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Thursday, March 31, 2011

Microsoft skewers Google in EU antitrust complaint (AP) : Technet

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Microsoft skewers Google in EU antitrust complaint (AP) : Technet

Microsoft skewers Google in EU antitrust complaint (AP)

Posted: 31 Mar 2011 02:34 PM PDT

By GABRIELE STEINHAUSER and MICHAEL LIEDTKE, AP Business Writers Gabriele Steinhauser And Michael Liedtke, Ap Business Writers – Thu Mar 31, 5:34 pm ET

BRUSSELS – Microsoft Corp. escalated its attack on Google Inc. by complaining to European regulators Thursday that its fiercest rival is an Internet bully that abuses its dominance of online search and advertising.

The allegations against Google crystallize the piecemeal gripes that Microsoft has been making about Google's business practices for the past few years. It's also an ironic twist for Microsoft, whose control over how software operates on most personal computers has made it a frequent target of the types of complaints it's now making against Google.

This marks the first time that Microsoft has lodged a formal antitrust complaint with a government agency against one of its own rivals.

In doing so, Microsoft hopes to encourage the European Commission to dig deeper into an investigation opened four months ago into Google's business practices.

The European inquiry was spurred by complaints made by several smaller websites. They contended Google was unfairly burying them in search results and highlighting the company's own services instead.

The sites behind the initial complaints included Ciao, an online-shopping site owned by Microsoft, and Foundem, a price-comparison site that belongs to a technology trade association backed by Microsoft.

Given that, Google said Microsoft's latest complaint was unsurprising.

"We continue to discuss the case with the European Commission, and we're happy to explain to anyone how our business works," Google spokesman Al Verney said.

Although the specifics of Thursday's European complaint were confidential, Microsoft General Counsel Brad Smith outlined the basics in a blog posting.

Microsoft has made most of these accusations before in public statements or forums.

It contends Google is making it difficult for mobile phones that rely on its Windows software to access Google's YouTube video site. Google is promoting its own phones software, Android, and has been accommodating with Apple Inc.'s iPhone, according to Microsoft. Google CEO Eric Schmidt was on Apple's board when the iPhone was introduced in 2007.

Microsoft also accused Google of making it difficult for advertisers to transfer their data used to manage online marketing campaigns to rival search engines. And Microsoft said Google has programmed its search formulas in ways that drive up prices that its rivals have to spend to buy ads shown alongside Google's search results.

The complaint also paints Google as a hypocrite. Microsoft says Google has made it increasingly difficult for Microsoft's Bing and other search engines to index the videos on YouTube, an apparent contradiction to Google's crusade to make content openly accessible.

Google has been particularly critical of Facebook's refusal to open up data within its social network. Microsoft owns a 1.6 percent stake in Facebook, and Bing has been granted better access to Facebook profiles.

"Unfortunately, Google has engaged in a broadening pattern of walling off access to content and data that competitors need to provide search results to consumers and to attract advertisers," Smith wrote in his blog post.

Microsoft has a business incentive to undermine Google, which processes about two out of three every search requests in the U.S. and an even higher ratio in other parts of the world, including many countries in Europe.

After investing billions in its search technology during the past few years, Microsoft is desperate to close the market gap. Toward the end, Microsoft teamed up with Yahoo Inc. last year and, together, they now have nearly 30 percent of the U.S. market.

To protect its search engine, Google previously has complained about the way Microsoft had set up its market-leading Web browser, Internet Explorer, to make it less likely that people would install software known as toolbars from competitors.

"Antitrust has become a competitive weapon used by both companies," said Boston University law professor Keith Hylton, who specializes in antitrust issues. "This is troubling because you never know quite what to make of the complaints."

Previous complaints against Microsoft had thrust that company into a court battle with the U.S. Justice Department in the late 1990s. European regulators have imposed heavy fines for anticompetitive practices involving its Windows operating system and Internet Explorer.

Google has been fined in France and admonished in Canada for inadequate privacy controls but so far hasn't been penalized in an antitrust investigation. If European regulators conclude Google engaged in anticompetitive behavior, it could fine the company up to 10 percent of annual revenue, which is expected to surpass $35 billion this year.

Microsoft's move could exacerbate the legal and public-relations troubles already facing Google, which is based in Mountain View, Calif.

The filing comes a week after a federal judge rejected a proposed legal settlement that would have given Google the digital rights to millions of out-of-print books. The judge concluded the agreement would have walled off its Internet search rivals from valuable content.

Meanwhile, the U.S. Department of Justice is reviewing whether Google's proposed $700 million acquisition of airfare tracker ITA Software would give it an unfair advantage in online travel.

Microsoft, which is based in Redmond, Wash., came out against both deals as part of broader coalitions.

The state of Texas is also looking into Google's business practices.

Microsoft's decision to get involved in Europe's Google probe is a natural step, said Federico Etro, an economics professor at the University of Venice who has studied the case.

But he doesn't see this as merely another round in the jousting between two companies that don't like each other. He said online search is very complex market, with multiple consumer and economic issues to sort out.

Shares of Microsoft fell 22 cents, or 0.9 percent, to close Thursday at $25.39, while Google shares rose $4.92, or 0.8 percent, to $586.76.

___

Michael Liedtke reported from San Francisco.

