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Twitter must give user info in WikiLeaks probe (AP) : Technet |
- Twitter must give user info in WikiLeaks probe (AP)
- Apple fans line up to buy first batch of iPad 2s (AP)
- The Gadget Hound bids farewell (Ben Patterson)
- Memolane Creates an Automatic Scrapbook of Your Social Media Activity (Mashable)
- LightSquared Signs up Open Range for Rural Service (PC World)
- Apogee announces Mike, the studio mic for iOS (Macworld)
- Quake brings modern Tokyo to a standstill (AP)
- Twitter ordered to give WikiLeaks data to US (AFP)
- Dramatic Videos, Photos Emphasize Scope of Japanese Earthquake Tragedy (PC World)
- Google Helps Searchers Can the Spam (NewsFactor)
- PlayStation 2 games appear to be coming to Android (Appolicious)
- Apple vs. Microsoft: A tale of two mobile updates (InfoWorld)
- Made-for-Internet movie debuts on YouTube (AFP)
- Big crowds greet Apple's iPad 2 (Reuters)
- Microsoft Delays Phone 7 Update After Prior Snafu (NewsFactor)
- Wall Street Beat: IBM, Apple Riding High (PC World)
| Twitter must give user info in WikiLeaks probe (AP) Posted: 11 Mar 2011 04:09 PM PST ALEXANDRIA, Va. – A federal magistrate ruled Friday that prosecutors can demand Twitter account information of certain users in their criminal probe into the disclosure of classified documents on WikiLeaks. The prosecutors' reasons for seeking the records remain secret and it's unknown how important they are to the investigation of the largest leak ever of classified American documents. The Twitter users argued that the government was on a fishing expedition that amounted to an unconstitutional violation of their freedoms of speech and association. But in a ruling issued Friday, U.S. Magistrate Judge Theresa Carroll Buchanan said the government's request was reasonable and did nothing to hamper the Twitter users' free speech rights. "The freedom of association does not shield members from cooperating with legitimate government investigations," Buchanan wrote in her 20-page opinion. The efforts by the Twitter users marked the first legal skirmish in the Justice Department's criminal investigation of the WikiLeaks disclosures, but is unlikely to be the last. The Twitter users' lawyers, including the American Civil Liberties Union and the Electronic Frontier Foundation, have said they will appeal. Cindy Cohn, the Electronic Frontier Foundation's legal director, said she was troubled by several aspects of Buchanan's ruling, including a technical ruling that the Twitter users lack legal standing to challenge the judge's order at all and a ruling that keeps much of the case under seal. "What we don't know is who else they're trying to get information from," Cohn said. Prosecutors have said little about their case, though Attorney General Eric Holder has said that the leaks jeopardized national security and promised to prosecute anyone who violated U.S. law. Prosecutors submitted their rationale for seeking the Twitter accounts to Buchanan, but that submission remains secret. In her ruling Buchanan said only that she "remains convinced that the application stated 'specific and articulable' facts sufficient to issue" the order. Steven Aftergood, who works on government secrecy policy for the Federation of American Scientists, said the government's aggressive pursuit of the Twitter accounts reflects one of two possibilities. "Either the government is being extremely diligent in crossing every 't' and dotting every 'i'. Or the other possibility is that they have no case whatsoever and they're tallying up all conceivable leads," he said. "The information they're going to get from Twitter is indirect evidence at best." A federal law — the Stored Communications Act — allows prosecutors to obtain certain electronic data without a search warrant or a demonstration of probable cause. Instead, the government must only show that it has a reasonable belief that the records it seeks are relevant to an ongoing criminal investigation. Prosecutors said the law is used routinely in criminal investigations, and that the WikiLeaks investigation is no different from any other criminal probe. The U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of Virginia, which is investigating the WikiLeaks case, declined comment after Friday's hearing. Buchanan agreed with prosecutors, and said the Twitter users had no reason to expect that the information sought by prosecutors would be kept private. The order does not seek the content of the tweets themselves, which are already publicly disseminated. Instead, it seeks certain "non-content" information, like billing records and IP addresses associated with the accounts. "The Twitter Order does not seek to control or direct the content of petitioners' speech