all.
Nikon has confirmed pricing and availability for the new Nikon D800 DSLR, as well as revealing its D800E sibling that dumps the low-pass filter for higher-resolution shots. The D800 has a 36.3-megapixel sensor and Nikon’s new EXPEED 3 image-processing engine, and will present an interesting alternative to the D700 being slightly lighter – though in some dimensions larger – but targeting more of a video-shooting, studio or landscape style of image capture. As for the Nikon D800E, that addresses the optical low-pass filter debate with an entirely separate model.
Deleting the low-pass filter comes with some compromises, Nikon warns – an increase in aliasing and moiré patterns, for instance, depending on shooting conditions and subject – though they should be relatively straightforward to tweak out in post-processing. However the benefit is higher resolution and clearer definition, ideal for landscape photographers among others.
What remains to be seen is whether the D800 is quite small enough to satisfy would-be buyers, who were looking forward to a compact full-frame Nikon. The camera is certainly smaller than the Nikon D4, launched at CES last month, though not as bag-friendly as might have been expected.
There’s more detail in the new online guide to the cameras, available here. The Nikon D800 will go on sale in late March, priced at $2,999.99 body-only, while the D800E will arrive in mid-April, priced at $3,299.99.
Tote Notes is a new Android app that will surely benefit those who want to keep tabs of conversations they’ve just made with someone else. Available now both as a free download and paid app, Tote Notes transcribe and records your phone conversations into text and then let you send the transcriptions to your email, right after your phone conversation. The app works in just two taps. First, right after the conversation, you’ll have the option to to record notes from the conversation. On the second tap, the app transcribe the message via Google Voice and sent to your email inbox. The subject line of the email that will be generated contains the name and number of the contact whom you just had conversation with. And for additional convenience, an mp3 of your conversations will also be attached to the email. Setting up Tote Notes is pretty easy as well. Right after you’ve installed the app, you’ll be guided on few steps that you need to do before you can start using the app. These steps include setting the email address where you want the trascribed conversations notes be sent to. You can set under settings under the app’s Preferences later on too. Obviously, Tote Notes Android app works best for professionals using Android devices who value every phone calls they make. The app provides a pretty good way of keeping tab of all your phone conversations.
Via [Tote Notes]
Outfit7 says its games on the iPhone and iPad have hit more than 300 million downloads since launching a year and a half ago.
At that size, it claims to have outpaced Rovio’s Angry Birds, which took 20 months to hit 300 million.
If you haven’t heard of Outfit7, it’s probably because it hasn’t raised any institutional venture capital, it wasn’t founded in the U.S., and much of its application usage is spread across 120 countries.
But the company’s franchise of apps called Talking Friends, which are sort of like a modern day Neopet, are gathering a large base of users.
The characters include Talking Tom Cat, Talking Ben the Dog and Talking Harry the Hedgehog — in other words, many more brands than Angry Birds alone. Of the 14 in existence, Talking Tom is the most popular having been downloaded 100 million times.
The animals serve as a pet, which responds to your touch and repeats everything that you say. You can pet him, poke him or grab his tail. A popular activity is to record videos of the pet and send them to friends.
The amount that users come back to the app is also impressive with more than 90 million monthly active users worldwide. The company also averages more than 25 million downloads per month.
Executive Chairman Narry Singh believes Rovio and Outfit7 have similar growth trajectories, and like Rovio, which was able to create a strong brand from Angry Birds, Outfit7 is angling to create brands, as well.
Today, Outfit7 has offices in Palo Alto, Calif., as well as Slovenia, Cyprus, London and Seoul, South Korea. The apps are primarily free, but users can make in-app purchases to buy virtual goods.
The company is also announcing today that it is partnering with Iconicfuture and Digital Artists, to bring branded virtual goods to Talking Tom Cat. In a testament to its international pull, the merchandise will include six of the world’s most popular soccer clubs from Spain, Italy, England, France and Portugal.
Of course, Outfit7 is not the first company to want to replicate Rovio’s successes.
In the end, it won’t be important which company got to 300 million downloads the fastest, but which one was able to build a more long-term and sustainable company.
When you look at it in those terms, the jury is still out on Rovio, as well.
In this economic climate, many small businesses do not qualify for loans based on the standards imposed by banks and financial institutions. For fledgling businesses, the establishment doesn’t have enough cash flow, revenue or credit to qualify for a loan. Many times, entrepreneurs have to put up personal assets as collateral for loans, which can be problematic and risky. The fact is working capital is difficult to get from banks unless a business has perfect credit.
Capital Access Network (CAN), a company that gives small businesses access to credit and working capital and helps solve the problem outlines above, is announcing this morning that it has raised $30 million from Accel Partners. As part of the transaction, Accel partner, Kevin Efrusy will join Credit Access’s board of directors, and Accel vice president, John Locke, will join as an observer.
CAN constitutes the largest, non-bank alternative capital provider to small businesses in the US. The company uses its own real-time platform and risk scoring models to provide capital to small and medium-sized businesses in the US and Latin America and has funded over $2 billion in capital to SMB’s under the brands NewLogic Business Loans and AdvanceMe. This represents roughly 100,000 distinct small business finance transactions. This year alone, CAN will fund over $600 million in loans to small businesses.
CAN uses a variety of data points to deem a business worthy of credit or capital apart from the traditional criteria. CAN’s proprietary underwriting algorithms will churn through its vast data stacks of historical merchant demographic, firmographic, psychographic and social and behavioral profiles seeking and seasoning new behavioral and synthetic risk indicators and recombining those indicators into new risk scorecards.
For example, CAN will look at frequency of sales (not just how much), inventory access, eBay seller rating, tax returns and other information. In terms of interest, the company uses a more unorthodox, merchant-friendly way of collecting money on top of a loan. If an online violin store needs $30,000 in working capital to purchase inventory, CAN will loan the money, but the borrower will need to pay back $35,000 to CAN over 12 months.
Typically, CAN will give merchants and businesses anywhere from $2,500 to $250,000 in working capital. Customers range from medical practices, to shoe stores to auto repair shops to clothing, accessory and home product online retailers.
CAN CEO, Glenn Goldman, tells me that the extra amount the borrower has to pay to CAN depends on risk of the loan, how long it will take for the loan to be paid back, the amount of capital lent and other factors. But he says many times, the amount CAN charges is less than any interest rate from a bank. And 75 percent of customers renew their funding. In some cases, repayment can be fairly simple. Goldman points to the example of one online merchant who chose to automatically forward a small percentage of sales from its payment processor directly to CAN to repay the loan every month. If sales were lower than usual that month, CAN would lower the amount needed to pay.
And Goldman explains that behavioral risk scoring, rather than just examining a small business owner’s FICO score, allows the company to ‘yes’ to a higher percentage of SMBs than traditional sources while mitigating losses.
For Accel, the investment marks the continuation of a thesis of investing aggressively behind companies that are enabling small businesses to grow faster, says Efrusy. He cites investments in Groupon, Etsy, 99 Designs, Braintee, DropBox as just a few of the Accel-backed companies that are helping are “giving small businesses tools to thrive.”
“From our work with small businesses, it’s clear that one of the most pressing issues for merchants is access to credit and working capital,” Efrusy said. “Especially today, banks are unable to play effectively in this market. Large institutions cannot reach, evaluate, or serve small businesses efficiently. Many newcomers to the finance space are constrained by limited access to and very high-cost capital combined with high portfolio losses given unseasoned risk scoring models. Capital Access Network has by far the strongest team, scale, and data-driven approach to this market.”
Goldman says the new funding will be partly used for boosting and redesigning the online merchant experience on CAN. By April, the lender will feature new user interfaces, merchant portals and online approvals.
As Efrusy explains, there’s a huge amount of disruption taking place in the online lending space, and CAN is in a great position to help small businesses grow with working capital. Kabbage is another startup that is also looking to provide capital to online merchants, and ZestCash is doing something similar on the consumer end of the spectrum.
Apple’s work on porting OS X to ARM processors has been revealed by an academic paper the company initially insisted on keeping secret, potentially paving the way to the much-rumored ARM-based MacBook Air. The handiwork of former intern turned CoreOS engineer Tristan Schaap, the project - ”Porting Darwin to the MV88F6281” – detailed how the underlying part of OS X was coaxed into running on a Marvell ARM chipset.
Schaap managed to get OS X Snow Leopard “booting into a multi-user prompt” on the Marvell chipset, though there were lingering hardware issues that persisted. In the process, he needed to build a filesystem and kernelcache from the ground up, as well as work around old code in the existing ARMv5 branch of XNU.
A proper release, he suggested, would first require significant reworking of elements of code, along with new drivers to “fully utilize the potential” of Apple’s hardware. Apps themselves would also need to be re-written – or ported from ARM-based platforms – as well.
Nonetheless, it adds to ongoing suspicions that Apple is at least considering using ARM-based chips – such as the company’s own A5 and upcoming A6, as currently used in the iPad 2 and iPhone 4S – in notebooks as well as tablets and phones. At least one prototype MacBook Air running on an Apple A5 chipset has been reported, performing ”better than expected”, though it was not specified whether it was running iOS or OS X.
[via Apple Insider]
If you think back when the current consoles like the Nintendo Wii and Sony PS3 hit the market, Sony was left playing catch-up and tacked on a rarely used motion control feature of the PS3 to try and match what the Wii had. If the sketches that are included new Sony patent that surfaced are any indication, Sony isn’t ready to let the new Wii U rocking controllers with little LCD screens get the better of it this time around. The Sony patent art is very odd; it shows something that looks more like a tablet or even an eReader then a Wii U controller.
Line art shows a tablet style controller that has some kind connectivity with a sensor on top of the TV. The set-top sensor connects to the console, which looks very much like the current Nintendo Wii in the artwork. Making things even odder, one of the pictures with the patent shows what appears to be the gamer turned into a robot with a laser gun in the tablet controller screen. The smart thing would be to use the PS Vita rather than some other controller, which is what this patent appears to be showing.
Engadget reports that patent text outlines a “position-dependent gaming, 3-D controller, and handheld as a remote,” that acts like an “input for video game.”" I really don’t want to make this; it is very odd. I am not surprised Sony is trying to go this route; it doesn’t want to be left out on a new and hot feature that Nintendo will be using. What do you think? This could be part of that Sony four screen strategy.
[via Engadget]
Jeff Atwood, the co-founder and CTO of Stack Exchange, a network of free, community-driven Q&A sites mostly about programming and gaming, and Stack Overflow, is stepping down from day-to-day operations at the beginning of next month.
Atwood writes on his Coding Horror blog that startup life was having too much of an effect on his family (Atwood has a son and twin daughters).
Startup life is hard on families. We just welcomed two new members into our family, and running as fast as you can isn’t sustainible (sic) for parents of multiple small children. The death of Steve Jobs, and his subsequent posthumous biography, highlighted the risks for a lot of folks.
…
You may have more discipline than I do. But for me, the mission is everything; I’m downright religious about it.
Stack Overflow and Stack Exchange have been wildly successful, but I finally realized that success at the cost of my children is not success. It is failure.
I concur with Instapaper creator Marco Arment, who says Atwood clearly has a healthy perspective on life, and others praising him for the decision, though maybe that’s because I became a first time father myself not too long ago.
You may also want to check out the Hacker News thread on the topic.
Stack Exchange has raised $18 million from Union Square Ventures, Index Ventures, Spark Capital and individual investors like Ron Conway, Naval Ravikant, Chris Dixon, Caterina Fake, Joshua Schachter and many more.
Commenting about the move some more on Twitter, Atwood says his decision to leave Stack Exchange’s day-to-day ops has also to do with his “personality and temperament”.
He adds: “Either I’m all the way in, or all the way out”.
Atwood blogs that he doesn’t know what’s next, though it seems he’s already pondering about it:
What’s next for me?
I honestly don’t know. I do know that I love the Internet, and I remain passionate as ever about making the Internet better – but right now I need to be with my family. In six months, perhaps I’ll be ready to choose another adventure.
Also check out our video interview of the other Stack Exchange co-founder, Joel Spolsky: (Founder Stories) Joel Spolsky On Startups: “Have A Co-Founder Otherwise You’ll Go Insane”
The fine folks over at Raspberry Pi have announced that they expect fans of their tiny little media streaming system will be able to purchase the device by the end of February. The company had apparently hoped the device would be ready to purchase before the end of the month, but ran into an issue in manufacturing. The manufacturing issue was with the quartz crystal package that the company had chosen.
According to the company, the quartz crystal that the Raspberry Pi board was designed to use was readily available in UK, but over in China where the device is manufactured it was hard to find. The manufacturer is finally putting the boards together after getting a supply of the crystals. The first batch of boards is expected to be finished on February 20.
After the boards are complete, they will be shipped over to the UK where they will be available for purchase shortly thereafter. Another interesting piece of news has been offered up as well. Broadcom has published a datasheet on the BCM2835 SoC that is used inside the Raspberry Pi. Those of you out there dying to learn more details about the SoC can grab the datasheet, which describes the ARM peripherals inside the chip in PDF form here. We mentioned that the Raspberry Pi would be running a custom version of the XBMC software not long ago.
Samsung Electronics is considering bringing Samsung Mobile Display, the division responsible for the Super AMOLED panels that have distinguished many of the company’s recent smartphones and tablets, completely in-house, tightening the Samsung supply chain. ”We are considering merging the business to improve synergy, but a final decision has yet to be made” Samsung Electronics revealed in a filing to the South Korea stock exchange, Reuters reports, a move that could spell danger for the display business’ other customers.
Currently, Samsung Mobile Display is jointly owned by Samsung Electroncs, with 64.4-percent, and Samsung SDI, holding the minority 35.6-percent. The joint-venture is unlisted on the stock exchange, but operates semi-independently, supplying not only Samsung Electronics but other companies with AMOLED displays.
That could change, at least partly, if Samsung Electronics decides to bring the display business in-house. Such a move with give the company even more choice for the first-pick of new panel technologies, and allow it to better control the access of rivals to the screens.
As the smartphone and tablet markets heat up, that advantage could see Samsung extend its lead in the Android segment, as well as better challenge high-profile rivals like the iPhone. Apple has already shown how tight control over the supply-chain can work to a firm’s advantage; now Samsung looks to be following in those footsteps.
[via OLED-Info]
Here we go again. It looks like one of the ugliest trials in the history of the software industry is about to repeat itself.
Last year the judge offered Oracle a choice. Accept a judgement of $272 million in damages, that had been reduced from $1.3 billion awarded at trial or seek a new trial. Oracle says in court filings that it wants a new trial.
The key passage of the two-page court filing reads as follows (the word remittitur refers to the judge’s previous order reducing the award):
Oracle has no choice but to elect a new trial, as accepting the remittitur would force Oracle to risk waiving its right to appeal the Court’s decision on the motions for judgment as a matter of law and for a new trial. Oracle’s objective is to obtain clarification of the law and, if it is right about what the law is and what the evidence supports in this case, to vindicate the verdict of the jury and Oracle’s intellectual property rights as a copyright owner. Accepting the remittitur would be contrary to this objective.
And so that means that the whole thing starts over again.
Calling the $1.3 billion award “grossly excessive,” U.S. District Court Judge Phyllis Hamilton in February granted an SAP request to throw out the award. Hamilton said that Oracle never proved that it lost enough business to justify a so large judgment.
Oracle had won the award in November after accusing SAP’s now-shuttered TomorrowNow unit of copying its software without paying appropriate licensing fees. It had been the largest judgment ever in a copyright infringement case.
At trial, Oracle accused SAP’s now-shuttered TomorrowNow business unit of illegally downloading Oracle software and then making several thousand copies of it in order to avoid paying the relevant license fees that are Oracle’s financial bread and butter. Oracle ultimately won the claim, but the the fight turned to damages.
Lawyers for Oracle had argued that the company’s damages should be tied to the value of a hypothetical license that TomorrowNow would have had to pay for the software had it been properly licensed. For its part, SAP had argued that as competitors, damages should have been calculated based on profits lost by Oracle and gained by SAP as a result of the infringement and as such is in a much lower range than what Oracle argued for.
The case has caused a lot of personal enmity between Oracle and SAP, as well as with Hewlett-Packard, especially during the 11-month period when former SAP co-CEO Léo Apotheker was CEO of HP. Apotheker’s first days on the job at HP were marred by his apparent absence from HP headquarters in what couldn’t help but look like an attempt to avoid being served with a subpoena. Maybe Oracle will try again.
Judging from every single TechCruncher’s inbox right now word on the street, there are job poachers amongst us. That’s cool, all’s fair in love and war and technology recruiting, right? Except when it’s not which, in a world filled with people who just want to win at any cost, is pretty damn often.
But let’s pretend for a second that you’re not as fantastic and amazing and desirable as a TechCrunch writer. What happens if you want to be poached!? Well, If you’re actively looking to be recruited like the rare species of programming fauna that you are, look no further than JobPoacher, which allows people who are in the market for a new employer to advertise as such, anonymously.
Just plug in your current salary, desired salary, email and locale, and JobPoacher does the rest. “I was inspired by the news of anti-poaching ‘gentleman’s agreements’ in the news a few weeks ago between high-tech companies,” explained JobPoacher creator John Everett about the inspiration behind the project, ‘I thought to myself, ‘I bet a lot of people out there would love to get poached from their jobs.’”
Indeed! So far the site has seen over 500 job postings, and over 100 emails have been sent to [the] postings from recruiters in the past 24 hours, according to Everett.
So how you like them apples?
Here’s a selection of recent posts on TechCrunch Gadgets:
Brinno Peephole Viewer Is A Viewer For Peepholes
LL Cool G: Ladies Love Cool Gadgets Too, Says Study
Real Augmented Reality Google Goggles In Prototype Stage?
Report: Samsung Planning A Full Line Of Galaxy S3 Phones, First Model To Hit This May
Here’s a selection of recent posts on TechCrunch Gadgets:
Brinno Peephole Viewer Is A Viewer For Peepholes
LL Cool G: Ladies Love Cool Gadgets Too, Says Study
Real Augmented Reality Google Goggles In Prototype Stage?
Report: Samsung Planning A Full Line Of Galaxy S3 Phones, First Model To Hit This May
As the world has realigned from being about portals and then search and now social, how do you build a media company for a social world? And a big part of that is scoops and exclusives and original content, and it’s also about cute kittens in an entertaining cultural context.