AP Interview: Catching up with Twitter's Biz Stone (AP)

Posted: 31 Mar 2011 01:40 PM PDT

By MICHAEL LIEDTKE, AP Technology Writer Michael Liedtke, Ap Technology Writer – Thu Mar 31, 4:40 pm ET

SAN FRANCISCO – When Twitter turned five years old on March 21, co-founder Isaac "Biz" Stone was on the road celebrating with some of the popular short messaging service's famous users. In the past two weeks, he has appeared on the shows of Conan O'Brien, Howard Stern and Martha Stewart among others. He also made a special stop in Chicago just to take out Twitter's employees there for drinks — a pastime he calls "beersonbiz."

It's a variation on Twitter's weekly employee meetings at its San Francisco headquarters. Although those gatherings are called "Tea Time," Stone told The Associated Press in a recent interview that everyone mostly consumes beer, salsa and chips. He also revealed another Twitter co-founder, Jack Dorsey, had become a regular Tea Time attendee in recent months, even though he technically wasn't working at the company. Dorsey's job status changed Monday when Twitter announced he is coming back to work as the company's executive chairman in charge of product development.

As Dorsey returned, Twitter's third founder, Evan Williams, confirmed he was moving on to explore new business ideas. Williams had stepped down as CEO six months ago and turned the job over to Dick Costolo.

Through it all, Stone has remained a constant, serving as the main face and social conscious of Twitter.

Here are excerpts from the interview with Stone the morning after his night on the town in Chicago.

Q: So you obviously think you can learn a lot about people over a few beers?

I think it's a really big deal to be able to meet people outside the context of something like a conference room or someplace where everything feels like it's formal talk. (Last night) I found out there is a dog named Twitter in a shelter in Chicago that needs adoption so we are going to try to work on that.

Q: You are a big dog lover, right? Has that been a lifelong thing?

Both my wife and I have a lot of compassion for animals in general. We had two rescue dogs for the past five or six years. One of them, Pedro, recently passed but we still have Maggie. We are always trying to get people to adopt a pet rather than buy a pet from a store.

Q: Any other pets?

We have two cats, we have a rescue tortoise. At any given point in time, my wife has bats, owls, gophers, whatever because she is a wildlife rehabilitator.

Q: Does that make for some interesting times around the house?

Yeah, I remember one time I was concerned there was this kind of weird smell in the hallway. I didn't want to complain to (my wife) Livvy because I knew she would just be like, "Clean it up." When she came home from work, I told her, "I don't want to complain. I just want to tell you there is a kind of weird smell downstairs." And she says, "Oh, that's probably the skunk in the guest room."

Q: Are you a big gadget guy?

Not really. The two things I use the most are the MacBook Air and my iPhone. Those are my two most-used gadgets that are dented, scratched and smashed.

Otherwise, I am not really obsessed with gadgets. If you came to my house, you wouldn't actually see anything. All the technology is hidden in my house. Even in the media room, everything is in a big chest so you can close it.

Q: Is that because you need a break from this wired world?

Yeah, it gives us some detachment. All day long, it's just computer screens and phone calls. When I come home, it's like traveling back in time. I will often read an old book out loud to Livvy while she is cooking dinner or something like that.

I love Sherlock Holmes, but I love any of these old stories where the writer was paid by the word so the adventures just continue forever. They are almost like they were meant to be read out loud.

Q: What's your advice about tweeting while drinking?

Oh, I would say definitely don't do that. That is like emailing while angry. You are better off saying, "You know what, I will just wait until tomorrow to see if it still seems like a good idea."

Q: Did you see "The Social Network?"

I did. The funny thing is my wife didn't want to go to it. But I did and it was the weirdest thing because when you order a ticket and say, "One for `The Social Network," you feel like you should have brought some friends with you.

Q: What did you think of the movie?

I thought it was a great movie. I am a fan of that style of fast-paced writing where you are challenged to keep up and where you are challenged to fill in the blanks. I recognized a lot of things. It also made me appreciate that we don't have those same kinds of issues.

Q: Do you think anyone should make a movie about Twitter's early days?

If they make anything, I think it should be a really bad sitcom on the CW. I don't think it's movie material. I think it's more like a good half hour, soap operatic sort of thing. It would probably get canceled after three episodes.

Q: Do you ever feel tempted to sell to a suitor?

No, we have created something that was much bigger and has more potential than we ever imagined. What we hadn't done is build a business on top of it. So we got the bug to really carry this through to prove we could. Once that switch flipped in our heads, it has become easier and easier to tell people, "Thank you for your interest, but we are not for sale."

Q: How is the whole moneymaking thing going for you?

It's going really well. We are taking this very slow and thoughtful approach to it, which is frustrating for some Twitter watchers who say, "Why don't you just blow it out?" But we really want to do it right. We are really thrilled with the early indications, but we have a ton more work to do there.

Q: When will Twitter go public?

I have no idea. Whenever I have that conversation, it's always with people outside the company. We are not even discussing that in the board meetings. We are still discussing product decisions. It feels weird. We have been around for five years, but it feels more like five minutes.