or association," Buchanan wrote. Lawyers for the Twitter users had argued that people would be less likely to speak freely if they knew that doing so could result in their being subjected to a government investigation. Twitter issued a statement Friday saying its policy "is designed to allow users to defend their own rights. As such, Twitter will continue to let the judicial process run its course." The original order issued by Buchanan in December 2010 at prosecutors' request sought account information from WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange and Pfc. Bradley Manning, who is being held at Quantico Marine Corps Base amid allegations that he leaked classified documents about the Iraq and Afghanistan wars to WikiLeaks. Three other accounts belonging to American Jacob Appelbaum, Dutch citizen Rop Gonggrijp and Birgitta Jonsdottir, a member of Iceland's parliament, were also targeted. Those three challenged the court order. Assange has contended that, as an Australian citizen, he is not subject to American law. Buchanan also rejected a request that would have required the government to disclose whether it sought similar records from other social networking sites like Facebook. |
| Apple fans line up to buy first batch of iPad 2s (AP) Posted: 11 Mar 2011 04:28 PM PST SAN FRANCISCO – The updated version of Apple Inc.'s iPad tablet computer went on sale Friday afternoon, and was greeted by the now-familiar lines of buyers outside Apple stores. The Cupertino company opened online sales of the iPad 2 at 4 a.m. Eastern time, well before they became available in East Coast stores at 5 p.m. They were set to go on sale nationwide at the same hour, local time. Apple fans, as usual, were eager to get their hands on the device as they waited at the company's Apple's Fifth Avenue store in New York. The line of customers, including some who traveled from Japan and Russia, snaked through the street-level plaza above the subterranean store while bystanders gawked at the crowd. Employees cheered from inside the store as iPad buyers entered. Alex Shumilov, a customer who traveled from Moscow to snag two iPads, emerged first, beaming while holding one tablet in each hand. The trendy device won't go on sale outside the U.S. for another two weeks. When the original version of the iPad debuted 11 months ago, Apple said it sold more than 300,000 in the first day. It ended up selling more than 15 million in the first nine months, including 7.3 million to holiday shoppers in the October-December quarter. The new iPad model comes with several improvements over the original version but the same price tag — $499 to $829, depending on storage space and whether they can connect to the Internet over a cellular network. Analysts believe the improvement would make it more difficult for rivals to break Apple's hold on the emerging market for tablet computers. The iPad 2 looks much like the first iPad, only with a sleeker, lighter body and a curved back. Among changes is the inclusion of cameras for videoconferencing, one on the front and one on the back. With the original iPad, Apple proved there is a large market for a tablet that's less than a laptop and more than a smart phone, yet performs many of the same tasks. Competitors including Dell Inc. and Samsung Electronics Co. have been trying to lure consumers with smaller tablets, without much success. In February, Motorola Mobility Inc.'s Xoom went on sale with a new version of Google Inc.'s Android software designed especially for tablets. Underscoring the importance of the iPad to the world's most valuable technology company, Apple CEO Steve Jobs emerged from a medical leave earlier this month to unveil the new version to bloggers and Apple enthusiasts. Jobs, 56, announced in January that he would take his third leave of absence in seven years to focus on his health. During that time, he has survived a rare but curable form of pancreatic cancer and undergone a liver transplant. After its U.S. launch Friday, the iPad 2 goes on sale March 25 in 26 other markets, including Mexico, New Zealand, Spain and other European countries. |