– Jonah Peretti, CEO of BuzzFeed, in conversation with David Carr of The New York Times
Here's some handy, infringealicious clip art for the discriminating Anon who wants to make a statement without paying a royalty: a Guy Fawkes mask, suitable for urban art, dress-up, and silkscreening.
Guy Fawkes Mask clip art
(Thanks, @crisnoble!)
Source: Boing Boing | 7 Feb 2012 | 12:34 am
Now here’s an entrepreneurial story that’s perfectly brewed for Seattle.
Concordia Coffee Systems on Monday announced that it raised $6.5 million in fresh funding from Marker Hill Capital, Fluke Capital Partners, Swiftsure Capital and several Seattle angel investors, money that it will use to continue to develop and market its line of self-serve espresso machines.
Concordia, whose patented technology was originally developed by engineers at Acorto in the early 1990s, claims to have the fastest espresso machines in the world.
The Xpress 6, as one machine is called, can produce an 8-ounce mocha in 8.5 seconds. Or, as the company, noted at the time of the release a few years ago.
In the time it takes to toast a slice of bread the X6 can create seven 12 oz. drinks. For example you can create a mocha, a vanilla latte, a caramel latte, a nonfat latte, a chai latte, and 2 hot chocolates.
Meanwhile, the company’s IBS6, launched in Dubai in 2010, can create a “world-class” 16-ounce Mocha in 22 seconds flat. (You can see it in action here).
Partners of Concordia include Starbucks and Caribou Coffee, while customers include Hilton, MIT, Costco, Google, Aramark and others.
The company plans to use the new cash infusion for international expansion, with CEO David Isett saying that the goal is to “bring our outstanding coffee to the whole world.” As a result of the deal, Marker Hill Capital’s Robert Fanch will join the company’s board.
Seattle angel investors actually have scored in the past by bankrolling coffee makers. You may recall that Coffee Equipment Co., a Ballard upstart and maker of the Clover device, was purchased by Starbucks in 2008.
Going back further, Fluke Capital, an investor in Concordia, helped bankroll Starbucks.
Amazon Web Services is cutting prices … again. The company just announced a series of price reductions related to its S3 storage service, with Jeff Barr of AWS explaining the rationale in a blog post.
S3, which stands for Simple Storage Service, is used by companies to store everything from Web applications to digital content.
“With this price change, all Amazon S3 standard storage customers will see a significant reduction in their storage costs,” Barr writes. “For instance, if you store 50 TB of data on average you will see a 12% reduction in your storage costs, and if you store 500 TB of data on average you will see a 13.5% reduction in your storage costs.”
Amazon has reduced prices before for its services, part of an overall strategy by the Seattle company to pass savings back to customers on its popular set of cloud services.
The landscape for cloud services, including offerings from providers such as Microsoft and EMC, is getting all the more competitive. But Amazon has been able to hold on to a first-mover advantage, driven in part by its culture of razor thin retail-style profit margins.
As cloud services become more of a commodity, Amazon believes it can continue to compete on price.
“It might be useful for you to remember that an added advantage of using a cloud storage service such as Amazon S3 over using your own on-premise storage is that with cloud storage, the price reductions that we regularly roll out apply not only to any new storage that you might add but also to the existing storage that you have,” Barr notes. “This could amount to considerable financial savings for many of you.”
Traffic numbers provided by companies should always be questioned — I mean, of course each company is going to try to present the data in a way that makes them look as good as possible. Which is what New York Times finance writer Andrew Ross Sorkin has understandably done, going to town on Facebook for how it counts its active users in an article out tonight called “Those Millions On Facebook? Some May Not Actually Visit.”
His main criticism is that Facebook counts 845 million monthly active users and 483 million daily active users, but gets to these numbers by including people who click “Like” or take another action on the web or mobile devices — but don’t visit Facebook.com during that time. Because they’re not visiting the home site, where the ads are, he suggests Facebook might not be making as much money off of them.
First, I’ll look at what third party data says about actual Facebook on-site usage, then at the idea that these users not visiting the site is a problem, anyway.
The article cites Nielsen, a well-regarded web measurement firm, to draw a contrast with Facebook’s own numbers. The filing said the social network had 161 million monthly active users as of December. Nielsen said 153 million unique visitors in the same period. From there, Sorkin goes on to guess that this difference might be due to the Like button and other off-site Facebook usage: “Assuming that Facebook’s United States traffic accounts for only about 19 percent of its business, that means the numbers are off by at least 40 million users from the 845 million Facebook defines as “active.”
First, Nielsen is just one data source, which itself disagrees with the numbers provided by competitors. For example, direct rival comScore showed that Facebook.com actually had 162.5 million uniques in December. Nielsen and comScore use similar types of methodologies, which involve doing things like tracking a sample of internet users, and there’s no reason (that I know of) to think one is more right than the other in this case. So if Sorkin went by comScore’s numbers, he apparently would have guessed that Facebook was actually undercounting site usage.
Another point on the comparison. Both of these companies track “unique visitors,” which are standards units of measurement that they separately define for all sites they track. The measure is a rough equivalents to the active visitors that Facebook tracks to Facebook.com, but we don’t know that for sure.
But Sorkin does have a fair point in noting the differences between the results. There are probably some users, especially the all-important daily active users, who don’t actually visit places with Facebook ads every day. ComScore provides worldwide Facebook numbers, and it shows 794.3 million monthly uniques and 297.1 million daily uniques. That could indicate Facebook’s monthly numbers are high by a relatively small 50 million MAU but a huge 186 million difference in DAU versus daily uniques. But that point comes with its own qualification: comScore may not be able to track Facebook data equally in every country based on local factors, like lots of users getting on a single computer at an internet cafe.
And there are also comScore data points in Facebook’s favor on this issue. There average Facebook user worldwide spent 11.6 minutes on the site per visit and December… and get ready for the kicker: visited 32.6 times. So if you’re an investor and you were worried that lots of users were clicking Like but not going to the site very single day, comScore seems to be saying that, well, they are visiting the site multiple times on some days even if they’re not on at every point of the calendar. This means they’d still be seeing a bunch of ads.
But this is just comScore data, possibly as right or wrong as Nielsen’s.
There’s a bigger point to Sorkin’s article, which he sort of addresses, which second-guesses the premise. Likes are actually quite valuable in and of themselves, because Facebook can use them to target ads, and provide the data to developers so they can build products that use Facebook to customize user experiences. Likes and other actions also generate content in the news feed that in turn makes the site more engaging. It’s hard to know exactly how valuable all that targeting and engagement activity is.
But the Like buttons and other web-focused products are only part of what could be going on with Facebook’s web-wide play. It could turn on an ad network or a payments system that is available across the web at some point in the futre. These possibilities have been speculated about for many years now in tech circles, and Facebook has tried to avoid saying anything definitive. But the idea of an ad network for publishers — like, uh, AdSense, which Facebook chief operating officer helped build in her previous job at Google — seems pretty straightforward. Facebook could sell ad inventory on other sites on behalf of publishers, and give them a cut just like Google does with its Adsense publishers. And on the payments front, Facebook could expand its Credits payment system to the web as well. In fact, it already has in the form of games like FarmVille.com, Zynga’s web version of its Facebook game. That game relies on Facebook as the login credentials, so it counts as off-site, but it also monetizes via Credits, so Facebook still makes money.
All in all, it’s reasonable for Sorkin to question the original numbers, and he might have a point. But third party data indicates that it might not be a meanginful one. And as far as this relates to prospective stockholders, Facebook is already monetizing traffic on the web via targeting, and could have ad plans for the future that would make this discussion moot.
[Top image via NASA.]
One of the quieter scenes from a story in Western Gunfight magazine, illustrated by George Wilson. The high bid on this piece of original art stands at $1!
Boing Boing was a clue on Jeopardy! tonight. "Who was Steve Jobs?"
Source: Boing Boing | 6 Feb 2012 | 9:17 pm
On the same day Verizon and Redbox announced it had formed a partnership to create a new video streaming service, Redbox appeared a second time with another announcement. Redbox has agreed to purchase assets from NCR Corporation. NCR Corporation specializes in operating a range of self-service kiosks including Blockbuster Express.
The deal is worth up to $100 million. For its money, Redbox is getting DVD kiosks, DVD inventory and contracts with unspecified retail partners. Redbox’s parent company Coinstar will be obligated to purchase products and services from NCR once the transaction is finalized during the third quarter of 2012.
The obvious question here is what will happen to the Blockbuster Express kiosks. We’ve asked the folks at Blockbuster that very question and will update you when we learn more.
Read [Engadget]
Google is ready to star laying down fiber for the Google Fiber initiative. The company will soon start laying the backbone for the 1Gbps connection that it plans to bring to Kansa City, Kansas and Kansas City, Missouri.
The backbone is the first step to bringing fiber to both cities, Google needs to set up the main connection. Then the search giant can start connecting communities and homes to the network. Google has said that it wants to have the project completed in 2012, but there’s not set date for when it’ll be ready. Google will update the timeline as it starts building the backbone, but for now it just needs to start building.
Read [Google Fiber Blog] via [Electronista]
Mr Norton also added: "It was a pleasure collaborating with PRADA and LG, both Global brands with impeccable reputations for being the most innovative and respected in their fields."How nice of Mr Norton to write that sentence for the press release!
Johannes sez, "Cory was so kind to post my TEDxVienna talk on monochrom's feature film project SIERRA ZULU. I wanted to give you guys an update. Today we released a short film: EARTHMOVING. It's the prequel to SIERRA ZULU. We thought that's a good way to expand on the backstory and give the folks something to see while we are still working on getting the feature film financed and (hopefully) done. We have a bunch of great actors (e.g. Jeff Ricketts, who was part of Firefly or Star Trek: Enterprise) and our crew at Golden Girls Filmproduktion (Vienna) was absolutely wonderful."
Earthmoving: A Sierra Zulu Prequel
(Thanks, Johannes!)
Source: Boing Boing | 6 Feb 2012 | 7:05 pm
In the aftermath of the defeat of the Stop Online Piracy Act and Protect IP Act, a long list of organizations have sent a letter to Congress asking members to “take a breath” before they trying to push through new piracy legislation.
The letter argues that the “wide variety of important concerns” that were expressed during the SOPA/PIPA protests cannot be addressed through “hasty revisions” to the bills. Instead, there needs to be more research and transparent discussion about the broader issues:
Furthermore, Congress must determine the true extent of online infringement and, as importantly, the economic effects of that activity, from accurate and unbiased sources, and weigh them against the economic and social costs of new copyright legislation. Congress cannot simply accept industry estimates regarding economic and job implications of infringement given the Government Accountability Office’s clear finding in 2010 that previous statistics and quantitative studies on the subject have been unreliable.
Finally, any future debates concerning intellectual property law in regards to the Internet must avoid taking a narrow, single-industry perspective. Too often, Congress has focused exclusively on areas where some rights holders believe existing law is too weak, without also considering the ways in which existing policies have undermined free speech and innovation. Some examples include the year-long government seizure of a lawful music blog (dajaz1.com) and the shutdown by private litigation of a lawful startup video platform (veoh.com).
A number of Web companies signed off on the letter, including Asana, WordPress-maker Automattic, the Cheezburger Network, Mozilla, Reddit, and Twipic. So did startup investment firms Foundry Group, O’Reilly AlphaTech Ventures, and SV Angel. And lest this be portrayed as simply a battle between the tech and media industries, the letter was also signed by the American Library Association, Amnesty International, and OpenCongress.org (to pick three names at random).
[image via Flickr/Nancy Pelosi, story via TheVerge]
Mobile music discovery Android app, Rdio has just updated their app bringing in newly redesigned interface as well as some other nice features that will make you like the app even more. The updated Rdio Android app now offers more intuitive navigation using one-click access to its features. The updated also introduced enhancements to its key features such as collection, playlists, new releases, top charts, recommendations, and support for Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich’s new remote control client. The app also now gives you more social features and options for discovering new music. The new features of the Rdio Android app include – streamlined top-level navigation, convenient control, new releases, top charts, recommendations, enhanced search, synched collection and playlist views, user profiles, and the other features of the previous versions including activity, collection, heavy rotation, playlists, listening history, synching for offline access and other control settings for synching and streaming on Wi-Fi or 3G.
The updated Rdio app is available now as a free download from the Android Market for the US, Canada, Brazil, Germany, Australia and New Zealand markets. You need to have an unlimited subscription though to access Rdio on your Android devices though. The good news is that Rdio offers several subscription options depending on your music streaming needs. Pricing starts from as low as $4.99 monthly.
Via [PR Newswire]
I've always enjoying studying the original art for comic book pages, because it's fun to look at the washes, white-out marks, pen lines, blue pencil lines, erased pencil, and brush lines. You can learn a lot from them.
IDW's Artist's Editions (I've not seen a copy in person) print scans of original comic art pages, and judging from this video, they seem to go a long way in getting the look of original comic art pages. Here's the video for John Romita's Amazing Spider-Man Artist's Edition (above).
IDW proudly presents John Romita's The Amazing Spider-Man: Artist's Edition, collecting six complete stories by the great John Romita, arguably the definitive Spider-Man artist. Each page is scanned from the original art, same size as drawn, and in full color (in insure the best possible reproduction). This Artist's Edition measures 12 x 17 inches and each book is shipped in a custom cardboard box for maximum protection.I just found out that there are Wally Wood, Dave Stevens, Walter Simonson Artist's Editions. They are sold out, of course. You can buy copies on Amazon for hundreds of dollars. If you want the Romita one, I suggest you get hopping.
While appearing to be in black and white, each page was scanned in color to mimic as closely as possible the experience of viewing the actual original art—for instance, corrections, blue pencils, paste-overs, all the little nuances that make original art unique. Each page is printed the same size as drawn, and the paper selected is as close as possible to the original art board.
At CES, the AOL booth where we worked, did interviews, and ate lunch was just a few short feet from Samsung’s huge Galaxy Note booth, where they were giving out free shirts printed with your caricature, drawn, of course, on a Galaxy Note. There was a line around this thing the entire time we were there, scores of people waiting for hours for their free t-shirt.
Outside CES there were enormous banners in the most prominent and expensive ad spots on the convention center. Phone? Tablet? It’s Galaxy Note™!
And just yesterday, in a grandiose ad rather out of keeping with their well-done “next big thing” campaign, the Note was made out to be the end of all our troubles, ending the tyranny of using our fingers and letting us circle and cross out and all those things you wish you could do on your obviously-now-obsolete iPhone.
But I saw the Note at CES and formed my opinion in about five or six seconds: it’s weak. And that’s why this advertising blitz makes so much sense.
First, let me just justify my judgment. At CES, I was handed a Note at some trade event. I felt it, hefted it: weird size, not big enough to make shows and movies and games pop, not small enough to be considered compact in any way. I was handed the pen, and made a few squiggles and letters. It was, like almost all active stylus LCDs, slightly laggy, accurate up to a point, and generally unsatisfying. And I’m in favor of using a stylus. The rest of the details will be in our full review when we get one for that purpose (I won’t be writing it), but as far as I’m concerned, it’s a pointless device. But that’s not what this article is about.
The thing is all this advertising. It reminded me very much of movies recently where they don’t allow advance reviews, gag people who go to screenings, and saturate the airwaves with promotional material. In the case of the movie, it’s so people will form a resolution to see the movie before the critics start beating on it. And even then, that earlier drive to see it will often overcome bad reviews. Who among us hasn’t gone to a blockbuster regardless of reviews?
Samsung is doing the same thing with the Galaxy Note. Although of course the European version has already been reviewed, consumers at large are not aware of that and likely think it’s a different product. Samsung is carpet bombing the world with Galaxy Note advertising so that people will decide they want it before they find out that it’s not, in fact, a killer product. Sure, it might be great for a few people who were looking for this kind of thing. But like the Flyer, HTC’s stylus-enabled tablet of old, it fails to deliver on its own promise. The screen and stylus aren’t new or interesting technology, nor is the OS. And as for the size, well, Dell tried it. But again, the point is not the device itself, which I obviously don’t like, it’s the launch strategy.
Sure, other companies have big launches all the time. But this is the biggest delta that I’ve seen, I think, between the effort to promote and the real confidence in the device. I think they put all this weight behind the Note because if they didn’t, the thing would sink without a trace. This way they might sell a few. And there’s nothing wrong with that. But treating the consumer electronics world like the movie world and selling on hype alone isn’t likely going to be a winning proposition. Devices can’t succeed on spectacle, and the economics are totally different.
Samsung makes a lot of great things, but the Note is not one of those things. It’s an awkward experiment that they felt could only break even on if they promoted it so relentlessly that people would have to believe it was a big-deal device. It’s a troubling trend and marks another point on the trend of CE companies competing awkwardly on either personality or spec. Few CE companies have any personality, unfortunately, and spec-sells are at best misleading and at worst a pack of lies. Samsung has no personality, and the Galaxy Note’s specs aren’t really salable. So they’re in the awkward position of selling by sheer visibility.
At CES, the AOL booth where we worked, did interviews, and ate lunch was just a few short feet from Samsung’s huge Galaxy Note booth, where they were giving out free shirts printed with your caricature, drawn, of course, on a Galaxy Note. There was a line around this thing the entire time we were there, scores of people waiting for hours for their free t-shirt.
Outside CES there were enormous banners in the most prominent and expensive ad spots on the convention center. Phone? Tablet? It’s Galaxy Note™!
And just yesterday, in a grandiose ad rather out of keeping with their well-done “next big thing” campaign, the Note was made out to be the end of all our troubles, ending the tyranny of using our fingers and letting us circle and cross out and all those things you wish you could do on your obviously-now-obsolete iPhone.
But I saw the Note at CES and formed my opinion in about five or six seconds: it’s weak. And that’s why this advertising blitz makes so much sense.
First, let me just justify my judgment. At CES, I was handed a Note at some trade event. I felt it, hefted it: weird size, not big enough to make shows and movies and games pop, not small enough to be considered compact in any way. I was handed the pen, and made a few squiggles and letters. It was, like almost all active stylus LCDs, slightly laggy, accurate up to a point, and generally unsatisfying. And I’m in favor of using a stylus. The rest of the details will be in our full review when we get one for that purpose (I won’t be writing it), but as far as I’m concerned, it’s a pointless device. But that’s not what this article is about.