New memoir highlights tension between Allen, Gates (AP)

Posted: 31 Mar 2011 12:18 PM PDT

By BARBARA ORTUTAY, AP Technology Writer Barbara Ortutay, Ap Technology Writer – Thu Mar 31, 3:18 pm ET

NEW YORK – In a memoir out next month, Microsoft Corp. co-founder Paul Allen details tensions in his relationship with Bill Gates, including a scene from 1982, when he overheard Gates talking to current CEO Steve Ballmer about reducing Allen's stake in the company while he was undergoing cancer treatment.

"Unable to stand it any longer, I burst in on them and shouted, 'This is unbelievable! It shows your true character, once and for all.' I was speaking to both of them, but staring straight at Bill," writes Allen in the book, a part of which was published by Vanity Fair magazine online this week.

The book, "Idea Man," will be published April 19 by Portfolio/Penguin Group.

In the published excerpt, Allen chronicles the first time he and Gates met, in 1968. Allen was in the 10th grade and Gates, "all arms and legs and nervous energy," in the eighth.

"You could tell three things about Bill Gates pretty quickly. He was really smart. He was really competitive; he wanted to show you how smart he was. And he was really, really persistent," writes Allen, who left Microsoft in 1983.

From there on, Allen paints Gates as an ultra-focused micro-manager who expects nothing short of total dedication from his employees. Allen's memoir says Gates slowly tried to lower Allen's stake in the company while increasing his own, which may remind readers of a movie about more recent founding story, that of Facebook.

"From the time we'd started together in Massachusetts, I'd assumed that our partnership would be a 50-50 proposition. But Bill had another idea," writes Allen, adding that he later agreed to a 60-40 split of Microsoft, thinking it might be fair. Not long after, Allen writes that changed to 64-36.

In a statement, Bill Gates said "while my recollection of many of these events may differ from Paul's, I value his friendship and the important contributions he made to the world of technology and at Microsoft."

Microsoft, where Ballmer is now CEO, declined to comment.

Discord among co-founders of successful companies are common — about who should get what, who did the most work and ultimately who was responsible for the idea that led to the world-transforming product and the piles of money.

The founding story of Facebook — or at least one side of it — become one of Hollywood's most talked-about movies of last year. In "The Social Network," which Facebook dismisses as fiction, the younger Mark Zuckerberg is portrayed as an arrogant, socially awkward kid who ripped off the idea of Facebook and sold out his best friend to get ahead.

Judging by the Vanity Fair excerpt, "Idea Man" isn't all Microsoft high drama. Allen also writes about a dinner he had with Gates where Gates eats roast chicken with a spoon, and the time he gives Allen's wife, Rita, some fashion advice: "basically, to buy all your clothes in the same style and colors and save time by not having to match them. For Bill, that meant any sweater that went with tan slacks."

___

Online:

http://www.vanityfair.com/business/features/2011/05/paul-allen-201105

U.S. Government Open-Sources IT Dashboard to Help Cut Tech Costs (Mashable)

Posted: 31 Mar 2011 03:12 PM PDT

Jolie O'Dell Jolie O'dell – Thu Mar 31, 6:12 pm ET

The United States government has made its IT Dashboard, a cost-cutting tool for federal transparency, freely available for anyone, especially other governments, to use and customize.

The IT Dashboard gives citizens important information on how the government uses tax money for technology initiatives across various agencies. Citizens can see how government investments are paying off, and they can compare types of IT spending over time by accessing easy-to-reach charts and graphs.

But this clarity of and access to vital information isn't just good for citizens; it's also used by the Federal Government, including Congress, to make important decisions about IT budgets and spending. Open-sourcing this cost-saving tool is part of the government's larger plan to save on IT by eliminating redundant efforts. In other words, the IT Dashboard already exists and has been paid for, and the government isn't going to hide that light under a bushel.

Here's a video demonstrating some of the features of the federal IT Dashboard:

The government is working with Code for America for this release. In am announcement, CfA said, "The IT Dashboard was a major component of the process the Federal Government employed to save over $3 billion in just its first two years of deployment."

In addition to the Dashboard, the government is also open-sourcing the complementary TechStat Toolkit, a set of tools and processes for reviewing any yellow or red flags that might pop up while using the Dashboard.

In this video, U.S. CIO Vivek Kundra talks about the results the government has seen by using the IT Dashboard and how those results were achieved:


But open-sourcing something like this isn't a cakewalk. The government worked with FOSS and government experts, Code for America and CfA's Civic Commons project to get the job done.

Project lead Karl Fogel wrote on the Civic Commons blog, "We knew from the beginning that a high-profile project can't be open sourced casually. It's not enough to just put an open license on the code, move development out to a publicly visible repository, and call it done."

He continued to note that for the Dashboard, Civic Commons had to ensure that all the code and documentation was safe for public use (i.e., not classified or a government secret) and audit the code; reduce dependencies on proprietary libraries; write documentation; ceate non-sensitive, non-classified sample data; work with the Drupal community; and much more.

Interested parties can download the Dashboard code now at SourceForge. While the Dashboard is intended to help governments cut costs and manage IT budgets, we can see such tools coming in handy at just about any large company, tech or otherwise.

Image courtesy of iStockphoto, GottfriedEdelman

China report claims Google-linked firms broke rules (Reuters)

Posted: 31 Mar 2011 08:22 PM PDT

By Chris Buckley Chris Buckley – 40 mins ago

BEIJING (Reuters) – Chinese authorities found three companies linked to Google Inc broke tax rules and are investigating possible tax avoidance, a Chinese state-run newspaper said on Thursday, raising the risk of fresh pressure on the Internet search giant.