| The Gadget Hound bids farewell (Ben Patterson) Posted: 11 Mar 2011 08:11 AM PST Four years, 3,000+ posts, and more gadgets than you could shake a stick at—it's been a great run. And just think: when I first started blogging as Yahoo!'s resident Gadget Hound back in March of 2007, there were no Kindles, iPod Touches, Android phones, and yes, no tweets (well, not unless you count those from sparrows). Google was already huge, but Facebook wasn't—not yet, anyway. And Windows Vista was barely two months old. Believe me, writing about tech for Yahoo! has been a blast and an honor, and I'm proud to have been part of such an all-star team. But change is good, and about a month ago, I informed my super smart, tireless, and always supportive editors that I'd decided to move on. So this, dear readers, will be my last post as a full-time blogger for Yahoo! News. For those of you who followed my Gadget Hound blog regularly, thank you. I'm grateful to everyone who took the time to read my posts, e-mail a question or leave a comment. Your feedback, encouragement, and tough love has been inspiring and motivational, and I truly appreciate it. So, what's next for me? Well, vacation, for starters. After that, it's back to work as a freelance writer. And I've already got a project or two in the pipeline—and if you're interested, I'd love to tell you about them. So stay tuned to my Twitter feed and my personal Web site (here's the RSS link), and feel free to contact me directly. There are many people to thank. First, thanks to the current team here at Yahoo! News: Richard Vega, Jamie Mottram, Andrew Golis, Sam Silverstein, Leah Hitchings, Alex Romanelli, Mia Zuckerkandel, Oliver Libaw, Phat Chiem, Richard Eisenberg, Becky Worley, Daniel Garza, and Anna Robertson. Special thanks to Jennifer Karmon and David Caplan for their copy-editing skills over the past year. On the business side of things, thanks to Yahoo!'s Chris Hunter and my agent, Ted Weinstein. Then there's the original Yahoo! Tech crew, which welcomed me with open arms and immediately made me feel right at home: Pat Houston, Annette Cardwell, Laura Lindhe, Roger Hibbert, Alexander Yoon, Gina Hughes, Dory Devlin, Robin Raskin, Erica Smith, and James Hamilton. Thank you. I'd also like to tip my hat to Yahoo! Tech's first Gadget Hound, Tom Samiljan. And last but not least, many thanks to my former partner in tech-blogging crime, Christopher Null, who e-mailed me more than four years ago to see if I'd be interested in writing for Yahoo!. He promised I'd have a ball, and you know, he was right. Thanks again for reading, and keep in touch. Note: My departure from Yahoo! seems like (very) small potatoes compared to the terrible tragedy unfolding in Japan. "Today we are all Japanese," tweets George Takai, who urges us all to make a donation for disaster relief through the American Red Cross. — Ben Patterson is a technology blogger for Yahoo! News. This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| Memolane Creates an Automatic Scrapbook of Your Social Media Activity (Mashable) Posted: 11 Mar 2011 03:12 PM PST The Spark of Genius Series highlights a unique feature of startups and is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark. If you would like to have your startup considered for inclusion, please see the details here. Name: Memolane Quick Pitch: Memolane automatically creates a searchable, visual timeline using your history from various social media accounts. Genius Idea: If you want to record any aspect of your life in real-time, you have your pick of services: Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, Picassa, Instagram, Myspace, Foursquare, TripIt, SPotify, Last.fm, and Youtube, to name just a few. But if you want to reflect upon these moments that took so many taps to record, for the most part, you're out of luck. "There is a gap on the internet today that we are drowning in the success of social media services, capturing the moment, yet we are neglecting the opportunity to capture all of the great moments and make them memorable," explains Memolane co-founder Eric Lagier. His solution to this gap, which launched its public beta on Tuesday, compiles posts from all of your social media accounts into a searchable, scrollable timeline. When you want to remember, let's say, a vacation, you can search for that point in the timeline to see Foursquare check-ins, photos, videos and updates you made during that time period.
Lagier built the first version of the product at a hackathon. He says it's been useful during business trips to recall fond memories of his family, which the web app instantly provides when he types in their names. Beyond just recalling good times (or the name of that restaurant that you ate at last month) Memolane also enables users to collaborate on shareable "stories" by selecting posts from their timelines to create a scrapbook-like timeline for an event or topic. During SXSW, Memolane will be challenging conference attendees to build the best such story in order to win an iPad 2. As of now, the Denmark and San Francisco-based company has no defined plan for revenue intake and is running on a $2 million round of funding from August Capital and Atomico Ventures. The team's first priority at the moment is to create an API that will allow the platform to include even more social media accounts within its users personal timelines.