The thing is all this advertising. It reminded me very much of movies recently where they don’t allow advance reviews, gag people who go to screenings, and saturate the airwaves with promotional material. In the case of the movie, it’s so people will form a resolution to see the movie before the critics start beating on it. And even then, that earlier drive to see it will often overcome bad reviews. Who among us hasn’t gone to a blockbuster regardless of reviews?
Samsung is doing the same thing with the Galaxy Note. Although of course the European version has already been reviewed, consumers at large are not aware of that and likely think it’s a different product. Samsung is carpet bombing the world with Galaxy Note advertising so that people will decide they want it before they find out that it’s not, in fact, a killer product. Sure, it might be great for a few people who were looking for this kind of thing. But like the Flyer, HTC’s stylus-enabled tablet of old, it fails to deliver on its own promise. The screen and stylus aren’t new or interesting technology, nor is the OS. And as for the size, well, Dell tried it. But again, the point is not the device itself, which I obviously don’t like, it’s the launch strategy.
Sure, other companies have big launches all the time. But this is the biggest delta that I’ve seen, I think, between the effort to promote and the real confidence in the device. I think they put all this weight behind the Note because if they didn’t, the thing would sink without a trace. This way they might sell a few. And there’s nothing wrong with that. But treating the consumer electronics world like the movie world and selling on hype alone isn’t likely going to be a winning proposition. Devices can’t succeed on spectacle, and the economics are totally different.
Samsung makes a lot of great things, but the Note is not one of those things. It’s an awkward experiment that they felt could only break even on if they promoted it so relentlessly that people would have to believe it was a big-deal device. It’s a troubling trend and marks another point on the trend of CE companies competing awkwardly on either personality or spec. Few CE companies have any personality, unfortunately, and spec-sells are at best misleading and at worst a pack of lies. Samsung has no personality, and the Galaxy Note’s specs aren’t really salable. So they’re in the awkward position of selling by sheer visibility.
Samsung said on Monday that it had no part in creating an Israeli ad that shows one of its tablets disabling an Iranian nuclear facility.
“Samsung Electronics is aware of a recent news report in Iranian media regarding an advertisement aired by HOT cable network of Israel,” Samsung said in a statement to AllThingsD. “This advertisement was produced by HOT cable network without Samsung’s knowledge or participation.”
Iran is apparently none too happy about the ad, with lawmakers reportedly considering a ban on Samsung products, under the assumption that Samsung was responsible for the ad.
Samsung, however, was responsible for a poorly received Galaxy Note ad that aired during Sunday’s Super Bowl, with the Twittersphere not taking too well to either the spot or the device.
Here is the Israeli ad in question:
Dan R sez, "This corporate news piece from the opening of 'Spaceship Earth' has plenty to offer the casual to semi-rabid technology fan who is also partial to World's Fair-esque exhibits about the FUTURE! Great footage of 'Spaceship Earth's' exhibits abound, and the film also features other highlights of EPCOT, including Exxon's 'Universe of Energy,' replete with animatronic dinosaurs."
I got trapped on Spaceship Earth during opening month (it had been going down sporadically all day, resulting in heroic queues), just as we reached the top. After a long wait at the apex, we all got to walk down the stairs to get out. It was my first look backstage at a ride. It was seminal.
Chronicle News Update: EPCOT
(Thanks, Dan R!)
Source: Boing Boing | 6 Feb 2012 | 5:36 pm
Yelp built its ad business by attracting users that know what they want, just not who to buy it from — exactly when ads are most effective. That’s why I find today’s VentureBeat piece by Rocky Agrawal titled “Yelp advertising is a rip-off for small advertisers” to be ridiculous. His sources say Yelp charges a $600 CPM, or 1,000-times the standard online CPM rate.
Yes, these ads are expensive, especially for low-end restaurants. But for lawyers, dentists, jewelers, and mechanics with a high lifetime average revenue per customer, turning someone searching for their services on Yelp into a loyal customer is no rip-off, it can drive big ROI.
Yelp sits at the end of the purchase funnel in the demand fulfillment stage. Users often already have a need for a business’ services and are prepared to spend. They go to Yelp to determine which service provider will get their money. When a user searches for “dentists in San Francisco”, Yelp local ads let advertisers put their own search result with a link to their Yelp profile at the top of the results.
For restaurants, a conversion could bring in $20 to $50 in revenue, and that customer will eat somewhere else tomorrow where they could get hooked. For a high CPM to provide ROI, restaurants need lots of customers to be swayed by their ads and turn into regulars. Yelp local ads might not work for them.
However, for more expensive financial, medical, automotive, real estate, travel, home, and professional services, these stakes are much higher. A single visit from a customer could earn an advertisers hundreds of dollars, their long-term business could be worth thousands, and they’re unlikely to switch if satisfied. If their local ads on Yelp net them just a few or even 1 new customer, they could earn significant long-term ROI.
Agrawal compares Yelp ads to Facebook ads, which doesn’t make sense because Facebook users aren’t actively looking for the service the advertiser is selling. He also says Yelp is overcharging advertisers. It’s only overcharging if the ads don’t produce results, not just because they’re priced much higher than less-targeted display ads.
If you want proof that Yelp provides value to advertisers, just look at Yelp’s S-1 filing to go public. It notes the massive growth and return-customer rate for its local ads business:
from the quarter ended December 31, 2010 to the quarter ended December 31, 2011, the number of active local business accounts increased by 109% from approximately 11,300 to 23,700. Of the approximately 23,700 total active local business accounts for the quarter ended December 31, 2011, approximately 15,800, or approximately 67%, were existing advertisers from which we recognized local advertising revenue in the immediately preceding 12-month period. (Page 56)
Yelp had a 67% return advertiser rate, and that would have been much higher if it hadn’t DOUBLED its local advertiser count in that year. If Yelp ads are such a rip-off, why are advertisers coming back for more? Yelp can’t say because it’s in its pre-IPO quiet period. It shouldn’t need to, though. It charges justifiably high CPMs, and is going to IPO, because its ads appear at the perfect time. And they work.
In case black isn’t your preferred color of choice for the Samsung Galaxy Nexus, then you will be happy to know that the white variant of the Android 4.0 device is just a week away from launch. However, it is important to remind our readers that the white version will be available in the United Kingdom first, before hopefully making its way to the United States.
The front portion of the Galaxy Nexus will remain black, as depicted in the image above, but the back and sides of the device will turn white. We first learned that the Samsung Galaxy Nexus would launch eventually in the UK in white because of a prematurely published product listing by Clove. As always, however, it is nice to have official confirmation from the manufacturer itself.
Expect the white Galaxy Nexus to retail for the same price as the black model, which is currently available. Again, it will be available in retail stores in the United Kingdom starting February 13.
Via [Android Central]
AP - Phone company Verizon Communications Inc. will challenge Netflix and start a video streaming service this year with Redbox and its DVD rental kiosks.
I am, by many measures, a digital enthusiast. I write almost exclusively for online media as part of my job, and in my Twitter profile, cop to being a 140-character addict.
But during last night’s super-media-saturated Super Bowl, I somehow managed to ignore digital media.
This wasn’t intentional (and it was very unlike our previous Footballmer dual-liveblog extravaganza, during which I balanced a laptop with a smartphone with 3-D glasses). The original plan was to watch the game at home and simultaneously monitor my multiple feeds. During the pregame festivities, I even used Foursquare to gauge how many people had already checked into a Boston-themed bar in downtown Manhattan.
Then a friend called and urged me to join him at a neighborhood bar. I brought along a tablet, its interface dotted with Super Bowl-related apps, on which I could keep an eye on the online stream. My Twitter app was open on my smartphone, and I eagerly awaited the smart and sassy commentary from the Twitterverse.
But once the game started, something happened. I decided to actually watch the game on TV and converse with the people around me. My phone was at hand, of course, in the event that someone might call or email with news, but I didn’t check my many apps.
I also paid attention to the commercials — even the ones I’d already seen on the Internet — and listened for the reactions of my fellow viewers.
By the end of the night, I had tweeted exactly once.
Apparently, my digital defection put me in the vast minority: My AllThingsD colleague Peter Kafka reports that social media commentary last night increased sixfold from the previous year’s Super Bowl broadcast. There were so many tweets flying at the end of the game that a new record for simultaneous Twitter messages was set; in television ratings, Super Bowl XLVI turned out to be the most-watched program in TV, with 111.3 million viewers.
But last night — even without reading updates on Facebook or Twitter — I sensed that the Audi “Vampire Party” ad was likely a winner, that people liked the idea of a slingshot-bound baby snatching a bag of Doritos, and that the newest Go Daddy commercial didn’t exactly resonate. According to data from the CNBC/Collective Intellect Super Sunday Ad Tracker, Doritos ads captured 15.8 percent of all engaged consumers, and the Go Daddy ad was deemed “offensive.”
Anecdotally, people like dogs. Also, Ferris Bueller triggers nostalgia in some, even if they could care less about Honda’s CR-V. And all you need to do is talk to people to get a feel for this. According to Hulu, “The Bark Side” and “Matthew’s Day Off” were the most-liked ads of the game.
Some people thought Madonna’s half-time “Vogue”-ing was impressive; others felt it was arthritic. This was later supported by postgame social media analysis from Networked Insights. But everyone I saw was glued to it, nonetheless — TiVo says so, too.
I knew that Tom Brady’s performance would be a hot topic of discussion, and that New Yorkers were pumped about the Giants’ victory, not because of Facebook status updates, but because when I walked through midtown after the game ended, the whoops and cheers could be heard for blocks.
Fortunately, I was not bound by my job to liveblog, tweet, tumble, update, text, post, buzz, pin or ping about the the big game. (AllThingsD’s Ina Fried, however, did an excellent job of liveblogging the Super Bowl for us.)
I’m sure if, say, CNBC’s Darren Rovell said, “I decided not to report on the game and just watch instead!” his bosses might have a different reaction than mine would. Not only that, but a strong voice in the field of sports business reporting would be sorely missed.
I doubt mine was missed all that much last night.
Generally, I enjoy monitoring — and contributing to — Twitter feeds while I watch live TV. I used Twitter while I watched the most recent State of the Union address. I followed along while the news of Osama bin Laden’s death was unfolding. And I chimed in during last year’s Academy Awards and March Madness games. I think the people I follow on Twitter are some of the brightest in the biz, so to speak, and I usually glean some good insights by following their tweets.
Unaccountably, last night, I just didn’t. And it ended up being the same game it would have been if I had been engaged in social media. I’m wondering if I didn’t even have a bit more fun because I communicated face to face instead of reflexively checking my little screens.
Even though I immediately returned to the social media water cooler this morning, enjoying a social Super Bowl in the old-fashioned sense of the term seems a good reminder that we don’t always need to be connected to feel connected.
(Image credit: Rickshaw_Man) | Flickr
Rogers Canada via its official blog has just announced the coming of two new LTE devices, the Sierra Wireless AirCard330U model of the LTE Rocket stick and the Sierra Wireless AirCard 763S LTE Rocket mobile hotspot. Offering maximum theoretical speeds of up to 100 Mbps, these devices were said to be the first devices to support connectivity on both the 1700/2100 Mhz and the 2600 MHz spectrum on Rogers LTE network. Download speeds for this network is up to 40 Mbps as compared to 12-25 Mbps for devices on 1700/2100 MHz only. To make these two LTE devices even more worth-getting, Rogers will be extending its range of 4G HSPA+ mobile internet plans to LTE such as the Flex Rate plan for the Rocket stick and mobile hotspot. Pricing for these plans starts from $22.93 per month and Flex Rate plans for tablet beginning from $7.93 per month. Rogers will also continue offering the LTE Introductory Plan which costs $52.93 for 10 GB/month on a three-year term. For smartphones, Rogers will also be expanding its range of LTE-ready plans including Voice and Data plans starting from $52.97 per month and $25/500MB Data plan options that you can opt to be added on any voice plan. All the pricing options for these LTE devices and data plans will be available starting this week.
Via [RedBoard]
The University of Washington is spinning out a new startup company by the name of TransformativeMed which has developed a new way for physicians more effectively communicate about patients. The technology — currently in operation at more than a half dozen hospitals, including Harborview Medical Center, the University of Washington Medical Center and Sinai Grace Hospital– works with the hospital’s existing electronic medical record system.
The company — founded by Dr. Erik Van Eaton, assistant professor of surgery and critical care at the UW, and David Stone – said it plans to have more than 20 customers in its first year and achieve profitability.
Van Eaton came up with the idea and built an early prototype in 2003 as a first-year UW surgical intern, noting that he was frustrated by the inefficient way daily patient updates were prepared for residents and attending physicians making hospital rounds.
“It was clear at the time that we were going to need an electronic solution to manage what would become increasingly complex care-team transitions,” said Van Eaton in a press release. “The current process of paper, email and Excel simply wasn’t going to be efficient or safe.”
The company said that the majority of hospitals in the U.S. do not have an electronic system to manage how physicians sign-out and hand-off patients to one another, with many relying on paper-based systems or Excel spreadsheets.
Advisors to the company include Ken Myer, former CEO of the Washington Technology Industry Association, and Rob Arnold, CEO of Geospiza.
Long-time iPhone users, take note. If you have unlimited data, you want to read this: the company will throttle you for more than 2GB of usage in any given month. Do you feel better now about the thousands you've handed over to AT&T for the past several years?
Users are alerted to the throttling via text message. "Your data usage is among the top 5 percent of users. Data speeds for the rest of your bill cycle may be reduced", it reads.
In a phone call to AT&T customer service, BetaNews has confirmed that the nation's second biggest carrier considers 2GB-plus data customers in the "top 5 percent". The company warned of its plans in July of last year, but didn't enforce it until October 1. It now appears that what AT&T considers excessive has fallen dramatically from when the program started.
I can tell you this firsthand because my own data usage exceeded 2GB after that October 1 cutoff. In December, I used 3.1GB; in January 1.9GB. In neither month have I received any warning of throttling. So AT&T has made a change in what it considers "excessive".
Don't forget AT&T just introduced a 3GB plan for $30, the same price most long-time iPhone customers pay for their unlimited plans. But the AT&T representative we talked to pointed out a key difference, which is sure to piss off a lot of people. While that new customer is still cruising along at 3G speeds, paying the same price, your data is now slower than EDGE. There is no throttling for the 3GB plan, just overage charges when the data allotment is exceeded, the representative tells us.
That seems patently unfair. Unlimited data users -- including myself -- are getting ripped off.
iPhoneHacks illustrates this point in a recent post. It placed two phones side by side and performed a series of tests. While the unthrottled phone was able to download at speeds eclipsing 1Mbps, the throttled phone at times was downloading content at speeds of .06 Mbps. That sounds more like GPRS speeds to me!
The most key point in their findings? "For everyday applications like Maps and Safari, there was a stark difference between the load times. These apps were effectively unusable on the throttled connection". In other words, congratulations, your shiny new iPhone is all but a useless brick.
AT&T is screwing the customers that it has profited from most. At this point the company has made quite a bit of money on you, even with phone subsidies. And the claims that the top 5 percent use 12 times the data of the customer base at large is laughable.
If the new throttling point is 2GB, then that means the average iPhone user consumes a paltry 170.6MB of data. It is extremely hard to believe with the amount of data-hungry apps for iOS that a majority of users consume so little data.
What AT&T's super-agressive stance indicates is that the company wants you to ditch your unlimited plan. There's a benefit to this: if you continue to be a heavy data user, then you're gonna pay for it. This doesn't sit well with me, nor with others who have been loyal AT&T and iPhone customers.
"I don’t know what AT&T thinks they’re doing here", technologist and iPhone user John Cozen writes in his blog. He was throttled at 2.1GB. "I’ve experienced nothing but excellent service over the years up until this fiasco. I wonder how people are liking Verizon these days".
We're trying to get AT&T to comment on why unlimited data users are being handled in a manner different from other customers paying the same price, but have not heard back. If we do, we'll certainly update this story.
BetaNews is looking for reports from AT&T iPhone customers with unlimited data plans. If you have been throttled, please tell your story comments below. Also please include the amount of data you used during the month that throttling occurred.
Photo Credit: valdis torms/Shutterstock
The current Apple TV is a set-top box, so pundits are using the term iTV to denote a speculated Apple-branded HDTV. Photo: Jon Snyder/Wired.com
News and rumors suggest an Apple-branded HDTV is somewhere on the horizon, but it’s hard to differentiate hard evidence from hype.
A digital survey put out by Best Buy and leaked to The Verge this weekend asked customers to rate their interest in a $1,499, 42-inch, iOS-laden Apple HDTV. The survey listed a series of intriguing features: a 1080p LED display, iPad/iPhone remote control, and access to the App Store and the cloud, among other alluring specs.
OK, Apple rumors are one thing. In fact, they’re Digitimes‘ stock and trade. But since when has Best Buy, the nation’s most well-known electronics retailer, become a player in the Apple rumors game?
We asked, and Best Buy answered: “The customer survey was a routine offer effectiveness survey conducted by one of Best Buy’s research partners. Any brand reference was hypothetical. The survey is no longer available,” Best Buy told us in a statement.
Leaks are common. Some are planned, most are accidental. But the Best Buy survey could be just another example of a company that didn’t forsee how its actions might be perceived.
“I doubt that this is something that is an intentional hype,” said Sarah Rotman-Epps, a senior analyst with Forrester Research. More likely, Rotman-Epps said, Best Buy is trying to gauge consumer interest so that it can have a better idea how many units to order — if and when an iTV comes along.
Although speculation fueled by Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster recently had Apple contacting TV component makers in anticipation of an iTV launch, opinions vary greatly as to whether an Apple TV would actually hit the market this year. Best Buy’s comments indicate it is just thinking ahead to a hypothetical release.
“Apple is notoriously private about its product releases, and careful about its interaction with partners, like Best Buy,” said Rotman-Epps.
Best Buy's leaked survey. Image: The Verge
Guest Commentary: Microsoft makes the Kinect motion controller for Xbox 360, and for a while tried out a mobile phone named Kin. Kinbook makes a Facebook app that is intended to capture and organize family memories. Kinbook discovered Facebook’s overzealous position that it owns the -book suffix, so Kinbook changed its product name to Kinbox. It alleged that Microsoft’s branding of Kinect for the Xbox infringed the Kinbook/Kinbox trademark.