Google, the world's largest Internet search company, said two of the companies named were its units, and a third was a separate firm that works closely with Google.

But Google denied the tax violations alleged in the Chinese-language Economic Daily.

"We believe we are, and always have been, in full compliance with Chinese tax law," Google said in a statement responding to Reuters' questions.

Even if the report is unfounded or embellished, it could bring fresh headaches in China for Google, which has gone through difficult times there since early last year when it quarreled with the one-party government over Internet censorship and hacking attacks.

China generates a small percentage of Google's revenues, but is the world's largest Internet market with more than 450 million users. The country's search market, dominated by homegrown Baidu Inc, was worth 11 billion yuan ($1.7 billion) in 2010 and is likely to grow by about 50 percent each year for the next four years, according to iResearch.

The Economic Daily said that the three companies investigated and punished were "Google enterprises in China".

"The taxation authorities have already investigated and punished the three companies according to the law," said the report on its front page.

The companies were accused of presenting false and unjustified claims to the total value of 40 million yuan ($6 million), said the report. It did not say when the claimed violations are alleged to have happened.

"It is understood by this reporter that the taxation authorities are further investigating Google businesses in China on suspicion of tax avoidance," said the brief story, which was also later reported by China's official Xinhua news agency.

A Google spokesperson said the two of the accused companies -- Google Information Technology (China) Co, Ltd, and Google Information Technology (Shanghai) Co, Ltd -- were its sub-units.

It said the third company named, Google Advertising (Shanghai) Co, Ltd, was a separate firm that works "closely with Google as Google's sole first-tier reseller in China" of advertising on the search engine's web pages.

"Most foreign companies in China, especially high-profile companies with a global reputation at stake, are pretty careful to make sure they are in full compliance with the relevant tax laws," said Mark Natkin, managing director of Marbridge Consulting, a Beijing-based company that advises investors about China's Internet and telecommunications sectors.

China's Foreign Ministry would not comment directly about the report. "Generally speaking, any companies operating abroad should obey the laws and regulations of the host country," said the ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu.

RUN-INS CONTINUE

The report appeared after Google again clashed with the Chinese government over Internet censorship.

Earlier this month, Google said any difficulty that users in China may have faced opening its email service were likely the result of government blocks.

China's ruling Communist Party has intensified censorship in recent months, fearing that calls for protests inspired by anti-authoritarian uprisings across the Middle East and north Africa could gather momentum.

Google's serious run-ins with the Chinese government began in January 2010, when the company said it was no longer willing to censor search results in the country. Previously, the company included a disclaimer on its China service that searches may not be complete because of local laws.

Searches for terms deemed sensitive by Chinese censors are routinely blocked. Chinese search engines such as that offered by Baidu already voluntarily filter searches.

Google also said it had uncovered sophisticated China-based attacks on human rights activists using its Gmail service around the world. The censorship and hacking dispute became a diplomatic sore point in Sino-U.S. relations.

After months of quiet wrangling with Beijing, Google altered its main Chinese-language search page so that inquiries are redirected to a site in Hong Kong.

That means Google searches from within China are still censored by the government's "Great Wall" of Internet filters, but the company no longer plays a direct role in that censorship.

(Additional reporting by Sally Huang, Sabrina Mao and Ben Blanchard in BEIJING and Melanie Lee in SHANGHAI; Editing by Lincoln Feast)

Google foe won't take "no" on Buzz cash (Reuters)

Posted: 31 Mar 2011 08:22 PM PDT

By Dan Levine Dan Levine – 40 mins ago

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – An internet privacy group that prodded U.S. regulators to scrutinize Google Inc is miffed about getting cut out of a class action settlement over the search behemoth's Buzz social network.

The Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) objected to the settlement in a court filing this week, claiming Google and others decided to fund groups already benefiting from the company's largesse.

EPIC, led by prominent privacy advocate Marc Rotenberg, filed a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission last year, saying Buzz threatened the privacy of Gmail users. Google settled with the FTC on Wednesday and agreed to independent privacy audits.

Google also agreed last year to resolve a separate class action lawsuit brought by a Gmail user. Part of that deal provided for more than $6 million to be distributed to groups advocating for internet privacy issues.

EPIC requested $1.75 million and while Google and plaintiff lawyers doled out money to groups like the American Civil Liberties Union, the Electronic Frontier Foundation and the Brookings Institution, EPIC did not get a cent. A federal judge will have to sign off on the disbursement plan.

EPIC and a handful of other groups objected in a court filing Wednesday, saying the majority of funds would be allocated to groups that "receive support from Google for lobbying, consulting, or similar services."

However, EPIC did not specify which of the groups provided lobbying services. Rotenberg declined to comment.

A Google representative also declined to comment, while plaintiff lawyers could not be reached.

The court should reject a deal "that encourages organizations to stand by quietly while others do the actual work of safeguarding internet privacy," EPIC said in its filing.

The case in U.S. District Court, Northern District of California is In Re Google Buzz User Privacy Litigation, 10-672.