Image courtesy of iStockphoto, sjlocke
Series Supported by Microsoft BizSpark
The Spark of Genius Series highlights a unique feature of startups and is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark, a startup program that gives you three-year access to the latest Microsoft development tools, as well as connecting you to a nationwide network of investors and incubators. There are no upfront costs, so if your business is privately owned, less than three years old, and generates less than U.S.$1 million in annual revenue, you can sign up today. |
| LightSquared Signs up Open Range for Rural Service (PC World) Posted: 11 Mar 2011 05:20 PM PST Mobile startup LightSquared announced a deal with rural carrier Open Range on Friday that is designed to extend broadband into remote parts of the U.S. through satellite and terrestrial wireless networks. Under the proposed plan, the companies expect that Open Range would lease L-band satellite spectrum from LightSquared and resell the company's satellite-based mobile service, once it's launched. In addition, the companies would work together to build out Open Range's network and would have a reciprocal roaming agreement between their respective networks. The companies said they have reached an agreement in principle and expect to complete a definitive agreement soon. The announcement, which the carriers said represented a major step toward fulfilling the National Broadband Plan of the U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC), came a day after opponents of LightSquared's network plans formed the Coalition to Save Our GPS. The group charges that evidence shows LightSquared's network would interfere with GPS (Global Positioning System) because it would operate in the same frequency band at greater power. The FCC approved LightSquared's network plan partly on the basis that it would use satellites to bring Internet access to 100 percent of the U.S. LightSquared already has satellites in the air and plans to build an LTE (Long-Term Evolution) network, selling one or both types of services wholesale to other carriers rather than operating a retail business of its own. The Open Range agreement is the first deal with a retail partner that LightSquared has disclosed. The arrangement still needs to be reviewed by the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Rural Development Utilities Program, and the spectrum leases would have to be approved by the FCC. Open Range, which has already built a WiMax-based, branded broadband service for underserved rural markets, should be able to help LightSquared reach those areas. The companies characterized their agreement as a move that would help bring fast Internet access to consumers, businesses, tribal organizations, public safety and other users. But some critics have warned that LightSquared's base stations would interfere with GPS, and that the FCC should not have granted the company a waiver that it needed in order to build the network. On Thursday, 17 companies and industry associations involved with GPS formed the Coalition to Save Our GPS, which plans to fight the LightSquared initiative. The group includes GPS receiver vendor Garmin, positioning systems company Trimble Navigation, and heavy hitters including the Air Transport Association and the National Association of Manufacturers. On Friday, Trimble Vice President and General Counsel Jim Kirkland testified before the Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice and Science of the House Appropriations Committee on behalf of the coalition. "Initial technical analyses have shown that the distant, low-powered GPS signals would receive substantial interference from high-powered, close-proximity transmissions from a network of ground stations," Kirkland said in his testimony, according to the coalition. "The consequences of disruption to the GPS signals are far reaching, likely to affect large portions of the population and the federal government." Kirkland told the House panel that LightSquared's network should not be deployed without a guarantee that GPS won't be affected. When the FCC granted LightSquared's waiver, it tried to address such concerns by requiring that the carrier work with government agencies and the GPS industry to determine the potential for interference. That process is still under way. The GPS interference issue will be central to LightSquared's success, said analyst Jack Gold of J.Gold Associates. "If there's any significant amount of interference, the government's going to get involved and shut them down," Gold said. "Any time you've got a potential risk with a service that's that popular, then you've got a really serious issue." Deals with reseller partners such as Open Range will also be critical for LightSquared, which by the time it goes commercial will be trying to compete against LTE services from Verizon and AT&T and other fast networks at Sprint Nextel and T-Mobile USA. Clearwire, which was first to build a national 4G network, also relies largely on wholesale partners and is struggling financially. "LightSquared needs to go out and get a bunch of licensees so they can start making some money. They don't want to end up in the same situation Clearwire is in," Gold said. Stephen Lawson covers mobile, storage and networking technologies for The IDG News Service. Follow Stephen on Twitter at @sdlawsonmedia. Stephen's e-mail address is stephen_lawson@idg.com |