It’s hard to tell how successful the Kinbook app is. Microsoft says it had 14 active users in May 2011. Kinbook claims closer to 17,000. Either way, Kinbook is hardly setting the world on fire. The court explains:
“Kinbook credits the arrival of the Kinect for XBOX 360 and Microsoft’s accompanying marketing blitz with the poor start of its ‘Kinbox’ Facebook application”
Stop right there. How could that be true? Assuming for a moment that “Kinbox” and “Kinect for the Xbox” are so overlapping that they could confuse consumers (a proposition I don’t believe), wouldn’t Microsoft’s massive marketing blitz increase interest in Kinbox’s offerings? So this should have produced a tidal wave of folks looking for Kinbox. Even if some of those users suffer disappointed expectations (they came because they wanted something other than what Kinbook provided), those users will turn over but won’t affect the organic interest in Kinbook. Microsoft’s promotion could only help Kinbook. Passing the blame to Microsoft isn’t very credible.
Instead, the court finds the following:
It sounds like any alleged trademark troubles with Microsoft are just the tip of the iceberg. Instead of fixing those core issues with their business, they invested their valuable resources in court proceedings.
The court reaches the entirely sensible conclusion that there’s no likelihood of consumer confusion and tosses the claims. Among other reasons, the court points out multitudinous other users of the “kin” prefix:
“Kincafe,” an online social network for families to connect; “Kin Valley,” a secure online social network for the family; “Kinzin,” an online social publishing service to allow groups to privately share photos; “Kinnect.Us,” an online social networking service to stay connected with family and friends; “Kinector,” an online service to help users stay connected with relatives through a private web site where family can share information; “Connect 2 Kin,” an online service for families to stay in touch and share photos, share documents, schedule events, etc.; “Kindle,” an e-book reader with social networking capabilities; and many others.
The plaintiff admitted that none of these other examples were confusing. Yet, somehow Kinect for the Xbox was. Hmm.
Kinbook also tried to argue that Xbox appeals to 5 year olds, so they should be the paradigmatic “consumer” whose confusion is measured. The court mocks this argument:
No matter what else the ever-remarkable current-day precocious 5 year-old can accomplish, this Court cannot fathom a 5 year-old with either the faculties or the financial means to independently purchase a retail item costing hundreds of dollars. Second, even the hypothetical precocious 5 year-old dispatched by indulgent parents (or grandparents) to make her or his own selections of amusement would likely be able to distinguish between a free software application, and a $150 piece of gaming hardware.
This lawsuit has all the indicia of a small trademark owner trying to squeeze a big company for a nuisance settlement. After all, Microsoft spent $100M promoting Kinect; if Kinbook could get only a 5% taste of the action, that would still be quite tasty.
This ruling reminded me a little of the recent Fancaster ruling, which also involved a trademark plaintiff who hadn’t really invested much in building a business before running to court. In the Fancaster case, there was some evidence that Comcast may have muscled into the plaintiff’s sphere knowing the potential pitfalls, but there’s no hint of that on Microsoft’s part here (the case indicates that Kinbook didn’t show up in Microsoft’s trademark search).
Instead, I’m just left with the suspicion that the plaintiff thought that a low-merit trademark lawsuit would be a faster path to revenues than building a business. If that’s your idea of entrepreneurship, as a LOLcat might say, ur doin it wrong.
Kinbook LLC v. Microsoft Corp., 2012 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 8570 (E.D. Pa. Jan. 25, 2012)
Eric Goldman is an Associate Professor of Law and Director of the High Tech Law Institute at Santa Clara University School of Law. Before he became a full-time academic in 2002, he practiced Internet law for 8 years in the Silicon Valley. His research and teaching focuses on Internet, IP and marketing law topics, and he blogs on those topics at the Technology & Marketing Law Blog, where this post originally appeared.
It has been a very busy day at Coinstar. The Bellevue maker of coin-counting machines already announced a strategic partnership between its Redbox video rental business and Verizon.
Now, the company has released strong financial results for the fourth quarter along with the purchase of assets from NCR’s entertainment business. The asset purchase includes Blockbuster Express brand DVD rental kiosks, a business that NCR picked up from the original Blockbuster video rental chain.
Shares of the company jumped more than 16 percent in after hours trading. It now has a market value of $1.5 billion.
“Our strong finish in the fourth quarter capped a great year for Coinstar, including revenue over $1.8 billion, diluted EPS of $3.61 per share and free cash flow over $227 million,” said Paul Davis, chief executive officer of Coinstar. ”The strength of our core businesses provides a solid foundation that enables us to focus on key growth initiatives in 2012, including our joint venture with Verizon that was announced earlier today.”
Revenue for the fourth quarter increased 33 percent to $520.5 million, with Redbox revenue growing 39.5 percent to $445.6 million. New kiosk installations and consumer acceptance of price increase from $1 to $1.20 for Redbox rentals fueled the growth. The traditional coin-counting business grew by 4.8 percent.
J. Scott Di Valerio, Coinstar’s chief financial officer, told the Associated Press that the company picked up Netflix customers during the quarter. Netflix lost 2.8 million DVD customers during the past quarter.
The purchase of the NCR assets includes “DVD kiosks, certain retailer contracts, and DVD inventory from NCR’s entertainment line of business,” the company said.
Redbox has more than 29,000 kiosks nationwide.
More from Vitals:
There have been whispers in the past of augmented reality goggles or glasses, but generally we have been able to dismiss them as exaggerations or concepts. The technology, while it isn’t unrealistic, simply isn’t quite there yet.
Apparently that hasn’t stopped Google: a new report is appearing corroborating earlier ones that they are working on a pair of augmented reality glasses. They’d piggyback on your phone’s connection and overlay information like directions, news, and so on.
Whether you think it’s a good idea or not, this kind of thing is going to come eventually, so it’s natural that Google would want to start girding itself for the approaching augmented glasses wars of 20XX.
The 9 to 5 Google report says they look something like a pair of athletic glasses, with a forward-facing camera and flash. The augmented reality bit is actually not a transparent display over one or both eyes, but a single opaque display on the side of one eyepiece (which eyepiece, and which side, were not specified). You operate it with voice or by moving your head around to navigate or select menu options.
Yes, not exactly the future we were expecting. I guarantee these things don’t look cool, either. But like I said, the technology isn’t there yet: cameras and processors aren’t small or fast enough, batteries can’t provide enough power, displays aren’t built for them, and computer vision isn’t good enough. Some of these things Google can work on, some they can’t. But the best way to have a product ready when the tech is there is to try to build one when the tech isn’t.
The glasses are apparently nowhere near done, unsurprisingly, and Google isn’t sure how to make anything out of them. A pilot program could be in the works, or it could continue to be an underground project, metamorphosing again and again until the market is ready. As it is, these things would be weird, expensive, and not particularly useful. In a couple years, though, who knows?
There have been whispers in the past of augmented reality goggles or glasses, but generally we have been able to dismiss them as exaggerations or concepts. The technology, while it isn’t unrealistic, simply isn’t quite there yet.
Apparently that hasn’t stopped Google: a new report is appearing corroborating earlier ones that they are working on a pair of augmented reality glasses. They’d piggyback on your phone’s connection and overlay information like directions, news, and so on.
Whether you think it’s a good idea or not, this kind of thing is going to come eventually, so it’s natural that Google would want to start girding itself for the approaching augmented glasses wars of 20XX.
The 9 to 5 Google report says they look something like a pair of athletic glasses, with a forward-facing camera and flash. The augmented reality bit is actually not a transparent display over one or both eyes, but a single opaque display on the side of one eyepiece (which eyepiece, and which side, were not specified). You operate it with voice or by moving your head around to navigate or select menu options.
Yes, not exactly the future we were expecting. I guarantee these things don’t look cool, either. But like I said, the technology isn’t there yet: cameras and processors aren’t small or fast enough, batteries can’t provide enough power, displays aren’t built for them, and computer vision isn’t good enough. Some of these things Google can work on, some they can’t. But the best way to have a product ready when the tech is there is to try to build one when the tech isn’t.
The glasses are apparently nowhere near done, unsurprisingly, and Google isn’t sure how to make anything out of them. A pilot program could be in the works, or it could continue to be an underground project, metamorphosing again and again until the market is ready. As it is, these things would be weird, expensive, and not particularly useful. In a couple years, though, who knows?
[Video Link] "Camden council in north London have recently installed this talking camera that issues threats to residents at Walker House."
Source: Boing Boing | 6 Feb 2012 | 4:25 pm
Motorola Mobility Holdings Inc. asked Apple Inc. to pay a potential royalty of 2.25 percent of sales for some iPhones and iPads last year, representing possibly billions of dollars in licensing fees.
In a letter filed in a California court last month, a lawyer said Motorola, which is being acquired by Google Inc., had “demanded” the royalty for a license of its patents.
Read the rest of this post on the original site »
Recently a rumor popped up that Nokia was lining up a quick successor to the Lumia 900 in the form of the Lumia 910. Now Nokia has come out and said that no such device is in the works.
The Lumia 910 was said to be similar to the Lumia 900 with a 12MP camera on the back, as opposed to the 900′s 8MP camera. Now there should be no fear that the Lumia 900 will be quickly outdated by Nokia, an idea that fits with Microsoft’s idea of quality over quantity. Windows Phone still runs on single core CPUs with 800×480 screens, it doesn’t make much sense to start warring over megapixels when Android can beat pretty much every spec. Instead the idea is to focus on creating a great experience, one that looks different than Android and iOS and builds in a lot of social network connections.
Of course the news is sad from a smartphone photographer’s point of view, but I find this to be great news. I was already contemplating picking up the Lumia 900, but the idea of a new, slightly better version coming out within just a few weeks made worried. The same sort of feeling, I’d imagine that Droid RAZR owners felt when the RAZR MAXX was announced. For Windows Phone, there’s the looming Apollo update which could make for better phones, but that won’t be out for a few months.
Read [The Next Web]
Duane Hoffman/msnbc.com
More than 250 million photos are uploaded each day on Facebook, according to the social network's media site. And in case you hadn't noticed, "sharing pictures is one of the most popular activities on Facebook." So, not surprisingly, Facebook etiquette about photos is a common complaint among users.
Whether to limit who can tag you in an image, or if pics of other peoples' kids should be shared at all, are often topics of controversy. Most egregious, however, are those embarrassing photos — purposely posted by your so-called "friends," or pics you posted and later regretted. Whether drunk, foolish or flirting with someone you shouldn't be, your appearance in such pics can lead to all manner of awkward situations, including, as we continue to see in the news, getting Facebook fired, or not even hired in the first place.
The best course of action in such situations seems to be obvious — delete these photos from the social network as soon as possible, whenever possible. But as Ars Technica reports, the photos you delete may still exist via direct links to the image, even years after you thought you removed the photo from your profile.
On Monday, Facebook confirmed to Technolog that the social network does have photos in its system that users believe to be deleted. Instead, these images live on, hiding out on content delivery networks which store copies of network data.
"Approximately 2 percent of users' photos are being stored in an older system that was not properly deleting (these images) after a user deleted the photo on the site," Facebook spokesperson Fred Wolens said.
How many photos is that? In September 2011, Facebook had more than 140 billion photos, making it 10,000 times larger than the photo catalog in the Library of Congress. So that's nearly 3 billion photos stored on that hinky, hoarding system — though who knows how many are supposed to be deleted, let alone how many feature the drunk and/or otherwise humiliated among us?
At any rate, said Wolens, "We are in the process of migrating these photos to the newer system to ensure proper deletion, but until this migration is complete (ETA four to eight weeks) CDN URLs from deleted photos stored on this legacy system may still be accessible."
Ars Technica first reported Facebook's problems with photo retention in 2009, and at the time was told by a Facebook spokesperson something similar — that the social network was "working with our content delivery network (CDN) partner to significantly reduce the amount of time that backup copies persist."
Follow-ups stories by Ars Technica 2010, and again on Sunday reported that images believed to be deleted by readers as far back as 2008 still exist via direct links on Facebook.
More on the annoying way we live now:
Helen A.S. Popkin goes blah blah blah about privacy and then asks her to join her on Twitter and/or Facebook. Also, Google+. Because that's how she rolls.
I had missed this sad news, but Dick Tufeld, the man who gave Robby the Robot his voice on Lost In Space, died last month. He was 85. Along with his famous catchphrase "Danger, Will Robinson!" and the intro to Lost In Space, Tufield's voice was also heard at the beginning of "Voyage To The Bottom of the Sea."
To say that RIM has had a tough time these past few months is an understatement, and today’s news probably won’t help raise the morale around Waterloo. According to AppleInsider, oilfield services giant Halliburton will soon be migrating their BlackBerry-toting workforce to run exclusively on a new fleet of iPhones.
I can also imagine the conversation now. “Sorry RIM, it’s not you, it’s us… alright, fine, it really is you.”
The news was sent out via an internal newsletter, which mentions that the reason for the switch was because the company “determined that the iOS platform offered the best capabilities, controls and security for application development.” It goes on to offer a basic timeline for the process — all 4,500 of Halliburton’s employee-operating BlackBerrys will be swapped for iPhones over the course of the next two years.
So what does this development mean for RIM? Not much at all, if Halliburton was the only company to jump ship. It’s clear that they’re not the only ones in search of some greener pastures — Apple CFO Peter Oppenheimer pointed out during the company’s Q1 2012 earnings call that nearly all of the top Fortune 500 companies “now approve and support iPhones on their networks,” including Credit Suisse, Kimberly Clark, St. Jude Medical, and Nike.
Of course, that hardly means that all or even most of them will transition their workforce from one platform to the other. Still, it clearly shows that these companies are considering different, more compelling mobile options to help conduct their business. And with the first BlackBerry 10 device not slated to ship until much later this year, RIM may not have too many chances left to show off what they’re really capable of.
In the meantime, RIM continues to illustrate how serious they are about the enterprise market with the launch of initiatives like BlackBerry Cloud Services, which allows businesses using Microsoft Office 365 more fine-grained control over devices and their data. It’s clear that RIM isn’t going to give up their hard-won enterprise segment without a fight, but if their recently leaked roadmap is any indication, they’re running awfully low on bullets right now.
Cloud software concern Salesforce.com reports earnings later this month, and analysts are starting to try to get an idea of how its quarterly results are going to look. Karl Keirstead of BMO Capital Markets checked in with a handful of sources; what he found and wrote in a note to clients today is that things look pretty good.
One highlight, Keirstead writes, appears to be Salesforce’s Service Cloud, the service that companies use to track customer complaints on the Web and social media sites. Meanwhile, the average size of deals is climbing as large companies are buying incrementally more expensive versions of different Salesforce products.
And even though Salesforce missed on billings last quarter, prompting a nasty selloff of its shares the next day, Keirstead is unconvinced that was called for. “While the bear case is rooted in a view that the modest October quarter billings miss was a harbinger of slowing momentum, we just don’t see it,” he wrote. One source told him that Salesforce’s reps pushed the social products like Chatter a little harder to the detriment of other core products.
He expects Salesforce to make up for that billings miss this time around: He looks for unbilled backlog to grow 40 percent to $2.1 billion and for operating cash flow to grow by 20 percent, which is good, but still below the previously forecast range. All things considered, Salesforce, he says, may be undervalued. It’s currently trading at less than six times projected sales in fiscal 2013. He rates it with an “outperform,” and gives it a $150 price target.
Still, "a growing number of sub-$250 device offerings, based on the Android operating system, have allowed Google's hardware partners to grow smartphone volumes and expand the market concurrently," said Kevin Restivo, senior research analyst with IDC's Worldwide Mobile Phone Tracker program.
Here's a snapshot of how each brand (aka "vendor") did in the fourth quarter of 2011:
Overall, the worldwide smartphone market grew 54.7 percent year over year in the last quarter, IDC said. Vendors shipped 157.8 million smartphones, compared to 102 million in the last quarter of 2010. While that growth didn't match 2010's year-over-year spurt of 75.7 percent, IDC "still fully expects continued double-digit growth for the foreseeable future."
Related stories:
Check out Technolog, Gadgetbox, Digital Life and In-Game on Facebook, and on Twitter, follow Suzanne Choney.
We’ve all been in a situation when we’re walking around in public with our eyes glued to our smartphones. We have to keep looking up whenever we do this because there’s always the risk of running into someone or something while our attention is diverted. That’s where a new app called Transparent Screen comes in. Transparent Screen uses the rear camera on an Android phone to provide a window into the real world while allowing you to use your phone as normal.
Transparent Screen is free, but there’s another version with no ads for $0.99. The app lets you adjust the transparency of your screen with a simple slider. You can also increase the screen’s resolution at will.
It may all sound like a sweet deal, but Transparent Screen needs a lot of resources to function. It’s a guaranteed battery eater. You may also experience problems with lag even if you’re using a fairly modern phone.
It’s worth checking out just to see how well the app works for you. Use it sparingly though.
Download Link [Android Market]
Today, Microsoft Store started taking pre-orders for the Lumia 900, Nokia's flagship Windows Phone. There's a $25 reservere for the handset, which, according to my local shop will be available some time in March. Microsoft Store had no official launch date to give.
My question: Will you buy the Lumia 900? Nobody is saying how much the smartphone will cost. That $25 is blind faith the final price will be reasonable enough. Who knows? Given Microsoft's and its partners' marketing commitment, the faithful might see a serious discount for their leap to pre-order. Will you be among them? You can answer the question(s) and give your reasons why or why not in comments below and answer the poll below. Lumia 900 will be available in the United States on AT&T.
What will you get for your 25 bucks plus additional unnamed amount: 1.4GHz Qualcomm APQ8055 processor; 4.3-inch AMOLED display (yes, it's Corning Gorilla Glass), with 800 x 480 resolution; 512MB RAM; 16GB storage: 8-megapixel rear-facing camera with Carl Zeiss lens and dual-LED flash; 1MP front-facing camera; 720p video capture from rear camera and VGA from front camera; GSM 850/900/1800/1900 radio; WCDMA 850/900/1900/2100 radio; 4G LTE; Bluetooth 2.1+EDR; Stereo Bluetooth; WiFi; accelerometer; ambient and proximity sensors; gyroscope; 2 microphones; 1830 mAh battery; Internet Explorer 9 mobile; and Windows Phone 7.5 "Mango" Commercial Release 2.