(Reporting by Dan Levine; Editing by Richard Chang and Matt Driskill)

Theater owners fuming over studios' VOD plan (Reuters)

Posted: 31 Mar 2011 08:25 PM PDT

By Pamela McClintock Pamela Mcclintock – 38 mins ago

LAS VEGAS (Hollywood Reporter) – Feeling blindsided, theater owners were furious Thursday that four Hollywood studios didn't brief them on plans to launch a new premium video-on-demand (VOD) service on DirecTV late next month, followed swiftly by Comcast and VUDU.

Exhibitors could respond by changing how they book films and play trailers.

Adding to their ire, word of the service broke just as exhibitors and studios were together in Las Vegas for CinemaCon, the annual convention of theater owners. Throughout Caesars Palace, home of the show, meetings between distributors and exhibitors ended abruptly as theater owners scrambled to make sense of the news.

Warner Bros., Fox, Sony and Universal are all on board, according to insiders. The movies will be available 60 days after their release in theaters for $29.99. Fox Searchlight titles will be offered 60 days from the date that they go wide.

Theater owners say the shortening of the theatrical window could damage their business. Today, the average window is 120 days, although exhibitors have been amenable to a 90-day window in some cases.

"(T)he length of a movie's release window is an important economic consideration for theater owners in whether, how widely and under what terms they book a film," National Association of Theater Owners president/CEO John Fithian Fithian said in a statement.

While exhibitors knew there were discussions going on between the studios and DirecTV, they didn't know the deal had been finalized. They say the studios had assured them they'd be kept in the loop.

"Theater operators were not consulted or informed of the substance, details or timing of this announcement. It's particularly disappointing to confront this issue today, while we are celebrating our industry partnerships at our annual convention -- CinemaCon -- in Las Vegas," Fithian continued.

"In the end, the entire motion picture community will have a say in how the industry moves forward. These studios have made their decision in what they no doubt perceive to be their best interests. Theater owners will do the same."

Theater owners aren't likely to speak out themselves until early next week, after they've returned home and checked with their boards. They always have the option of refusing to play a film.

Throughout the history of the film business, there have been dramatic showdowns between theater owners and studios over the window issue.

While DirecTV will offer the service to its to customers nationwide, Comcast and VUDU will do so only in select markets, at least initially.

Studios are hoping that premium VOD can help offset the decline of the DVD business, once a major source of revenue. Some in the industry question whether consumers will want to pay up to $29.99 for a movie when the average movie ticket costs almost $8. There's also concern over piracy. Paramount isn't taking part in the premium VOD service because of this issue.

MLB takes notice of the Android just in time for 2011 season (Appolicious)

Posted: 31 Mar 2011 06:15 PM PDT

Parody blooms on Twitter (AFP)

Posted: 31 Mar 2011 07:19 PM PDT

by Chris Lefkow Chris Lefkow – 1 hr 45 mins ago

WASHINGTON (AFP) – Twitter is becoming the place for parody with a cast of characters that includes an elusive cobra, a tipsy Queen of England, a profanity-spewing US politician and a maladroit BP spokesman.

The latest entry in the Twitter comedy sweepstakes was @BronxZoosCobra, a Twitter feed which purported to be that of the Bronx Zoo's escaped Egyptian cobra that amassed more than 200,000 followers in less than four days.

The venomous snake may have been captured in the Reptile House on Thursday but not before delighting its legions of followers with its adventures in New York City and its witty tweets.

"Leaving Wall Street. These guys make my skin crawl," the snake hissed on one of its first days of freedom.

Continuing its tour of the Big Apple, @BronxZoosCobra reported it was "On top of the Empire State Building! All the people look like little mice down there. Delicious little mice."

For doubters in the Twittersphere, it provided an explanation on just how a serpent tweets.

"A lot of people are asking how I can tweet with no access to a computer or fingers," @BronxZoosCobra said. "Ever heard of an iPhone? Duh."

Among the many followers of the tweeting cobra was New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who referred to the snake on his @MikeBloomberg Twitter account on Wednesday.

"Today President Obama and I toured NYC's Museum of Natural History. We saw a 94 foot whale, but not @BronxZoosCobra," Bloomberg said.

The @BronxZoosCobra also spawned a host of other Twitter accounts including one from a honey badger at the Bronx Zoo -- @BronxZooHBadger -- which claimed to be stalking @BronxZoosCobra around the city.

Reptiles are not the only comedians on Twitter.

There are scores of accounts impersonating celebrities and politicians, some, deservedly, with only dozens of followers while others have tens of thousands.

An account that has drawn more than 161,000 fans is @Queen_UK, which affectionately pokes fun at the Queen of England, portraying her as a benevolent leader with a taste for gin.

In between lampooning Britain's politicians and the weather, she also targets England's traditional rivals, the French.

"Sarkozy on the phone. He's sent two planes to Libya to assist in the evacuation. Good of him to make the entire French Airforce available," she tweeted recently.

On a rare sunny day in London, she fired off: "In celebration of British sunshine, one is declaring an early Gin O'Clock. Home time boys and girls."

While @Queen_UK is unfailingly genteel, on the other side of the Atlantic is @MayorEmanuel, the parody account of famously foul-mouthed Rahm Emanuel, the former White House chief of staff who was elected mayor of Chicago in February.