| Apogee announces Mike, the studio mic for iOS (Macworld) Posted: 11 Mar 2011 04:46 PM PST Looking to capitalize on the interest surrounding Garageband for the iPad, Apogee Electronics has announced the upcoming release of Mike, a studio-grade microphone for recording audio on the iPad, iPhone and iPod Touch. Mike is specifically designed to record vocals and acoustic musical instruments, Apogee says. It can also record voiceovers, interviews or podcast recordings with what the company bill as "pristine sound quality" thanks to PureDigital technology. At 4.5 inches tall, the Apogee is about the size of an iPhone or iPod touch. It doesn't require any configuration, and it features a multicolor LED for status indication and input level monitoring. Mike comes with its own mic clip and desktop stand. Some details left out of Friday's announcement—when Mike will be available and how much the microphone will cost. |
| Quake brings modern Tokyo to a standstill (AP) Posted: 11 Mar 2011 05:16 PM PST TOKYO – Japan's huge earthquake brought super-modern Tokyo to a standstill as it paralyzed trains that normally run like clockwork, crippled mobile phones, stranded hordes of commuters and trapped scores of people in elevators. The magnitude-8.9 quake that struck off the coast Friday afternoon and triggered a deadly tsunami in the northeast also violently shook buildings in the capital, where halted trains choked an evening commuter flow of more than 10 million people. "This is the kind of earthquake that hits once every 100 years," said restaurant worker Akira Tanaka, 54. He gave up waiting for trains to resume and decided — for his first time ever — to set off on foot for his home 12 miles (20 kilometers) north of the capital. "I've been walking an hour and 10 minutes, still have about three hours to go," he said. Tokyo prides itself on being an orderly, technologically savvy, even futuristic city. Residents usually can rely on a huge, criss-crossing network of train and subway lines. But authorities were forced to scan the entire web for quake damage and cancel nearly all trains for the rest of the day. Tomoko Suzuki and her elderly mother were unable to get to their 29th-floor condominium because of a stalled elevator. They unsuccessfully tried to hail a taxi to a relative's house and couldn't immediately find a hotel room in their neighborhood. "We are so cold," Suzuki said Friday evening on a crowded corner. "We really don't know what to do." Although there were no power outages in central Tokyo, some elevators may have been damaged in the quake while some others were intentionally shut down as a precaution. Elsewhere, widespread electricity outages left millions of homes and buildings without power. In all, 163 people were reported trapped in elevators throughout the country, the Transportation Ministry said, with 75 of them still stuck Saturday morning. It wasn't clear how many of those were in Tokyo. Tens of thousands of people milled at the capital's train stations, roamed its streets or hunkered down at 24-hour cafes, hotels and government offices offered as emergency accommodations. Mobile phone lines were crammed, preventing nearly all calls and text messages. Calls to northeastern Japan, where a 23-foot (7-meter) tsunami washed ashore after the quake, generally failed to go through, with a recording saying the area's lines were busy. Unable to rely on their mobile phones, people formed lines at Tokyo's normally vacant public phone booths dotting the city. Japan's top telecommunications company, Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corp., set up an emergency phone line and a special Internet site for people to leave messages for family and friends. Up to 90 percent of calls were being restricted to prevent telecom equipment from being overloaded, NTT spokeswoman Mai Kariya said. The company was checking on damage to towers and cables. Osamu Akiya, 46, was working in the office of a Tokyo trading company when the quake sent bookshelves and computers crashing to the floor and opened cracks in the walls. "I've been through many earthquakes, but I've never felt anything like this," he said. A handful of subway lines resumed service after a six-hour outage, and officials said they would run all night, past their usual hours. When Tokyo trains suffer rare problems, they usually are running again within an hour. So, many people initially waited at stations. But when the railway company announced a suspension of nearly all service for the day, crowds poured into the streets. City officials offered more than 60 government offices, university campuses and other locations for stranded commuters to spend the night. The Tokyo suburb of Yokohama offered blankets for people who wanted to sleep at the community's main concert hall. "There has never been a big earthquake like this, when all the railways stopped and so this is a first for us," Yokohama Arena official Hideharu Terada said. "People are trickling in. They are all calm." ___ Associated Press writers Yuri Kageyama and Tomoko A. Hosaka contributed to this report. |