Any device only needs as much hardware as necessary for your needs and to give operating system and applications ample performance. I say that in qualification before observing how much more is available on many Androids and even iPhone 4S. The Androids are bitchin': All LTE phones currently available from AT&T or Verizon have dual-core processors, more RAM and typically better screen resolution or video capture than Nokia Lumia 900. What they don't have is Windows Phone 7.5 CR2.
A suggestion to Microsoft and Nokia: As part of your launch promotion kitty, put aside some money to pay the carrier subsidy. In other words, make every person who wants Lumia 900 eligible to get one, regardless of where they are in their contract, during, say, the first 30 days of availability. Hey, it's just a suggestion.
Is this the Windows Phone you have been waiting for? Scratch that. Is this the smartphone you've been waiting for?
Microsoft Store is taking pre-orders for Nokia Lumia 900. Will you buy this Windows Phone?
Because I am an obessive-compulsive and Facebook is my new target of stalkery, I have re-read its IPO filing from earlier this week about nine times so far.
It’s chock full of interesting little bits of tasty info about the Silicon Valley social networking giant that I plan to shine a little more light on this week.
First up is not exactly a news flash: Besides graphic artists, VCs also clean up in the public offering docs.
But I am not talking about the variety of venture firms with their fingers in Facebook, which run the gamut from Accel Partners to DST Global and more.
I am talking about individual wins for venture capitalists, most especially Accel’s Jim Breyer and Marc Andreessen of Andreessen Horowitz.
According to the filing, while Accel holds almost 190 million shares, Breyer himself holds 11.7 million shares personally in the “James W. Breyer 2005 Trust dated March 25, 2005.”
Depending on what Facebook’s valuation turns out to be, based on current estimates, that hovers around $300 million. One caveat, according to the filing, is that 10.4 million of those shares — which are currently Class B stock and will be converted to Class A stock — are “subject to a voting agreement in favor of Mr. Zuckerberg.” That would be CEO and co-founder Mark Zuckerberg, who controls the company via such arrangements.
Not so the shares of super-VC Marc Andreessen, whose firm holds 3.6 million shares. But he himself has 5.2 million restricted stock units, presumably for board service and other advisory duties to Facebook. That’s a possible $125 million or more windfall.
Other board members have also gotten RSUs, but not in that large an amount. Washington Post head Don Graham holds one million of them, while Washington, D.C. political vet Erskine Bowles and Netflix’s Reed Hastings each clock in at only 20,000 each.
That’s a big delta, of course, which means it’s good times for VCs in Silicon Valley, both professionally and personally.
HTC Corp., the giant Tawain-based smartphone maker that maintains its North American operations in the Seattle area, said Monday that revenue may drop as much as 36 percent in the first quarter as it continues face challenges from Samsung and Apple. Sales are now expected in the range of $2.2 billion to $2.37 billion.
Reuters reports that the problems are expected to be “short-term” in nature since HTC is gearing up to release several new smartphone models, including four devices at the Barcelona Mobile World Congress this month.
Last month, HTC said that profits declined for the first time in more than two years as net income fell 26 percent to $364 million.
Here’s a look at what’s happening in the smartphone market:
On Friday, Dec. 2 at Seattle Children’s Hospital, 11-year-old Braydon Hutchison was crying. It wasn’t because of his leukemia, which kept him quarantined, or the nausea and vomiting that had made him sick all day. A musician he’d never met was playing a concert across town in his honor, calling out his name to the crowd. Braydon could see the live stream on his laptop from his hospital bed, and it finally moved him to tears.
It was the best thing that ever happened to him in the hospital, Braydon said later. “It made me feel really good.”
The musician was local artist Levi Ware. The concert was the work of the Melodic Caring Project, a nonprofit startup Ware and his wife, Stephanie, founded last year with the mission of using music and technology to help kids heal.
“I’ve always felt music was for more than entertaining,” said Ware, 35. “Now, finally, with this coming together, it’s like, ‘Wow — this is really our purpose.’”
The idea for Melodic Caring Project grew out of an August 2010 benefit concert Ware and other artists performed in Mount Vernon for Kaydee Curbow, a then 11-year-old Burlington girl who was battling leukemia. Treatment for the disease can leave the immune system susceptible to infection. So Kaydee, a student of a Bayview Elementary teacher who is one of Ware’s friends, could not leave the hospital.
“We thought, ‘It’s great to do this in Mt. Vernon, but we want her to know people care, so how can we make her a part of it?’” Ware said.
Ware set up a camera at the venue and told Kaydee’s family how to access the concert via UStream. She and her mother, Patti, watched from her hospital room as people she’d never met came together in her honor.
“We called her afterward, and she was so happy,” Ware said. “That’s how Melodic Care Project was born.”
The Wares put on three more shows for Kaydee, including an emotional homecoming concert, that helped her family raise more than $5,000 for medical expenses.
At the end of the year, Levi and Stephanie made a big decision. Levi quit his day job in construction, and Stephanie quit hers in accounting, so the couple could devote themselves full time to cultivating an idea they said already feels bigger than they are. They’re starting small, but with partnerships with the Seattle Living Room Shows and the Fremont Abbey Arts Center about to kick off, they’re looking forward to helping more and bigger acts break hospitalized kids’ isolation and give them a meaningful experience.
“The staff, the nurses would come in and and watch it and say, ‘How cool that they’re doing this for you,’” Patti Curbow, Kaydee’s mom, said about her daughter’s streamed concerts. “I hope [Levi Ware] does really well with this, just because of how it’s made us feel. You can tell his heart is totally into it. He wants to help people. He wants to make the crazy go away for a while.”
The Wares want to keep their service free to patients, and free to the hospital. So to make the project sustainable, they know, they have some work to do. Most costs so far they’ve paid out of pocket, and the Dec. 2 concert — the project’s first after the Wares’ shows for Kaydee — relied on a volunteer cameraman who used his own equipment.
Their first step is to launch an online community fundraising campaign on Kickstarter or PledgeMusic in the coming weeks. Also on the to-do list: apply for grants, scout for corporate sponsorships and host fundraisers for the nonprofit. The first fundraiser, a combination benefit that will double as a live streamed show to hospitalized kids, is scheduled for March 29.
The Wares have met one early goal to collaborate with local performance series so visiting artists can easily plug in with kids as they play. Another is to partner with hospitals that can connect artists with patients.
To set up the Dec. 2 show at Seattle Children’s, the Wares approached David Knott MT-BC, the hospital’s resident music therapist. Intrigued by the idea, Knott introduced the Wares to three young patients — including Braydon — whom he’d deemed to be “music identified,” meaning that they respond to music in ways that help them deal with pain.
When the patients’ families agreed to take part in the concert, they were told the appointed time to tune their laptops or tablets to the project’s UStream channel for the show. Ware, who was performing live at the non-profit Q Cafe just south of the Ballard Bridge, told the crowd that night that the concert was dedicated to three special fans at Seattle Children’s.
He referenced the kids by name throughout his set while Stephanie chatted with them and their families on UStream, occasionally stepping up to the mic to share a comment or question. One of the children, the Wares later learned, could not participate due to last-minute treatment. The other, a little girl, spent part of the concert dancing with her nurses.
Renae Knowles, Braydon’s mom, watched with her son in his hospital room. Braydon had played guitar on and off for four years. He’s been practicing daily in his new room at Seattle Ronald McDonald House since the concert, Knowles said.
“Once we streamed in, it took his mind off the bad stuff that was going on, how [Ware] called his name several times and called them rock stars,” she said. “It touched his soul that strangers would be willing to do this for someone they didn’t know.”
Knott said he “applauded” the concert and looked forward to helping the project put on more.
“We’ve seen really remarkable ways music can make a difference for people,” Knott said. “Having a personal concert made for them — that’s a pretty big deal. They’ve found way to use technology to break the isolation.”
The field of music therapy struggles to quantify the benefits its practitioners see in the patients they treat. One of the most important, Knott said, is hope. When Braydon met Levi Ware weeks after the concert, he told him the experience made him want to “fight even harder” to recover his health.
Hearing that made the Wares double sure that what they’re doing is worth it.
“It’s not about the musicians. It’s about the kids,” Levi Ware said. “What’s the point of all this wonderful technology if you don’t do something good with it?”
The Melodic Caring Project will stream its next show March 10 with tourist artists at the Seattle Living Room Shows. Its next show, March 29 at the Fremont Arts Abbey, will double as a project fundraiser. Both shows will stream to patients at Seattle Children’s and a new partner, PeaceHealth St. John Medical Center.
Mónica Guzmán is a community strategist in startups and media and a digital life columnist for GeekWire. On every day except Sunday, you can find her tweeting away at @moniguzman, subscribe to her public Facebook posts at facebook.com/moniguzman or reach her via email. See a list of her clients on her website. Also see this archive of her weekly GeekWire columns.
The user-generated media site Wikia has been profitable for three years and grew traffic 42 percent last year to 47.6 million global unique visitors.
Part of Wikia's extensive interactive map of the Skyrim game
Wikia’s traffic in the gaming category is second only to IGN, with comprehensive and constantly updated databases about games like Skyrim.The new Wikia management didn’t have much to do with that — CEO Craig Palmer and other execs only joined at the end of last year. But they’re trying to channel the momentum.
Palmer said he thinks the next step for the company is to get better brand recognition, as its content is currently spread across more than 200,000 wikis.
“Our readers get siloed,” Palmer said. “People don’t know the brand except for those who edit.” And the editors are a small minority.
Hilary Goldstein, a 10-year editorial veteran of IGN, also recently joined Wikia to manage its gaming category. His industry relationships will help Wikia’s top contributors get early access to new games.
Goldstein said he thinks Wikia’s ever-evolving wikis are a far better source of information for gamers than the static, single-author articles found in traditional gaming media.
Palmer said he is also overseeing a plan to create content hubs and direct visitors to related programming. He described it as similar to YouTube’s new “channels” strategy — though Wikia’s volunteer writers would still be unpaid. Another direction for development is mobile, where Wikia content could serve as a “second screen” while a user plays a game.
Palmer and Goldstein stopped by our office last week to give their pitch on the promise of “collaborative media.” Here’s a video interview:
Source: AllThingsD | 6 Feb 2012 | 2:00 pm
All those analysts predicting Windows Phone as No. 2 smartphone OS in 2015, lifted by Nokia magic, need a reality check. Put away the crystal balls and peer into the present. Today, IDC released fourth-quarter smartphone shipment data, whoa, is the data chart scary.
Shocker is Nokia's smartphone death spiral, which no Windows Phone has yet lifted. The once mighty Finnish handset maker ended the quarter with 12.4 percent market share, down from 27.6 percent, and plunging from first place a year earlier to fourth at end of 2011. This is the same quarter Nokia launched its first Windows Phones, the Lumia 710 and 800. Right now, looks like Windows Phone can't save Nokia, which cuts the other way, too: Nokia can't save Windows Phone.
Apple and Samsung were the big beneficiaries of Nokia's nose dive. IDC's data affirms Strategy Analytics findings from late last month: Apple and Samsung ended fourth quarter in near smartphone shipments photo finish. iPhone did better -- 37 million units to Samsung's 36 million. Both vendors saw huge year-over-year gains.
Samsung's shipments rose 275 percent year over year, going from fourth to second ranking -- market share rise from 9.4 percent to 22.8 percent. That's better than Apple, which was no slouch. Shipments grew 128.4 percent, with share rising to 23.5 percent from 15.9 percent. By comparison, Nokia's share fell 30.6 percent -- or nearly three times the other laggard. Research in Motion share fell 11 percent to 8.2 percent from 14.3 percent.
Apple and Samsung largely split the smartphone market's largest portion, shipping 73 million of the quarter's 157.8 million units.
"The launch of Apple's iPhone 4S played a key role in smartphone growth to capture pent-up demand, and smartphone launches from other vendors also provided a broad selection to meet varying preferences and budgets", Ramon Llamas, IDC senior research analyst, says. The majority of "launches from other vendors" were Androids.
"So-called 'hero' devices, such as Samsung's Galaxy Nexus and Apple's iPhone 4S, garner the bulk of the attention heaped on the device type", Kevin Restivo, IDC senior research analyst, says. "But a growing number of sub-$250 device offerings, based on the Android operating system, have allowed Google's hardware partners to grow smartphone volumes and expand the market concurrently". No Android partner benefitted more than the aforementioned Samsung.
Fourth-quarter smartphone shipments exceeded IDC's growth forecast of 40 percent, rising 54.7 percent year over year. "By the end of the quarter, one out of every three mobiles phones shipped worldwide was a smartphone", Llamas says.
For all 2011, smartphone shipments rose 61.3 percent to 491.4 million units from 304.7 million than a year earlier. While growth exceeded IDC's forecast (54.7 percent), it fell below 2010's year-over-year growth (75.7 percent).
While the smartphone market grows gangbusters, Nokia is the biggest loser -- and Windows Phone along with it. If Lumia's launch quarter is any indication, the road back, if there is one for manufacturer or operating system, will be long and arduous. One year ago this week, Microsoft and Nokia announced a sweeping distribution deal where Windows Phone replaces Symbian as primary operating system. So far, the Windows Phone transition is killing Nokia, not that it had a workable smartphone strategy before.
Microsoft has committed $1 billion annually in payments to Nokia, as part of the agreement. The return on that investment is what? Coincidentally, today, Microsoft Store started taking pre-orders for the Nokia Lumia 900; there's a $25 reserve. That handset's success or failure may answer the question, or at least foreshadow it.
You may not have noticed, but a bogus Instagram for Android app recently appeared in the Android Market. The fake Instagram app played on the desires of Android users to finally have access to one of the most popular apps on iOS. Unfortunately, it turns out this app did nothing but fill phones with malware.
We’re mentioning the fake Instagram app because In Flex We Trust received a notification to download Instagram for Android on their Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1. However, the Android Market link to the Instagram app didn’t work. This leads us to believe there’s a possibility Samsung was suckered into believing the fake app was legit as well.
The bogus Instagram app apparently made users give it a five-star rating before they could use it. As a result, the app received a high rating before it was removed from the Android Market.
Read [AndroidGuys] Also Read [In Flex We Trust]
Deep in the skunk works of its Research and Labs divisions, secreted around the Seattle area, Microsoft is working on totally reinventing the way people interact with their computers. Very little is out in the open or in more than a prototype form, but the work is unquestionably being done.
Last week it transpired that Microsoft is working on building Kinect into the bezels of laptops, and after that, presumably, tablets and eventually mobile phones. But it’s not just about building out the install base for Dance Central 3. It’s enabling the next generation of awareness in our electronics. The iPhone ushered in an era where our devices know when we touch them. Microsoft is working on the next one, in which our devices will simply know us.
How do you, as a person, experience the world around you? You mostly see and hear, and to a lesser extent you touch, taste, smell. Our devices, however, are largely restricted to an extremely limited sense of touch. Why shouldn’t they be more like us?
There’s a good reason, actually: computers don’t need to be like people because computers aren’t people. For years this has held true: the computer’s primary purpose for decades was to sit still and perform calculations humans couldn’t do. Interaction with a computer was strictly input, output. You didn’t interact so much as instruct, and wait for the result.
But mobile phones and touchscreens and laptops began changing the idea of a computer into something more personal, more interactive, more two-way. And technology exists to let our devices become more human. Why not let them?
Microsoft wants to. Despite their reputation among tech enthusiasts as a sort of stodgy blue-chip still coasting on the PC explosion of the late 90s and early 2000s, their R&D sections are world-class and put out actually innovative ideas and devices all the time. The trouble, briefly stated, is that implementing these ideas as products that fit into the Microsoft ecosystem isn’t easy, and even if it were, Microsoft has no talent for it.
But this work on “Natural User Interaction,” or NUI, is more promising. People have embraced the idea in gaming: the Wii led the way and the Kinect brought the future into your living room, though the future is a little laggy and the voice controls spotty. People are simply interested in new ways of interacting with their content and devices. For years the promise of a different kind of interaction has been dangling, in the form of sci-fi shows and movies usually, and people have always been intrigued by it.
So people want it — and Microsoft wants to make it — and they have the technology. Purchasing the IP behind the Kinect was an extremely smart move, maybe smarter than they know. What started out as a way to cash in on the market the Wii had created has snowballed into an entirely new form of interacting with computers, and a way for Microsoft to differentiate itself meaningfully for years to come.
It was reported to me that one of the things the new Kinect/depth/IR sensors will do is read lips. At first it sounds silly. Why? Maybe so it can better interpret your words from across the room, or in a loud environment. You won’t have to turn the music down to search and navigate the web on your TV or tablet.
And then it becomes clear that it’s just part of a larger suite of “senses” the device would have. The new devices are to have face recognition and voice recognition, so your password will be you saying your password in your own voice, not someone else, and not a print-out of you. They’ll be able to pick you out of a crowd, say a small party, and will be able to tell when you’re giving it a command — because you make eye contact and move your lips. Again, it sounds perfectly ridiculous until it starts sounding perfectly natural.
Another feature described was a sort of 3D desktop on which you could actually grab files and place them here and there. This has been tried before, of course, and Windows 8 is looking decided two-dimensional, so it’s probably more of a research project than anything. But it’s still interesting. Think of the basic gestures you might be able to make. One was described as pulling out a drawer. In the surprisingly resilient desktop metaphor of files and folders, what could be more natural? Or perhaps raising your hand palm up to show the task bar or dock? Trace your finger in a counter-clockwise circle to undo, clockwise to redo?
User experience reflects both the needs of the user and the capabilities of the device. For a few years now we’ve been satisfied with running our fingers along a slab of glass, producing an electrical signal interpreted as a point or blob — mainly because capacitive screens got good and cheap, and nobody wants to plug a mouse into their phone. But there are many other ways of interacting with our new mobile objects and information. Soon the glass touchscreen will seem as quaint as the command-line interface.
And yet, some are no doubt thinking, we still have some command-line interfaces in use. Sure. And mice and keyboards are still better for productivity, and a pen and paper is better for sketching out ideas, and headphones are better for listening to music in public. There are countless use cases and potential applications of technology, but it’s good to recognize when one should give way or simply isn’t applicable.