Virtually every tweet in the @MayorEmanuel account was punctuated by an expletive or two and the feed drew nearly 50,000 followers until the author outed himself the day after the election and shut it down.

The real Rahm Emanuel confessed to being a fan of his imitator even if his own much less colorful Twitter account -- @RahmEmanuel -- was followed by far fewer people.

One of the earliest and cleverest parody accounts on Twitter was @BPGlobalPR, which claimed to be British Petroleum's public relations department during last year's massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

It relentlessly parodied BP's efforts to spin the disaster with tweets dripping with satire.

"Please do NOT take or clean any oil you find on the beach. That is the property of British Petroleum and we WILL sue you," said one.

"Thousands of people are attacked by sea creatures every year. We at BP are dedicated to bringing that number down. You're welcome!" said another.

HTC Android Tablet: The Pen Makes It Special (PC World)

Posted: 31 Mar 2011 03:07 PM PDT

Jeff Bertolucci Jeff Bertolucci – Thu Mar 31, 6:07 pm ET

HTC has posted a new promotional video for its upcoming Android tablet, which will either be named the Flyer--its moniker in the video--or the smartphone-like Evo View 4G when it arrives this summer.

As tablets go, the specs for the Flyer (I like this name better, so I'm sticking with it) are impressive but far from unique: a 7-inch, 1024-by-600 display; 1.5GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon processor; 1GB of RAM; 32GB of internal memory; a microSD card slot; and dual cameras (5-megapixel rear, 1.3-megapixel front).

Nice, yes, but not unique enough to win a specs battle against the iPad 2 and umpteen other Android tablets that will ship this year. What makes the Flyer unique is its pen-input feature. OK, I know what you're saying. A stylus? Pen input? That's so ten years ago. Didn't Microsoft and others try and fail at pen-based tablets sometime last century?

In the consumer market, tablets never caught on until Apple launched the iPad in 2010. And as we all know, the finger-friendly iPad most definitely does not require a stylus.

But despite the woeful history of pen-based tablets, HTC is giving it another go with the Flyer. There's an important distinction between the Flyer and the failed tablets of yesteryear, however. As PCWorld's Mark Sullivan made clear in February when he got a sneak peak at the Flyer at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, the new HTC slate is really a touch tablet that does a few pen-based tricks:

"Don't worry, you don't need [a stylus] to operate the device. The pen is used mainly in the Notes app: you can draw out ideas whiteboard style-and talk while you're doing it-and the app records everything that happens," he wrote.

If one can trust HTC's promo video, the Flyer's pen implementation looks pretty slick.   The abilities to notate in ebooks, comment on documents and Web pages, and sign contracts with a stylus add a new layer of functionality to today's tablets. A pen is also better for many drawing and photo-editing tasks, as the video carefully illustrates.

As much as I like the touch-based iPad--and to a lesser degree, the Samsung Galaxy Tab--I've felt that some tools would benefit from a more precise input device (e.g., a stylus). It'll be interesting to see if HTC's pen-input makes the Flyer a standout in an increasingly crowded tablet market.

Contact Jeff Bertolucci via Twitter (@jbertolucci) or at jbertolucci.blogspot.com.

New Google Tool Tells You How to Make Your Site Faster (Mashable)

Posted: 31 Mar 2011 02:30 PM PDT

Ben Parr Ben Parr – Thu Mar 31, 5:30 pm ET

Google has released Page Speed Online, a Google Labs project that analyzes any website for its speed and gives suggestions on how to improve it.

The experimental tool is straightforward to use; just type in a website and Google will come back with suggestions for how to improve that website's speed. The suggestions are ranked as either High, Medium or Low. In addition, Google displays which rules of thumb a website is already following. Each website also gets an over score out of 100.

Here are a few examples of site issues that Google says might be slowing down your site:

  • High Priority: Enable Keep-Alive and leverage browser caching.
  • Medium Priority: Combine images into CSS sprites and minimize redirects.
  • Low Priority: Minify JavaScript and remove query strings from static resources.

While speed analysis tools have been around for years, Page Speed Online has a neat little trick; it can also analyze mobile websites for their performance. And rather than using the same set of suggestions for desktop websites, Google has a fresh set of suggestions for mobile site optimization.

Google has been consistently launching tools like Site Performance and its page speed Apache module in order to help speed up the web. The search giant has made speed one of its core missions because a faster web equals more revenue for Google.

Which of Google's rules for speed do you still have to implement? Let us know in the comments.

Image courtesy of Flickr, Eole

Another look at Apple’s Most Controversial Apps (Appolicious)

Posted: 31 Mar 2011 05:17 PM PDT

Vodafone (Investor's Business Daily)

Posted: 31 Mar 2011 03:25 PM PDT

– Thu Mar 31, 6:25 pm ET

Vodafone (NASDAQ:VOD - News), the U.K. wireless service provider, agreed to pay $5 bil cash to buy out Essar Group's 33% stake in their Indian joint venture. Vodafone originally paid $11 bil for a 67% stake in Hutchison Essar. Vodafone fell 1.5% to 28.75.

GarageBand '11 adds support for iPad files (Macworld)

Posted: 31 Mar 2011 03:47 PM PDT

Serenity Caldwell Serenity Caldwell – Thu Mar 31, 6:47 pm ET

When GarageBand for iPad arrived earlier this month, its laundry list of features included the ability to take projects you created on your iPad and open them in the desktop version of Apple's music-creation application. There was a catch, however: before that could happen, Apple needed to update GarageBand '11 to support that feature.