| Twitter ordered to give WikiLeaks data to US (AFP) Posted: 11 Mar 2011 06:08 PM PST WASHINGTON (AFP) – A US judge ordered Twitter to hand over data of three users in contact with the controversial website WikiLeaks, rejecting arguments the move violated freedom of speech and privacy. President Barack Obama's administration obtained a court order last year seeking information from the Twitter accounts as it considers action against WikiLeaks, which has released a flood of secret diplomatic documents. One of the accounts belongs to an Icelandic lawmaker, Birgitta Jonsdottir. Iceland's foreign ministry in January summoned the US ambassador to express "serious concern" about the Twitter order. Magistrate Judge Theresa Buchanan, based in the Washington suburb of Alexandria, Virginia, rejected the argument made by the three Twitter users' that the order would have a "chilling effect" on freedom of speech. "The Twitter order does not seek to control or direct the content of petitioners' speech or association," she wrote. She said the three "already made their Twitter posts and associations publicly available" and voluntarily provided information to Twitter pursuant to the website's privacy policy. Buchanan also dismissed the argument that the order violated the Fourth Amendment to the US Constitution, which protects people against "unreasonable" searches. When the trio relayed information to Twitter, they gave up "any reasonable expectation of privacy," she said. WikiLeaks, which has strongly criticized the order, said that three Twitter users never worked for the site but that two helped make public a video that showed a 2007 US helicopter strike in Baghdad that killed several people. The footage appeared to show the Apache pilots mistaking a camera carried by an employee of the Reuters news agency as a rocket-propelled grenade launcher. WikiLeaks has since angered US authorities by posting secret documents on the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq and releasing a slew of internal correspondence among US diplomats around the world. Aden Fine of the American Civil Liberties Union, the rights advocacy group which defended the Twitter users, said they planned to appeal. "This is not the last word," Fine said. "This decision gives the government the ability to obtain private information about Internet communication in secret, except in extraordinary circumstances," he said. "That's not how our judicial system works and it shouldn't have been permitted here," he said. Fine said the Twitter users planned to take the case to a district judge. Buchanan is a magistrate, a type of legal officer who generally helps courts prepare for trials. Cindy Cohn, legal director of the Electronic Frontier Foundation which also backed the legal challenge, said that in an era in which third parties hold so much digital information, "the government can track your every move and statement without you ever having a chance to protect yourself." Besides Jonsdottir, the Twitter accounts belong to US computer researcher Jacob Appelbaum and Rop Gonggrijp, a Dutch volunteer for WikiLeaks. Buchanan rejected calls to drop the order in light of Jonsdottir's position as a foreign lawmaker. The order "does not seek information on parliamentary affairs in Iceland, or any of Ms. Jonsdottir's parliamentary acts. Her status as a member of parliament is merely incidental to this investigation," she wrote. The decision came amid growing controversy over the conditions in custody of Bradley Manning, 23, the soldier suspected of releasing the data to WikiLeaks. In a letter released Thursday, Manning said that he was treated improperly at the Quantico military base in Virginia, including being stripped at night. The State Department's chief spokesman, Philip Crowley, was quoted as telling a forum at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology that the treatment of Manning was "ridiculous and counterproductive and stupid." Obama told reporters he had inquired about Manning's treatment and that the Pentagon assured him it was "appropriate." |
| Dramatic Videos, Photos Emphasize Scope of Japanese Earthquake Tragedy (PC World) Posted: 11 Mar 2011 01:37 PM PST Yesterday's 8.9-magnitude earthquake in Japan has been captured on video by people all over the world on their smartphones and digital cameras. They're uploading to Twitter, YouTube, and CNN'S iReport, among many other sites. With the proliferation of camera phones in the last decade, people continue to single-handedly capture events like this one and the 2004 tsunami that killed hundreds of thousands. Today, we see that same thing happening. News agencies are posting user video and digital stills all over the Web in a fury to show people's first-hand accounts of the destruction. Here is a video from AlertNet showing the tsunami reaching the shore Here's a video from YouTube from user kirakirayuji, which shows a rattling house as a family tries to escape. And this video really shows the force of the quake. Directly after the quake, user escot2008 posted this video on YouTube of a group of skyscrapers swaying back and forth. The building appear to be built to sway, a modern earthquake engineering design that is used in many buildings, especially in California. A tsunami warning was issued and this model from the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) graphically shows the expected wave lengths of the tsunami as it moved across the Pacific after the giant earthquake. This startling image from the Twitter feed of adrianrhaas shows an aerial view of the Sendai Airport in Sendai, Japan, which was hit by the tsunami caused by the earthquake. And this twitpic by apricotvodka shows the tsunami rushing the shore. Posted on Gizmodo, but originating Hell For Leather , Jason Fullington, who was there, documented his experience surviving the earthquake from his office in Tokyo. He says, "At 2:46 p.m. Japan time it hit! When it started I thought it was just another tremor like we have frequently here. But it got strong and stronger. I was at my desk at the office just whipping through a few order rips for Icon Moto. My monitor would have fallen off the desk had I not grabbed it (it's a 40 inch TV monitor). This shaker kept building in strength, I have never felt one like this in 9+ years of living in Japan. I yelled to my staff, "GET OUT OF THE BUILDING NOW!" We all darted to the parking lot. And it was still shaking about 30 seconds into it! You could see the ground rolling, my van was literally jumping off the ground, car sirens blaring, telephone and electric poles waving violently." Read the full account. |