Microsoft is working hard at this, and you’d better believe that Apple is too, though they aren’t nearly as open about their research. And for once, they seem to actually be missing a piece of the technology pie: Microsoft has a head start on them in the world of NUI, having purchased and developed depth and personal sensors for at least two years now. Apple can always throw money at the problem, but it’s pretty clear that Microsoft has perceived this rare advantage and will be using it as a wedge wherever possible.
This shouldn’t be taken as an indication that Windows 8 is going to be anything other than advertised, but I think it will be a test bed for some major changes coming down the line. Microsoft wants to change the way people interact with computers because it sees, hopefully not too late, that the old way, the PC way, treating a computer like a box that computes things, is on its way out in a hurry. So if computers are going to be a part of the real world, they need to be able to live in that world. Eyes, ears, and who knows what else. It’s only creepy until you can’t live without it.
[images: Matthew Fisher/Stanford, Wolfgang Herfuntner]
Om Nom is a lovable little monster, a character who can keep people playing “Cut the Rope” for hours under the simple premise of trying to satisfy his sweet tooth.
But behind the scenes, the game by ZeptoLab is anything but basic. Swinging ropes, floating bubbles, a subtle realism and other complexities require an underlying physics engine different from any other in the world of video games.
That was one of the challenges for the team at Pixel Lab, the Seattle-area development shop tapped to port the original iOS version of Cut the Rope to the web in partnership with Microsoft’s Internet Explorer team. At one point in the process, in fact, it looked like they might be forced to actually cut the rope on the whole project.
Ultimately they produced a browser-based version of the game that lives up to the original. Cut the Rope is available for free here, working in a variety of browsers, thanks to its use of HTML5. It offers exclusive levels to IE9 users, and special features including the ability to pin Om Nom to the Windows 7 taskbar.
Apart from becoming masters at playing Cut the Rope, the Pixel Lab team learned a lot about the potential and limitations of HTML5 and JavaScript. Challenges included making the game run quickly enough on older hardware, and inconsistencies in the way some browsers deal with audio — which led to a difficult decision to use Flash audio in some browsers other than Internet Explorer.
Their experience will become even more relevant as Microsoft gears up for the release of Windows 8, starting with a consumer preview later this month — include a new Windows Store and a focus on PC apps that use those fundamental technologies of the web.
Their biggest takeaway: ”Nobody should have any concerns about making a bet on HTML5,” says Robby Ingebretsen, Pixel Lab founder and creative director. “In general, for 95 percent of the cases, it’s definitely up to the task.”
Apart from the technical challenges, they had to keep the project under wraps leading up to its unveiling at the Consumer Electronics Show in January, where Microsoft showcased the game in an arcade-style cabinet on the show floor.
“It’s actually kind of hard to hide it from your kids, at least with mine,” says Joel Fillmore, a Pixel Lab senior software engineer. “They were as excited as anyone for the game to be done so they could play it.”
So how did Pixel Lab get it done, and what did they learn? Here are excerpts from our recent conversation with Ingebretsen and Fillmore, including some deep technical details from the project.
How did you end up creating an HTML5 version of Cut the Rope?
Ingebretsen: About a year ago, we did a pool game called Agent 008 Ball. We wanted to get our feet wet in HTML5. We were really excited about the possibilities. We had some friends at Microsoft, and they were launching IE9 at the time, and we convinced them to let us try to write a game.
We ended up writing this pool game and had a ton of fun with it. That game ended up getting a lot of attention. It surprised people that you could do that with HTML5. It bent the browser in a way that people didn’t expect. …
Microsoft had the relationship with ZeptoLab. They pitched us on Cut the Rope. We were booked. I was saying no to every project at the time, and we just made it happen, because we knew that it was going to be a blast.
We were a little nervous going into it. It’s a different physics engine than in any other game. I was nervous that we wouldn’t be able to pull it off. We wrote the contract so that we had a milestone that was literally just about rendering the ropes and breaking the candy and getting the sprites to render.
We hit this moment in that milestone where we were about ready to call it a day. We were hitting 60 frames per second, but we’d get on older hardware, and it would just plummet immediately. We traced it back (using a profiling tool in IE9) and we got some help from the Microsoft guys, and after that it just lit up.
What was the challenge you ran into?
Fillmore: There are two phases every time you draw a frame for the game. There’s the update phase, which is where you do all the physics calculations to determine the state of the ropes. The ropes are really complicated in that each rope is composed of multiple segments. For each one you have to run the physics engine across it to calculate how it moves. Gravity is a factor there, and the interaction between other game elements. So there’s quite a bit of computation that goes into the physics calculations.
First you do the update, and then you do the draw. Those are the two phases that go into each frame that gets rendered. This particular problem was during the update phase. That’s where it’s primarily JavaScript executing to run the physics engine and calculate all the different positions.
The JavaScript compilers and interpreters (in web browsers) are getting really good. Pretty fast. But they don’t have quite as much time as a traditional compiler to optimize the code. Traditionally compilers can do what they call “inline,” where it can take a function and rather than calling into itself multiple times, they can take that logic and put it right where it needs to be so it runs really fast.
It’s hard for a JavaScript just-in-time compiler to do that because it just doesn’t have the time to optimize the same way a static compiler does. We took some of that work that a compiler with more time to optimize might do and we did that work for the compiler. We took pieces of logic and moved them into the right place so it would run really fast. And then we unwound that recursion — this idea of a function calling into itself — into an iterative method where it runs sequentially. That’s how we really got the speed.
Ingebretsen: The sound bite version of that is that you have to write JavaScript like you’re writing JavaScript. Most languages that are compiled, you write with an eye toward a certain set of principles, like not rewriting the same code more than once. JavaScript, because of its nature, you have to bend your understanding of how you write code just a little bit. You have to write JavaScript for JavaScript.
You’ve also created a version for Windows 8. What do you think about the use of HTML5 and JavaScript for PC apps, and what did you learn?
Fillmore: I think if anything we learned that it’s possible. One of the biggest compliments that I appreciated about the game is that it felt like the native version of the game. I think that has been challenging in the past, and we’re starting to see the point where HTML5 apps can feel like native apps.
If you’re asking what’s going to be different about JavaScript apps in Windows 8, hopefully they don’t feel different than native apps. Hopefully you get the same sort of smoothness, the same sort of feel that you would with a native app.
But why would you want to make a PC app in HTML5 and JavaScript, as opposed to a native app?
Ingebretsen: JavaScript and HTML5 are inherently collaborative. It’s easy to pull in scripts from other places. Even the language itself is inherently collaborative. Beyond that, there’s just massive community support for this language. It’s just everywhere. Also, it’s a skill set that a lot of people have, and it’s a good learning language in that you can do a lot early as you’re learning it, compared to Objective-C. The barrier to entry with something like the iPhone is huge.
Fillmore: There’s this feeling that you can reuse what you learn as a web developer to develop for platforms like Win8. I’ve developed in a lot of different languages over my career. C++ and other languages as well. The fact that you can now author apps for Win8 in JavaScript feels like you’ve leveraged all that learning and work you’ve done for the web. You get to take advantage of all these libraries that people have created, and you can really focus on one environment, and that works on the web and works on Win8.
Ingebretsen: There’s a big appetite for this, clearly. There’s PhoneGap. There’s other platforms that are trying to let people do this. Hugely popular, people love them. And it’s for that same reason. People have this skill set and they want to figure out how to use it in other places.
What were your biggest takeaways from this whole process?
Ingebretsen: Nobody should have any concerns about making a bet on HTML5. That’s my biggest takeaway. (In the past) there was this huge UI surge, whether it was Flash or Objective C or Silverlight, and I think there was the potential to be concerned that now we’re settling or something. It’s not settling. … There might be times when, for whatever reason, you might need to be closer to the metal. Maybe closer to drivers or devices, or whatever. But in general, for 95 percent of the cases, it’s definitely up to the task.
Fillmore: There’s a lot of debate right now in the community about whether Javascript can go forward as a viable language for the web. I think originally a lot of people had the same doubts. But when you get an order or two orders of magnitude faster, that removes a lot of concerns for people. When they get this type of performance out of a game … I think it makes people reevaluate what’s possible.
Ingebretsen: There’s this huge potential with HTML5. Right now we’re still working with the raw pieces. Canvas is a relatively low-level API compared with something you might have in Flash or Silverlight. But because we’ve as a community created these low-level pieces, I think there’s a big opportunity for people to build the bigger pieces on top of that.
I think a year out, two years out, you’re going to have these incredibly rich UI platforms built on top of canvas and html where you’re getting both the ease of development as well as the speed and the quality of experience that you have in silverlight or flash. It’s ripe for people to come in there and start building those frameworks.
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"Attracted by a faster processor, improved camera and the Siri speech-driven agent, most iPhone buyers paid a premium for the iPhone 4S, making it the top-selling handset in Q4," he said. He noted that the iPhone 4S "outsold the iPhone 4 by 75 percent, and outsold the iPhone 3GS, available for free on AT&T, five to one.”
Smartphones themselves continued to grab an increased share of the mobile market over less-complex feature phones. In the last quarter, smartphone sales represented 68 percent of the mobile phone market, up 18 percent from the last quarter of 2010, NPD Group said.
The "average selling price" for smartphones was $143 in the fourth quarter, $6 less than the average price of $149 in the last quarter of 2010.
And even though the new iPhone outsold its older siblings, all iPhone models led the top-selling handset list for the fourth quarter, with Samsung Galaxy models next in line:
1. Apple iPhone 4S
2. Apple iPhone 4
3. Apple iPhone 3GS
4. Samsung GALAXY S II
5. Samsung GALAXY S 4G
Related stories:
Check out Technolog, Gadgetbox, Digital Life and In-Game on Facebook, and on Twitter, follow Suzanne Choney.
I used to scowl when I saw people walking down the street with eyes locked on their phones, but necessity has gotten me in the habit of doing it too. Thanks to a new app called Transparent Screen though, now I can do it free from the fear of falling into an open manhole or into a large fountain.
No, that’s not a hastily Photoshopped image you see here, that’s more or less exactly what you’ll see when the app is running. I say “more or less” because while all of the Android UI goes translucent upon launch, you’re afforded with quite a bit of a control over how dramatic the effect is. It’s in your best interest to get familiar with the settings if you plan on using Transparent Screen for a while too, because you’ll soon have some choices to make.
If you’re a fan of texting while sprinting for example (which I don’t condone, for the record), crank the camera resolution down to keep that forward view going as smoothly possible. Alternately, crank it up you’re more a fan of slow, meandering walks while you tweet about the wonders of nature.
The big issue, as Android Police points out, is that you’d be hard-pressed to find a configuration that works well while bouncing between your favorite apps. Still, that’s a pretty minor concern — Transparent Screen seems like an app best used occasionally, when you absolutely have to fire off a message while on the move. Sure, there’s nothing that says you can’t have it running nonstop, just be prepared to watch your remaining battery life disappear in front of your eyes.
Interested? Mosey on over to the Android Market, where Transparent Screen can be had for the low, low price of free.
A lot of us out there are waiting for a company to provide a true Netflix-like experience for e-books. Amazon and Kobo have dabbled in this kind of service with the Kindle Owners’ Lending Library and the Kobo 2012 Book Club, but there is no all-you-can-eat option from either of these companies. On the other side of the spectrum, we have Audiobooks.com. This website has taken the Netflix approach and applied it to audio books. For $24.95 a month, Audiobooks.com provides unlimited access to over 10,000 audio books. The audio books can be streamed across a variety of platforms. We’re here to tell you how it all holds up.
When you sign up for Audiobooks.com, you’ll need to visit the website every time you want to listen to an audio book. Audiobooks.com supports Firefox 9, IE9, Safari 5.0 and Chrome 16.0 on desktops, and is also optimized for iOS and Android. One downside I noticed is there is no standalone application for Audiobooks.com. Instead, you’re taken to a HTML 5 mobile version of the site that has individual tabs for Home, Browse, Search and Account. The mobile site works well enough, but it would be so much faster and more convenient to access audio books from a dedicated application. A mobile app could also contain features that aren’t present on the mobile site such as a section containing books you intend to listen to, or a wishlist that could inform you when certain audio books become available.
One of the biggest advantages Audiobooks.com has is streaming from the cloud. There’s no need to download any audio books. You can also stop listening to an audio book on one device and resume listening on another. Audiobooks.com does a good job at remembering where you left off. Usually, I never had to re-listen to more than a few seconds of dialogue whenever I switched platforms. Speaking of platforms, let’s go over how Audiobooks.com performs on PC, iOS and Android.
Listening to audio books from the desktop is the easiest way to experience Audiobooks.com. You’re immediately presented with a list of new arrivals and staff picks when you sign in. Once you’ve listened to a few books, a recommended section and a list of the books you’re currently listening to will also populate the home page. Much like Netflix, you can give each book a star rating from one to five. Your ratings help dictate which books are presented to you in the future.
There’s also another section of the site labeled “My Books.” In this section, you select which genres you are interested in, and Audiobooks.com will factor that into which books are recommended to you.
Once you pick an audio book to listen to, a separate window will open that contains the media player. The media player has four functions – play, pause, rewind 30 seconds and fast forward 30 seconds. It would be nice to be able to select certain chapters instead of fast forwarding to an unknown section of the book, but such a feature doesn’t exist at the moment.
I was pleased with the audio quality in every audio book I tested. The only issues I see anyone having with audio deals with how well the narrator articulates him or herself.
My first experience with Audiobooks.com was on an Android device. Specifically, the device I used was the HTC Sensation. It was admittedly a bad first experience. Make sure you allow your Android device to access mobile web pages or you may have problems. I could never get an audio book to play in the default HTC browser from the desktop site. The media player was also very ugly with the timeline stretching well outside its intended boundaries.
Once I enabled the browser to view mobile web pages, the difference was astounding. The media player fit within its borders, and I was free to open other applications on my phone while the audio book played.
That’s not to say I didn’t have any problems. There were occasions across all platforms when audio books would not play. I had to reload the page and start another audio book in order to get everything to work again. This didn’t happen most of the time, but it happened enough to concern me each time I wanted to listen to an audio book.
Surprise, surprise there were little issues when I listened to audio books on iOS. My iPod Touch played well with the Audiobooks.com mobile website. The same intermittent audio issues I experienced on PC and Android remained. Also, much like on Android, audio books can be listened to while using other apps outside of the browser.
Audiobooks.com has a lot of room for growth. The HTML5 mobile website is a good start, but an official mobile app is desperately needed to make Audiobooks.com the best it can be. It can also benefit from additional features I previously mentioned such as wish lists, and a way to add books to your collection without needing to listen to them first. All things considered, I still recommend Audiobooks.com for those who dozens of hours listening to audio books on a regular basis. This service probably isn’t for those who occasionally partake in audio books. If you’re unsure, you can sign up for a seven-day free trial.
Site [Audiobooks.com]
Israeli startup Appoxee has raised an undisclosed amount of funding from early-stage investment firm Cyhawk Ventures.
The company offers a service that helps app developers and publishers increase user engagement through rich push notifications and helps them with things like audience segmentation, targeting, analytics and reporting.
Read more over at TechCrunch Europe.
If you don’t know a resistor from a Mister Mister, this is the app for you. Built by Adafruit, creators of DIY Arduino gear, Circuit Playground is a $2.99 app designed to help you identify and understand various electronic components. For example, the app includes a resistor identification system based on the colored bands painted on the casing as well as a field guide to many electrical components.
The rest of the tools – including converters, calculators, and datasheet storage systems – just makes things a little bit easier when you’re building an electronics project. I’m terrible at this stuff so it would be a boon for me and my slow-witted monkey mind.
Calculate power, resistance, current, and voltage with the Ohm’s Law & Power Calc modulesThe app is available now for the iPhone and iPad.
Walt Disney Home Entertainment
Follow @rosaOur "deals of the day" roundup is a selection of some of the better gadgets, gaming and app deals on the Internet right now — with a few strange odds and ends thrown in for fun. Here's what's worth considering today: The "Pirates of the Caribbean" trilogy on Blu-ray for $40, discounted PlayStation gear, deals on monitors and more.
Gadgets:
Gaming:
Apps:
Miscellaneous odds and ends:
Today's deals were discovered via:
AppBrain, LogicBUY,Gamingaholic, FatWallet, Laptopaholic, 148Apps, SlickDeals, CheapStingyBargains, Dealzon, Brand Name Coupons, GamerHotline, HDTVaholic and Tabletaholic.
Please read the detailed descriptions of each linked offer carefully before buying — msnbc.com is not responsible for the duration or integrity of individual deals.
Want more tech news, silly puns, or amusing links? You'll get plenty of all three if you keep up with Rosa Golijan, the writer of this post, by following her on Twitter, subscribing to her Facebook posts, or circling her on Google+.
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“We have confirmed with sources close to Microsoft’s Windows 8 development that a hot corner has replaced the Start button orb. A thumbnail-like user interface will appear in Metro or desktop mode, providing a consistent way to access the Windows desktop and Start Screen in Windows 8 regardless of touch or mouse input. The new interface is activated on hover from the lower-left corner of Windows 8 and includes a thumbnail preview of where you will navigate to after clicking on the new visual element.”
The Start Screen he’s referring to is the tile-based Windows 8 default screen that I mentioned earlier, pictured at right, with Microsoft's new the "Metro" interface. In the Developer Preview, the Start button and menu appear in the lower left of this screen when hovering over that area with a mouse. A square Start button is also fixed to the lower left of the screen in the traditional desktop view in Windows 8 (pictured above).
It’s important to note that the report of the Start button’s demise hasn’t been confirmed yet by Microsoft, and it’s tough to judge something until you actually get to use it — but this is a surprise, to say the least.
The Windows 8 Consumer Preview, a.k.a. the first Windows 8 beta, is due out later this month, and a final version of the new operating system is widely expected later this year. Microsoft is banking on Windows 8 to give Windows tablets new traction against the iPad and Android devices, but the new interface will also be the standard for traditional PCs with keyboards and mice.
Also from GeekWire
Todd Bishop of GeekWire can be followed on Twitter and Facebook.