That update arrived Thursday in the form of GarageBand 6.0.2, which promises support for opening projects imported from GarageBand for iPad.

The 47MB update is available from Apple's Support Website as well as via Software Update. Note that after installing the update, if you try to open a project exported from the iPad version of the app, GarageBand will prompt you to download a second patch for compatibility. After everything's installed, GarageBand '11 will support opening any project you've exported from GarageBand for iPad, allowing you to expand upon your eight-track-maximum masterpiece.

In addition to support for iPad files, the 6.0.2 update claims to improve overall stability while tackling a number of other minor bugs.

You'll need to be running Mac OS X 10.6.3 or later to install the GarageBand update.

Updated at 3:53 p.m. to correct the maximum number of tracks allowed in GarageBand for iPad.

Remains of the Day: So sue me (Macworld)

Posted: 31 Mar 2011 04:30 PM PDT

Dan Moren Dan Moren – Thu Mar 31, 7:30 pm ET

Amazon does an about face on licenses for cloud music, and we go three for three in matters legal, including an eye-rolling patent suit against Apple and a surprise antitrust complaint. The remainders for Thursday, March 31, 2011 demand a retrial.

Amazon in Big Push to Clinch Music Deals (Wall Street Journal)

Amazon has apparently rethought its stream-first, don't-ask-for-licenses later approach to online music by, er, asking the music industry for licenses. They say it's better to ask forgiveness than permission, but given the record companies' history of extreme litigiousness, maybe that wasn't the best approach.

Exclusive: Apple Global Marcom VP Allison Johnson Leaving Company (All Things D)

The name Allison Johnson may not mean much to you, but as Apple̢۪s vice president of worldwide marketing she managed much of the company̢۪s iconic ads and other branding. Now Johnson is moving on from Apple and founding a marketing firm; we wish her the best and hope she doesn̢۪t have that Get a Mac music stuck in her head for the rest of her life.

AP, WaPo, Other Big Media Companies Send Cease & Desist Over Zite App (paidContent.org)

Several major content providers, including the AP and the Washington Post, have fired off cease-and-desist letters at iPad app Zite, which they claim is reformatting and republishing their content without permission. "Plus," one letter concluded, "how do you even pronounce 'Zite' anyway? Does it rhyme with 'kite'? Is it 'zeet'? What is up with these crazy app developers? Why can't they use real words?"

Apple, 31 other companies sued for patent infringement (The Loop)

Continuing in the legal vein, a company called H-W Technology sued Apple and 31 other companies on Wednesday over—you guessed it—a software patent. For what amounts, essentially, to a smartphone. Allow me to propose something I like to call Moren's Theory of Patent Trollosity: I posit that the trollosity (J) of a company suing over patents (r) is directly proportional to the number of companies sued times the vagueness of the patent (k) multiplied by the factorial of the number of lawsuits the company has previously filed (s!). Or, in other words, J=rks!

Adding our Voice to Concerns about Search in Europe (Microsoft on the Issues)

We're shooting for the courtroom trifecta: Microsoft, of all people, has filed a complaint with the European Commission over alleged antitrust violations by Google. Well. Isn't that the pot calling the kettle, uh, Microsoft?

Product News:

tappr.tv 3.0 - Version 3.0 of deeje's free iOS music visualization software lets you add visuals to music from your iPod library.

Boom 1.1 - An update to this Mac volume-boosting software can now boost audio in video files and save them, accept dragged-and-dropped folders and files, and adds channel balance support. $9.

Web Albums 2.1.2 - Pixite's Picasa client for the iPad has been updated with support for the iPad 2's cameras. $3.

Four New Features Coming to Ubuntu 11.04 'Natty Narwhal' (PC World)

Posted: 31 Mar 2011 04:30 PM PDT

Katherine Noyes Katherine Noyes – Thu Mar 31, 7:30 pm ET

The combination of Ubuntu Linux's growing popularity with all the big changes coming up in the next version mean that Natty Narwhal, or Ubuntu 11.04, might just be the most widely and anxiously anticipated release of the open source operating system ever.

Due to launch officially on April 28, Natty Narwhal will be the first version of Ubuntu to reflect a number of radical changes. The Wayland graphics system won't be ready in time, but 3D-enabled Unity has already replaced the GNOME shell as the default desktop interface, for example.

A 2D version of Unity is also available, and Ubuntu 11.04 uses the Compiz window manager rather than Mutter by default. LibreOffice is now included, and a raft of other changes are planned for the software as well. The first beta version of Natty Narwhal was just released on Thursday.

Meanwhile, news of several additional features has emerged in recent weeks that will likely further heighten anticipation of the final release. Here are the four that have most recently stood out.

1. Try Before You Buy

Starting with Ubuntu 11.04, the Ubuntu Software Center will reportedly let you test out applications without actually installing them, much the way Android users now can on the Amazon Appstore. A WebUpd8 video on YouTube demonstrates the new Ubuntu capability in action.

2. 'Love Handles'

Those using touchscreen devices will surely appreciate Ubuntu's upcoming "Love Handles," which are designed to make it easier to resize or move windows when using Ubuntu on a tablet or other touchscreen device. Available as a Compiz plug-in, Love Handles reportedly let users resize a window by tapping on arrows or grabbing a corner. An OMG! Ubuntu! video demonstrates how Love Handles work.

3. No Third-Party Installs by Default

After considering the possibility of enabling by default the option to "install third-party software" when installing Ubuntu, the Ubuntu Technical Board voted last week not to do that. Both legal and usability reasons were cited for voting down the proposed change.

"There is a low tolerance for failure in common and basic use cases," the board meeting notes explain. "In the world we want to get to, all the functionality users expect will be deliverable with open source software."

Flash, for example, will be downloadable from within Ubuntu, but the option won't be selected by default.

4. No More Netbook Edition

Finally, a few weeks ago we learned that Canonical is planning to discontinue its separate Netbook Edition of Ubuntu starting with the Natty Narwhal release. Rather, there will be a single core product that you run on "anything you like from a netbook to a notebook to a desktop," the company explained on a recent blog. Ubuntu Server, meanwhile, will be maintained separately.

Work has already begun, of course, on Ubuntu 11.10, or Oneiric Ocelot. But with so much exciting new functionality coming to Natty Narwhal, there's plenty to look forward to in the much closer future.

Follow Katherine Noyes on Twitter: @Noyesk .

Acer Must Look Beyond PCs After Lanci's Departure (PC World)

Posted: 31 Mar 2011 06:10 PM PDT

Agam Shah Agam Shah – 2 hrs 54 mins ago

In the wake of Gianfranco Lanci's departure as president and CEO on Thursday, Acer must move aggressively in the smartphone and tablet markets and step up its focus on enterprise PCs in order to remain a major player on the world stage, industry analysts said.

Lanci resigned from Acer over a conflict with the board about the best strategy for the company, including the importance of scale, growth, "customer value creation," and how to enhance its brand, Acer said in a statement. Acer Chairman J.T. Wang has stepped in as interim CEO until Acer finds a permanent replacement.

Analysts said Lanci's resignation may reflect a difference in opinion about how aggressively Acer should shift its focus from consumer PCs and pursue the markets for smartphones and tablet computers. Acer was one of the biggest sellers of netbooks, sales of which have been declining since Apple introduced the iPad last year.

In its statement Thursday, Acer highlighted the cautious approach it will take in the mobile device market.

"The personal computer remains the core of our business. We have built up a strong foundation and will continue to expand within, especially in the commercial PC segment. In addition, we are stepping into the new mobile device market, where we will invest cautiously and aim to become one of the leading players," Wang was quoted as saying.

The resignation came just under a week after Acer said revenue from PCs in the first quarter of fiscal 2011 would fall short of expectations due to weak demand in Western Europe and the U.S . Acer said PC revenue was showing declines of 10 percent from the fourth quarter of last year.

Since that announcement, Acer's stock has slumped 18 percent to Thursday's close of NT$60 (US$2.04) and Acer founder Stan Shih has called for changes in the company's focus. Shih, who is no longer involved in daily operations at Acer, was widely quoted by Taiwanese media as saying the company should increase emphasis on smartphones and tablets and other higher end mobility products, and less on PCs.

Acer will face challenges if it clings too hard to its traditional PC business, said Jay Chou, senior research analyst at IDC. Along with the decline in the netbook business, consumer spending on PCs has slowed, he noted.

Acer has been slower to move into tablets and smartphones than rivals such as Hewlett-Packard and Dell. And those companies are less exposed to shifting market trends due to their bigger share of the enterprise PC market, where sales are relatively stable with the corporate PC refresh cycle underway, Chou said.

The popularity of the iPad, as well as rival products running Google's Android software, has caused PC makers to rethink their strategies. PC powerhouses like Dell, HP and Lenovo all started shipping tablets to complement their PC offerings, and Acer itself also started shipping tablets earlier this month.

Acer must also step up its enterprise focus and be aggressive in selling higher-margin products such as servers, Chou said. Right now, Acer's servers go mainly into small- and medium-size businesses, and it will need to build up the infrastructure to support enterprise customers.

Lanci had been a proponent of Acer's enterprise push in the past, Chou noted. Acer acquired Gateway in 2007 to improve its access to commercial channels, although the company mostly failed to expand its sales of higher-margin products.

Stephen Baker , vice president of industry analysis at NPD Techworld, said it's hard to know exactly where the disagreement lay between Lanci and the board, but he too said it may have come down to how aggressively Acer should pursue non-PC markets.

"It's pretty apparent there was a dissension over the level of commitment to the PC business," Baker said.

Netbooks had been one of the biggest growth drivers for Acer over the last few years, and replacing that growth will be a challenge, Baker said. Beyond tablets, buyers are also ditching netbooks for aggressively priced laptops with full-size screens, Baker said.

Acer offers smartphones, but they should be more tightly integrated into the company's wider operations, Baker said. A big question also remains how much of an enterprise focus Acer wants to take as it diversifies.

An Acer spokeswoman declined to comment for the story, referring to the company's press release from earlier today.

"Acer needs a period of time for adjustment," Wang said in the statement. "With the spirit of entrepreneurship, we will face new challenges and look to the future with confidence."
at 9:34 PM

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