The Nest thermostat -- a more attractive method of dealing with your home's temperature. Photo: Ariel Zambelich/Wired.com
Honeywell, a company long known for its commercial and residential thermostats, filed a patent infringement lawsuit on Monday against Nest Labs, the outfit that launched the highly publicized Nest thermostat last October.
The suit claims the Nest Learning Thermostat infringes on seven of Honeywell’s patents, spanning categories as generic as a “natural language installer” (a set-up menu, by any other name) to an “HVAC controller,” a standard component of any temperature control system.
“Competition is good and we welcome it, but we will not stand by while competitors, large or small, offer products that infringe on our intellectual property,” Honeywell environmental and combustion controls president Beth Wozniak said in a statement issued Monday.
As for Nest, the company is keeping mum on specifics: “We have not yet reviewed the actual filing, which we learned about this morning through Honeywell’s press release,” said Nest Labs spokeswoman Kate Brinks in an e-mail to Wired. “We will provide comment once we’ve had the opportunity to review it.”
The Nest thermostat made waves within the consumer tech community when it was unveiled last year, thanks in part to its creator Tony Fadell’s pedigree: Fadell led Apple’s iPod and iPhone division as a vice president before leaving the company in early 2010. To follow up two of the most successful consumer tech products of all time with a thermostat, of all things, was a peculiar move.
Fadell’s thermostat, however, aims to revamp how consumers use their heating and air conditioning systems. Like the iPod, the Nest is a sleek piece of industrial design, deviating from the bland boxes we’re so accustomed to seeing on our walls. Artificial intelligence programming within the Nest turns your heat and A/C on or off, depending on who’s home, who’s awake and who’s just wasting energy.
Honeywell’s infringement claims seem broad at first glance, akin to many suits being thrown around in the smartphone industry as of late. Best Buy, the retailer that offers the Nest thermostat, is also named in the suit.
In its press release filed on Monday morning, Honeywell claims its suit against Nest and Best Buy is in line with other suits it has filed recently against Venstar Inc. and ICM Controls, again for infringing on “thermostat and combustion controls patents.”
The shifting sands in the online real estate industry continue to morph. The latest development involves Zillow which recently notified Redfin and other real estate sites that it will no longer distribute for-sale-by-owner listings to their Web sites.
Redfin CEO Glenn Kelman explains in a blog post:
Zillow primarily gets listings directly from individual brokers, not from the Multiple Listing Services (MLSs) that all brokers use to share listings with one another, so Zillow is governed by different restrictions than we are. This means that we will continue to display for-sale-by-owner listings from other sources, wherever it’s allowed by the local MLS to which we belong.
We aren’t crazy about the decision, but presumably neither is Zillow: Zillow’s listings got 35,000 views on our site alone in January, and many of the people who viewed them ended up on Zillow’s website too. We’ll continue to show Zillow’s Zestimates, mortgage data and any other information from Zillow we can get that would be useful to our customers. The Zestimates drive lots more traffic from Redfin to Zillow than the for-sale-by-owner listings.
Zillow Chief Marketing Officer Amy Bohutinsky tells GeekWire that they are discontinuing the feed because it was the company’s least used API. She did not immediately respond to questions about how many real estate sites were impacted by the move.
UPDATE: Bohutinsky declined to offer specifics on how many sites were using the API. But she did add: “We have lots of API’s, and we invest in maintaining the ones that are used frequently. This one was our least-used.” Here’s a list of all of the company’s APIs.
The decision comes after San Diego real estate agent Jim Abbott lashed out at Zillow, Trulia and other online real estate sites, posting a video on YouTube in which he said he planned to remove listings from the “listing syndicators.” The video sparked a lively discussion on GeekWire, with many readers suggesting that Abbott’s comments were misguided.
We also talked about the issue on the GeekWire podcast this past weekend with Findwell CEO Kevin Lisota.
I am still trying to make sense out of this and the wider implications, so if you have thoughts, feel free to share them.
UPDATE: Here’s the press release from August 2008 in which Zillow announced the new API, noting that Redfin was one of the early adopters.
According to GoodEReader, Amazon is planning to open a retail store in Seattle this year where they will sell Amazon-exclusive books and, more importantly, Kindles of all kinds. While this looks to be more of a pop-up retail presence than a fully-fledged store, if I were in publishing I’d be circling the wagons right now.
To be fair, Amazon’s own publishing offerings are pretty wonky so far. There haven’t been many runaway successes coming out of the house although Seth Godin and Tim Ferris will soon be bringing their own brand of publishing success and there are some interesting cross-cultural titles coming out. But that’s not why publishing has to worry.
The Kindle was Amazon incarnate, a way for Amazon to bring its online presence into the real world. A physical Kindle store – one that exists in a mall or popular area, even for a short period – is like the third coming. It’s basically a chance for Amazon to grab every else they have missed during the initial run up in Kindle popularity. We’re talking older folks, luddites, grumps, and folks who claim that “reading it in paper” is better. To have them walk up to a display of working Kindles, newly minted and displaying the latest Stephen King book, is the only way Amazon will convince them that going digital is the only way to go.
This will also encourage the movement from the agent-publisher-distributor model of book publishing into a direct to consumer model that Amazon will spearhead. By showing potential authors that they can get their books bound in handsome Kindle editions, they’ll be more likely to go that route instead of pounding fruitlessly against the gates of big publishing. It’s obviously a no-brainer to many of us, but old paradigms die hard.
As I said before, the Fire is Amazon’s Trojan Horse. However, rather than the wary hold-outs bringing in Amazon’s market by buying the fire, Amazon will bring the Trojans to their own branded stores.
The store will appear in Settle in the next few months and presumably be the first of a nation-wide roll-out. I suspect it will be a bit of a loss for Amazon but hopefully it will convert the last hold-outs to the benefits of ereading.
Well, it took long enough. Google waited until passing 100 million G+ users before opening a platform developer page. What? You think only Facebook has a social network platform agenda? Google has ambitions, too.
Perhaps the big thing will be the weekly Hangouts, where Google+ developers can get the lowdown. It's nothing on the scale of Microsoft's Channel 9 (Say didn't Vic Gundotra have a hand in both Nine and G+?). Channel 9 is more about broadcasting developer information, while Hangouts are live and more interactive.
Hangouts are one of the best Google+ features -- video chat with a bunch of people, whether they're actively or passively participating. (If it's so good, why haven't I, ah Hungout? Got to fix that one.)
"Our team will host regular Hangouts to talk about the +Platform, your experiences with it, and share tips and tricks with the community. Our weekly office hours hangouts take place every Wednesday at 11:30am - 12:15pm PDT, and can be accessed from our Google+ Developers page", Chris Chabot, Google+ developer relations team lead, explains. "The +Platform team will also share Google+ developer events, conferences and hackathons, as well as photos and videos of the events. In addition, we’ll announce and discuss our +Platform launches on our page".
Windows 8, the next version of Microsoft’s PC operating system, will be a radical change for people who pick it up for the first time, with a primary screen based on tiles similar to the Windows Phone interface — relegating the old-fashioned yet familiar Windows desktop to a secondary status.
Go ahead and laugh, but given the degree of change, it has actually been comforting to see the Windows flag, representing the Start button, in the lower left corner when using the Windows 8 Developer Preview. First introduced with Windows 95, the Start button has gone through several changes, but it’s a nice connection to the past.
But it looks like that may be going away, as well.
A report by Tom Warren in The Verge over the weekend, citing a leaked Windows 8 build, says the upcoming Windows 8 Consumer Preview nixes the Start button entirely. He explains …
“We have confirmed with sources close to Microsoft’s Windows 8 development that a hot corner has replaced the Start button orb. A thumbnail-like user interface will appear in Metro or desktop mode, providing a consistent way to access the Windows desktop and Start Screen in Windows 8 regardless of touch or mouse input. The new interface is activated on hover from the lower-left corner of Windows 8 and includes a thumbnail preview of where you will navigate to after clicking on the new visual element.”
The Start Screen he’s referring to is the tile-based default screen that I mentioned earlier, pictured below. In the Developer Preview, the Start button and menu appear in the lower left of this screen when hovering over that area with a mouse. A square Start button is fixed to the lower left of the screen in the traditional desktop view in Windows 8 (pictured above).
It’s important to note that the report of the Start button’s demise hasn’t been confirmed yet by Microsoft, and it’s tough to judge something until you actually get to use it — but this is a surprise, to say the least.
The Windows 8 Consumer Preview, a.k.a. the first Windows 8 beta, is due out later this month, and a final version of the new operating system is widely expected later this year. Microsoft is banking on Windows 8 to give Windows PC tablets new traction against the iPad and Android devices, but the new interface will also be the standard for traditional PCs with keyboards and mice.
OK Go set up over 1000 instruments over two miles of desert outside Los Angeles. A Chevy Sonic was outfitted with retractable pneumatic arms designed to play the instruments, and the band recorded this version of "Needing/Getting," singing as they played the instrument array with the car. The video took 4 months of preparation and 4 days of shooting and recording. There are no ringers or stand-ins; [lead singer Damian Kulash] took stunt driving lessons. Each piano had the lowest octaves tuned to the same note so that they'd play the right note no matter where they were struck.
As you may recall, OK Go inadvertently started its viral precedent with the charming breakout video, "Here It Goes Again," performed on treadmills. Then there's the Rube Goldberg goodness of "This Too Shall Pass," "White Knuckles" (my favorite — it features dogs and also a goat), and "All Is Not Lost," made in interactive goodness with dance troupe Pilobolus and Google’s Play With Chrome project.
If OK Go continues this ambitious — dare I say, reckless? — pursuit of upping its own high-tech ante, can a partnership with DARPA be far behind? (DARPA! What, you don't know what DARPA is? Here, just click this.)
You can see more about the making of "Needing/Getting" at OK Go's website.
More on the annoying way we live now:
Helen A.S. Popkin goes blah blah blah about privacy and then asks her to join her on Twitter and/or Facebook. Also, Google+. Because that's how she rolls.
After price, "ease of use, warranty and multiple functionality are the next most important purchasing factors among both sexes," the study finds. "Also important to women is product size and weight, something that generally is less of a concern among men. Color ranks near the bottom as a factor among women when buying electronics."
While 6 in 10 women "initiate or are involved in the process in which a CE product is actually purchased," they're more likely to consider devices like TVs and DVD players as "household" items rather than their own personal gadgets. But, when it comes smartphones, laptops and e-readers, "women were more likely than men to claim sole ownership."
So, no need for pink phones or laptops this year when you're shopping for your sweetie. If she wants a pink case, that's another story. Those are as changeable as a pair of sneakers or heels.
Related stories:
Check out Technolog, Gadgetbox, Digital Life and In-Game on Facebook, and on Twitter, follow Suzanne Choney.
As the only girl on the Gadgets team, I often get asked to write what I call “lady-rants” about products targeted toward women. I have a problem with most of them, as the products themselves are either being forced into a demographic by marketers (like the HTC Rhyme, which would’ve been a fine phone for anyone if marketed that way) or they’re simply painted pink in the hopes that pink is, in fact, what all women have been looking for in their consumer electronics.
The truth of the matter is, men have spent more money on consumer electronics in the past and, as a result, women have unfortunately been left with ads targeted towards men or pink versions of everything. But no more.
According to a study out of the CEA, the same folks that brought you that over-sized week of madness called CES, more and more women are showing an interest in consumer electronics than they were in the past.
Specifically, eight in ten women expressed an interest in gadgets, up 10 percentage points from the same time in 2007. Of those women, 41 percent said they were “very interested” in consumer electronics. But it gets more interesting than that.
In 2007, the spending gap between men and women in the CE space was around $200, with men obviously spending more. Now, men spend an average of $728 over the course of a year, as opposed to women spending an average of $667 during the same period. That’s a difference of just $61.
But even if women spend a bit less and show less interest than guys, women are still a part of the picture when it comes to their man’s gadgetry. According to the study, 61 percent of women either initiate or are involved in the decision-making when it comes to consumer electronics purchases.
Both men and women look at the same things when purchasing a product, most important of which is price, followed by ease of use, warranty, and multiple functionality. Where men and women differ, however, is on size (shocker!). Speaking from the standpoint of someone who wears girls’ jeans, size is pretty important to women when it comes to mobile gadgetry like smartphones and tablets, a sentiment echoed by the study.
And perhaps the most important thing we can take away from this study comes out of the mouth of CEA manager of strategic research Jessica Boothe:
Forget pink. Women don’t want to be catered to with ultra-feminine looking products; they simply prefer lightweight devices that can fit smaller hands and smaller body frames. Women play many roles, like mother, spouse and career women, and CE products that can perform many functions are a necessity.
[IMG Credit: ShutterStock]
My Dad, bless his heart, spends all day on the Internet and, like a reverse Cat’s In The Cradle, my dad is just like me in that he loves to find wild junk that he thinks is interesting. To wit: he just found the Brinno Peephole Viewer, an electronic system for looking through a peephole.
To be fair, this is definitely something people need. My parents are getting up in years so they’re getting both blind and paranoid, so anything to assuage those two situations is a plus. This thing attaches to your normal peephole and then displays the scene behind the peephole on an LCD screen. It runs on two AA batteries and costs about $90.
The viewer also reduces fish-eye distortion found with regular, non-LCD peepholes.
It’s definitely not new nor is it particularly high tech, but if you, like me, are dealing with a set of parents who are getting up there in years and need a leg up, it might be a nice investment. Besides, it’s fun to say peephole.
University of Hasselt
John Roach is a contributing writer for msnbc.com. To learn more about him, check out his website. For more of our Future of Technology series, watch the featured video below.
Coinstar-owned DVD rental kiosk company Redbox was one of the biggest reasons Blockbuster video went bankrupt. Monday, Coinstar announced it has begun a joint venture with communications service provider Verizon to build a subscription streaming video service.
It is a move nearly identical to the one Netflix took three-and-a-half years ago, when it branched out from being a DVD-by-mail service to also being a streaming video provider through a partnership with Starz.
The streaming content is expected to debut in the second half of 2012, available to both residental and wireless subscribers, and will offer "subscription services and more in an easy-to-use, flexible and affordable service that will allow all consumers across the U.S. to enjoy the new and popular entertainment they want, whenever they choose, using the media and devices they prefer."
The Redbox/Verizon joint venture does not yet have a name of its own, but majority ownership is Verizon's. The network operator will hold a 65 percent stake while Redbox will hold a 35 percent ownership stake.
We hear that "Qwikster" is still available!
If you occasionally need to format a text document in advanced ways, perhaps adding line numbers or sorting its lines alphabetically, then your first thought might be to find and install a programmer’s editor. But these can be expensive, and complex, leaving you with a whole new editing interface to learn.
A better idea might be to install Dolphin Text Editor Menu. The program runs in the background, ready to work with virtually any application where you can enter text: Notepad, Wordpad, Word, Excel, Visual Studio, browsers and more. So you can use your preferred application as normal, then when you need some advanced option, just select the text you’d like to format, press Dolphin’s hotkey (Ctrl+Num Pad 0 by default) and the program’s menu will pop up.
The functions on offer here are fairly basic, but provide most of the core functionality you’d expect. There are tools to add numbers or text to the beginning or end of lines, for instance. The program can sort lines in various ways. And you’re able to remove blank lines, duplicate lines, leading or trailing spaces, and so on.
Dolphin also provides various options to change the case of your selected text. It can clean up text by removing hidden formatting, HTML or BBCode tags, say. And assorted other miscellaneous options will do everything from split up paragraphs into separate sentences, to count the words, lines and characters you’ve selected.
What you don’t get here are the more advanced programmer’s editor-type features, such as syntax highlighting or regular expression find and replace: Dolphin is more about covering the essentials. It does this well, however, is supremely convenient (it can even be installed to a USB stick for running anywhere) and free for personal use (commercial licences are $5), so it seems impolite to complain.
If you do think of ways in which Dolphin Text Editor Menu could be improved, though, the developer points out that the program is “being actively developed, so any requests for additional functionality will be seriously considered”. Pass on your thoughts at Animal Software’s forum.
Photo Credit: Laszlo Szirtesi/Shutterstock
Donationcoder.com has announced the release of Screenshot Captor 3 for Windows PCs. The donation-ware screen capture utility adds three major new features to this landmark release, including splicing effects, a scrolling screen capture function and a number of watermarking options for marking screenshots.
Version 3.0 also includes other recently introduced features, such as full TWAIN and WIA scanner support, automatic upload to supported image hosting services and support for partial Windows 7 transparency effects.
Screenshot Captor 3, which is now also available as a separate portable version, adds a “super deluxe scrolling capture system”, which the author claims is the best on the market. This allows users to capture screens that are larger than the display, such as lengthy documents or websites.
Version 3.0 also adds a number of new splice effects, including ragged edge, that are also available via the cropping and border menus. It also adds a simplified watermarking menu and options that allow users to stamp their ownership on screen captures.
Screenshot Captor also builds on major features added in recent months, which include a full set of scanner acquisition and image correction tools. These are disabled by default, but support both WIA and TWAIN scanners and can be switched on via the Edit > Preferences menu.
Another recent addition is support for uploading to various online image hosting services, including Flickr and Imageshack.
Other changes in version 3 are minor -- there are new options when saving modified screenshots for preserving the original date and timestamp, an option to rename files when changing various field information and a loaded file’s creation and modification date and timestamps are now displayed in the program’s Status bar.
Version 3’s installation file has also been repackaged. Prior versions could be renamed as zip files and installed as portable installations, but version 3 now uses a standard setup file, necessitating the release of a separate portable build.
Screenshot Captor 3 and Screenshot Captor 3 Portable are both available as free, donationware downloads for PCs running all flavours of Windows from 95 onwards. A nag screen will appear on each launch which can be supressed by registering for a free key. This free key will expire after six months, at which point a new key can be requested. Donating any sum for continued use of the program produces a registration key that removes the nag screen permanently.
Rosa Golijan/msnbc.com
Follow @rosaMany individuals have been holding their breath and waiting for the day when Siri becomes officially available on older iPhones. But according to one analyst, that moment may never come — thanks to a technical difference between the iPhone 4S and older generation devices.
CNET reports that Linley Group analyst Linley Gwennap believes that noise-reduction circuitry built into the iPhone 4S processor explains why it can handle Siri — and why the iPhone 4 supposedly can't.
Gwennap points out that one of the differences between the A5 processor found in the iPhone 4S and the A4 processor in the iPhone 4 is a noise-reduction technology called EarSmart, the creation of a start-up by the name of Audience. While the iPhone 4 contains this technology in the form of a dedicated chip, the iPhone 4S has it built directly into the A5 processor. And when the EarSmart technology was integrated directly into the processor, Apple didn't just save a little bit of space — it also wound up with better noise-reduction technology.
The noise-reduction technology in the iPhone 4 "was good only when the phone was held near the speaker's mouth," explains CNET. But this limitation disappeared with the iPhone 4S, according to Gwennap, who says that this "situation helps explain why Apple does not offer Siri as a software upgrade on the iPhone 4":
Although the older phone includes an Audience chip, the company has since improved its technology to handle 'far-field speech,' which means holding the device at arm's length rather than directly in front of the mouth.
So there we have it: The reason Apple will likely never officially offer Siri to older generation iPhones is because their hearing isn't up to par. And if Siri can't hear you over background noise, how is it supposed to answer your every question?
Related stories:
Want more tech news, silly puns, or amusing links? You'll get plenty of all three if you keep up with Rosa Golijan, the writer of this post, by following her on Twitter, subscribing to her Facebook posts, or circling her on Google+.
In fourth quarter, that would be iPhone 4S, 4 and 3GS, in order from one to three, according to NPD. But before the Apple Fanclub does high-fives, Android share among first-time buyers outpaced iPhone, as measured by smartphone operating system, contradicting some other analyst data.
"iPhone 4S outsold the iPhone 4 by 75 percent, and outsold the iPhone 3GS, available for free on AT&T, five to one", Ross Rubin, NPD executive director, says. Well, so much for my theory older, discounted iPhones was a brilliant Apple strategy. Which again raises questions about the power of brand, considering iPhone isn't LTE, while AT&T and Verizon offer real 4G smartphones -- all Androids.
"Android has been criticized for offering a more complex user experience than its competitors, but the company’s wide carrier support and large app selection is appealing to new smartphone customers", Rubin says. "Android’s support of LTE at Verizon has also made it the exclusive choice for customers who want to take advantage of that carrier’s fastest network".
So perhaps LTE matters after all, at least to new buyers -- 57 percent chose Androids and 34 percent iPhone. The math is scary, by the way. NPD didn't publicly release new buyer share for other platforms, but Bada, BlackBerry, Symbian and Windows Mobile split up just 9 percent share. Well, we know what Americans aren't buying.
Additionally, iOS/iPhone closed the distance on Android, capturing 43 percent share to 48 percent share. The numbers are significant for another reason -- NPD tracks actual sales to end users rather than shipments into the channel.
More broadly, smartphone sales considerably outpaced feature phones. Smartphones accounted for 68 percent of sales during fourth quarter, up 18 percent year over year.
Now let me explain something about contradictory analyst reports. There are many out there right now, which makes them all suspect. Last week comScore reported dramatically different share numbers, putting Android way ahead of iOS/iPhone -- 47.3 percent to 29.6 percent, respectively. comScore measures US cellular subscribers ages 13 and above, which is different data methodology than NPD. The one uses a survey (of more than 30,000 Americans) and the other looks at sales.
Then there is Nielsen, which data seemingly directly contradicts NPD's. Android share, as measured in smartphone operating systems among new purchasers, plummeted from 61.6 percent in October to 46.9 percent in December. Meanwhile, iPhone rose from 25.1 percent share to 44.5 percent.
So whose data can you trust? No one's solely, nor any of the New York Post-style headlines trumpeting iPhone over Android, or visa versa. The clearest picture of US smartphone sales may come when Sprint announces holiday quarter earnings later this week. Assuming Sprint reveals iPhone sales, or activations, combined with AT&T and Verizon there will be clearer but not exact sense of what really occurred in the US market. I say "not exact" because iPhone activations don't necessarily mean on new handsets.
If 2011 was all about integrating social media relationships to CRM software, 2012 looks like it will be all about taking relationships to the mobile realm, and mobilizing sales, service and marketing teams with powerful CRM apps.
Microsoft on Monday announced the next update to its customer relationship management product Microsoft Dynamics CRM will include a new native mobile client for iOS, Android, BlackBerry, and Windows Phone 7.
The Microsoft Dynamics CRM Q2 2012 service update brings a cloud-based mobile CRM service that communicates with these native CRM apps for smartphones and tablets to give them the huge volumes of data and important customer graphs and metrics that are available to desktop users.
The applications allow users to access Dynamics CRM either remotely or on-premise, and include offline syncing functionality so users can keep their customer data handy even when their data connection is severed, like when they're on an airplane.
The mobile service is centrally managed, and administrators can configure the record types, forms, views, offline synchronization rules and navigation structure for the mobile application. Admins even have the ability to remotely wipe all of the CRM data from the mobile device if it's lost, stolen, or simply loaded onto the user's personal device.
Furthermore, extended CRM applications built in xRM are also integrated into Microsoft Dynamics CRM Mobile.
"We want to be revolutionary, not evolutionary, and the market is moving fast. Our customers are tackling CRM initiatives like never before. They can't afford to be casual. They are serious. They don't flinch," said Dennis Michalis, General Manager of Microsoft Dynamics CRM. "The most successful customers are innovating with mobility, using every kind of device they can deploy CRM functionality on, and they are going deeper with Microsoft Dynamics CRM flexibility for their specific needs than ever before."
Microsoft Dynamics CRM Mobile will cost $30 per user per month, and each user license includes three simultaneous mobile installs. The mobile client apps will be available on Windows Phone 7.5+, iOS 5+, Android 2.2+, and BlackBerry 6.x and 7.x.
The only tablets to support the application at launch will be Apple's iPad family.
According to new research from the NPD Group, Apple passed LG and Samsung to become the top-selling U.S. handset brand in Q4 2011. Combined, the three available models of the iPhone (iPhone 4S, iPhone 4 and iPhone 3GS) accounted for 43% of the U.S. smartphone market.
Android, however, continued to see larger market share at 48%.
Together, iPhone and Android accounted for over 90% of U.S. smartphone sales, leaving little room for any up-and-comer like Windows Phone, or even the declining brand that is RIM’s BlackBerry.
Android’s market share may continue to grow, too, given that more first-time smartphone buyers were choosing Android over iPhone this past quarter, the firm found. Based on NPD Group’s monthly Smartphone Track service, 57% of first-time smartphone buyers went with an Android device compared with just 34% who purchased iPhones.
NPD suggests that the reason for these consumers’ Android preference has to do more with availability – Android has “wide carrier support,” the report says. Also helpful is Android’s large app selection and its support of LTE at Verizon.
The overall portion of handset sales that were smartphones also climbed in Q4 2011, now accounting for 68% of the total U.S. phone market. That’s an increase of 18% from Q2 2010, said NPD. The average cost per smartphone, however, hasn’t seen as much movement, down from $149 in Q4 2010 to $143 in Q4 2011.
Not surprisingly, Apple’s record-breaking quarter (its fiscal Q1, running September 25-December 31), led to the iPhone 4S coming out on top as the best-selling handset in Q4. It also earned the top three slots among the top five handsets for the time period:
Ross Rubin, executive director, Connected Intelligence for The NPD Group, said that consumers were attracted to the iPhone 4S’s ”faster processor, improved camera and the Siri speech-driven agent.”
“The iPhone 4S outsold the iPhone 4 by 75%, and outsold the iPhone 3GS, available for free on AT&T, five to one,” Rubin noted.
Do you believe in a thing called love?
If not, just listen to the rhythm of my heart… Or head on over to AT&T’s website to pre-order the Galaxy Note.
If for some reason you don’t remember, the Note is a 5.3-inch phone/tablet hybrid that showed its face in a costly Samsung commercial during last night’s Super Bowl. Its claim to fame would be a little stylus, what Samsung is calling the S-Pen, which makes the Note a tad more useful when you’re in a pinch and need to jot down a note or something quick like that.
Samsung has started out the year with 1 million Galaxy Note sales under its belt. If you feel like getting touchy-feely (touching youuuuou, touching meeeee) then you also have the option of sauntering into an AT&T come February 19 and settling the decision then and there.
The Galaxy Note will cost you $300 on-contract.
Samsung’s next flagship smartphone needs to be huge, iPhone 4 huge. It needs to be as competitive as the Galaxy S II as its set to go head-to-head with the iPhone 5. But success won’t be found as easily this time. Samsung had nearly a full year to design and release Galaxy S II after the iPhone 4′s release. The company doesn’t have that luxury this time around.
South Korean news outlet Electronic Times News just published a report that pegs the S3 as a superphone on a diet. The report states that printed circuit boards, chips and connectors allowed for an overall thickness (or thinness) of just 7mm. That’s 1.9mm thinner than the current Galaxy SII — not that several millimeters really mater. But even though the phone is thinner overall, Samsung is reportedly packing their next flagship to the gills.
Inside the svelte body is a quad-core CPU of unknown pedigree or clock speed running Android 4.0. The new model will use the same 8MP camera as the S II, which will result in a slight extrusion on the phone’s backplate. Inside is the usually assortment of an LTE radio, WiFi, GPS, and, although not specifically mentioned in this report, NFC is highly likely. No word on screen size.
But early adaptors might want to hold off. Samsung is reportedly set to launch a large line of Galaxy S3 phones in 2012.
etnews states that Samsung is preparing several S3 flavors. One model will have a better camera and one will use a stylus (like the Note!). There will even be 3D variation. The exact release schedule is not mentioned but expect a steady stream of S3 phones this year and early next.
The Samsung Galaxy S II was a massive success but it could have been better. The company announced the phone at MWC in late February 2011 but it didn’t hit markets until May/June. The company is seeking to eliminate that lag by not launching the S3 at MWC this year. The phone will instead get its own event closer to launch, and if etnews is to be believed, the phone will be released this coming May.
The scene is set. The lines are drawn. The summer of 2012 is set to play host to a massive battle: the iPhone 5 vs the Samsung Galaxy S III. But don’t get caught up in the nonsense war. Stand on the sideline and watch as two, likely awesome, smartphones trade shots. In the end it doesn’t really matter. The consumer wins no matter what.
Samsung’s next flagship smartphone needs to be huge, iPhone 4 huge. It needs to be as competitive as the Galaxy S II as its set to go head-to-head with the iPhone 5. But success won’t be found as easily this time. Samsung had nearly a full year to design and release Galaxy S II after the iPhone 4′s release. The company doesn’t have that luxury this time around.
South Korean news outlet Electronic Times News just published a report that pegs the S3 as a superphone on a diet. The report states that printed circuit boards, chips and connectors allowed for an overall thickness (or thinness) of just 7mm. That’s 1.9mm thinner than the current Galaxy SII — not that several millimeters really mater. But even though the phone is thinner overall, Samsung is reportedly packing their next flagship to the gills.
Inside the svelte body is a quad-core CPU of unknown pedigree or clock speed running Android 4.0. The new model will use the same 8MP camera as the S II, which will result in a slight extrusion on the phone’s backplate. Inside is the usually assortment of an LTE radio, WiFi, GPS, and, although not specifically mentioned in this report, NFC is highly likely. No word on screen size.
But early adaptors might want to hold off. Samsung is reportedly set to launch a large line of Galaxy S3 phones in 2012.
etnews states that Samsung is preparing several S3 flavors. One model will have a better camera and one will use a stylus (like the Note!). There will even be 3D variation. The exact release schedule is not mentioned but expect a steady stream of S3 phones this year and early next.
The Samsung Galaxy S II was a massive success but it could have been better. The company announced the phone at MWC in late February 2011 but it didn’t hit markets until May/June. The company is seeking to eliminate that lag by not launching the S3 at MWC this year. The phone will instead get its own event closer to launch, and if etnews is to be believed, the phone will be released this coming May.
The scene is set. The lines are drawn. The summer of 2012 is set to play host to a massive battle: the iPhone 5 vs the Samsung Galaxy S III. But don’t get caught up in the nonsense war. Stand on the sideline and watch as two, likely awesome, smartphones trade shots. In the end it doesn’t really matter. The consumer wins no matter what.
Today, Rdio is releasing a brand new application for Android phones chock-full of fresh features, which is awesome. Mainly because it gives me an excuse to write up a related rant I would have published at some point anyway.
But let’s get the new Android app part out of the way first:
“The new app offers intuitive navigation with one-click access to features previously available on Rdio for Android, along with several new enhancements and key features including collection, playlists, new releases, top charts, recommendations, and support for Android Ice Cream Sandwich’s new remote control client.
Now Android users not only have easy access to Rdio’s catalog of more than 12 million songs, they can also take advantage of Rdio’s rich social features and extensive music discovery options.”
Great. Swell. Cool. If you’re an Android phone user. Which I’m not, at least not anymore.
A few months ago I started using Nokia’s Lumia 800 as my primary smartphone. One of the apps I really need on any platform happens to be Rdio, which I gladly pay for every month. There has been an official WP7 Rdio app since November 2010, so no problem. At least, it shouldn’t be a problem.
Instead, it’s a major source of daily frustration. You see, the Rdio app for Windows Phone has one fatal flaw: it doesn’t actually play music. It also doesn’t go out to buy my groceries for me, nor does it clip my toe nails, but the point is that I have a right to be flabbergasted by its lack of music playing ability. You know, because I pay the company for being able to play music on my phone.
Not for crashing apps. Not for playlists, albums and songs that never load. Not for ‘black screens of death’ while I’m discovering new music. Not for half-assed offline syncing features.
Browsing the company’s help forums, it seems I’m not the only one who’s frustrated by the extremely poor quality of Rdio’s Windows Phone app (with some people even taking to canceling their subscriptions as a result of their justifiable dissatisfaction).
For months, Rdio employees have been promising complainers that the issues will be resolved on those very forums, but so far these promises have not been kept. I mean, they’re still asking users to restart their devices to see if that fixes the problem. Well, it doesn’t.
Rdio folks, please just look at those ratings and user reviews on WP Marketplace, and be ashamed.
Look, I get it. I’m in the minority as a Windows Phone user, and there’s no critical mass in sight yet. You have every right to focus your development efforts on apps for iOS and Android, given that most of your users likely use devices that run those operating systems. It’s a sensible thing to do.
The thing is, I’m a paying customer. I fork over $9.99 a month to access my Rdio account on the Web, my Sonos system and my phone. That phone happens to be a Windows Phone device, which you built an app for, which you’re actively advertising on your website. Yet, it’s helplessly broken.
The Spotify app for Windows Phone, meanwhile, works perfectly.
There’s absolutely no reason for me to put up with this, and I’m close to canceling my subscription over this. Not really because your Windows Phone app has issues, which is understandable, but because you’ve demonstrated clearly that you do not care about repairing them and giving your paying customers any reasonable indication of how to fix it themselves, or when a problem-fixing update will finally make its way to the Marketplace.
My view is this: either you develop an app for a mobile platform and proudly commit to enhancing and supporting it over time, and fixing problems that may arise within a reasonable timeframe, or you stay away from that platform entirely. I don’t know or care if Nokia or Microsoft paid you to build the app, but you should hang your heads in shame for offering it to users in its current state.
Rant over, for now. But hey, at least the new Android app apparently rocks, right?
Mobeam, the San Francisco-based startup whose technology enables mobile phones to interact with laser scanners at the point of sale, has added another $1.5 million to its Series A round. The company had previously raised $4.9 million in October 2011.
The round includes new investor DFJ Athena, a Korea-focused venture fund affiliated with Draper Fisher Jurvetson, and brings in new funds from existing investor and board chairman, Ben DuPont.
Also announced today, DFJ Athena’s founder and managing director, Perry Ha, will join Mobeam’s board of directors.
The funding follows the company’s announcement in December of a partnership with Procter & Gamble for a pilot program which brings a fully mobile couponing system to U.S. consumers. The technology developed by Mobeam involves a patented way to beam barcodes from a phone’s screen which can be read by normal laser scanners like those found at the point-of-sale.
Due to the way mobile handset screens are constructed, they can’t be read by the commonly used scanners found at checkout. Mobeam’s technology instead uses the LEDs already present on many mobile handsets to transform barcodes into beams of light that any laser scanner can read.
Mobeam says it’s using the new funding to help establish its technology, called light-based communications (LBC), as a new industry standard. It’s also planning to advance its business development efforts with major retail and consumers brands for mobile couponing and other initiatives.
It’s hard not to love the Galaxy Nexus, even if you’re not a Fandroid. With a 4.65-inch 720p display, a 1.2GHz dual-core processor and Android 4.0 ICS to boot, what’s not to love?
Well, if you’re being picky, perhaps you’re yearning for a white GalNex, in which case I have good and bad news. Which do you want first?
The good news is that the white Galaxy Nexus is indeed an official product and it will be available on February 13, which gives you a whole day to use a combination of Google Wallet and Fab to find your sweetheart a nice Valentine’s Day gift.
The bad news is that, according to TrustedReviews, the white GalNex is only available to the UK this week. (Bad news for us, anyways.)
Wait, there’s one extra bonus bit of good news: If you have enough dough, the white GalNex is has a pentaband HSPA+ radio, meaning it will work on both AT&T and T-Mobile’s networks. And by “enough dough”, I specifically mean at least £496.79 ($770), which is what the 16GB model seems to be going for over at UK online retailer Handtec.
Past it’s pale appearance, all the specs will remain the same between the black and white models. However, if you happen to remember when we first noticed the white Galaxy Nexus, you’ll recall that the render within the post showed an all-white bezel. That isn’t the case with the official version, as the front bezel of the phone is still solid black and the back portion of the phone is white.
Forget about the Lumia 900 for a minute. Nokia just announced white Nokia Lumia 800 is finally on the release block and scheduled to hit stores later this month. Availability will be limited to Europe initially but it will eventually hit other countries as well.
Other than the stark white exterior, it’s essentially the same phone as its colored counterparts. The albino edition (not the official name) still has the same 3.7-inch screen, 16GB of storage, 1.4GHz processor and WinPhone 7.5 operating system.
Nokia didn’t go into pricing details, probably because the phone is set to hit so many different markets, each with a different pricing strategy. However, Nokia has seemed to stress affordability with their Windows Phones so far so this white edition will likely follow the same mantra. Alright, enough with the Lumia 800, bring on the 900!
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