| Google Helps Searchers Can the Spam (NewsFactor) Posted: 11 Mar 2011 04:13 PM PST First Google made over its algorithm to deal with content farms. Now, the search engine giant is experimenting with another way to help you personalize your search results. This time, the aim is to help you block sites you don't want to see -- for whatever reason. "You've probably had the experience where you've clicked a result and it wasn't quite what you were looking for. Many times you'll head right back to Google," Amay Champaneria and Beverly Yang, search quality engineers at Google, wrote in a blog post. "Perhaps the result just wasn't quite right, but sometimes you may dislike the site in general, whether it's offensive, pornographic or of generally low quality." Blocking Porn The latter is what Google is working to address with a new option that blocks particular domains from future search results. The new feature is rolling out now on google.com in English for people using Chrome 9 or higher, Internet Explorer 8 or higher and Firefox 3.5 or higher. Here's how it works: When you click a result and then return to Google, you will find a new link next to "Cached" that reads "Block all example.com results." After you click the link, you will get a confirmation message, along with the opportunity to undo the ban if it was an accident. The blocked domains are connected to your Google Account, so you have to be signed in to use the new feature. "Once you've blocked a domain, you won't see it in your future search results," the Googlers wrote. "The next time you're searching and a blocked page would have appeared, you'll see a message telling you results have been blocked, making it easy to manage your personal list of blocked sites. This message will appear at the top or bottom of the results page depending on the relevance of the blocked pages." Staying Ahead of Bing Google said it's adding the feature based on the belief that giving you more control over the results you find will make for a better search experience. Essentially, Google is at once trying to address spam or low quality content and allow for greater personalization and user control, explained Greg Sterling, principal analyst at Sterling Market Intelligence. The innovation follows a toolbar plug-in recently introduced on Google's Chrome browser, where users can block sites, and a companion to the "farmer" algorithm update which seeks to demote and penalize low-quality sites. "Users who block specific sites will provide Google with valuable information about spam and low-quality domains that Google can factor back into its algorithm. It's real time human editing of search results," Sterling said. "Most people are unlikely to use the feature extensively but Google's audience is so larger that Google will receive a lot of data back. Ultimately Google is acting in its own self interest to protect the quality of page one search results and stay one step ahead of Bing." |
| PlayStation 2 games appear to be coming to Android (Appolicious) Posted: 11 Mar 2011 02:30 PM PST |
| Apple vs. Microsoft: A tale of two mobile updates (InfoWorld) Posted: 11 Mar 2011 01:37 PM PST San Francisco –  On the one hand, you have Apple, which quietly rolled out iOS 4.3 with the precision of a Swiss watch. The update came a day earlier than expected, in fact. Clearly, Apple has its mobile act together. It has its partners in lockstep. And it has seemingly maintained its typical shroud of silence and censorship to perpetuate illusion of perfection. Then there's Microsoft, which is handling the latest update to Windows Phone 7 with the precision of a digital watch you might purchase with a few cereal-box tops. The company has belatedly managed to push out an alleged February update to just some users and has further delayed a March update. But one thing you don't get from Microsoft is silence, just lots of excuses. Take this patch and shut up Part of Apple's ability to roll out an update early stems from its monopoly on what hardware runs iOS, as well as the fact that it doesn't rely on carriers to push out updates. But it's also pretty typical of Apple to be on the ball and stick to deadlines. It certainly has enough experience in the mobile space to have this down pat. Also typical of Apple, though, is its tendency to quash controversy by any means necessary. As reported by Sophos, the newest iOS release does not work on iPhones that predate the 3G S. This means users of the iPhone 3G don't benefit from "a number of critical security patches, some of which are designed to prevent vulnerabilities being exploited that could lead to malicious code being run on your iPhone or iPad." Whether or not Apple should be responsible for providing a security update for the iPhone 3G is a whole other debate, but evidently not one Apple wants to engage in or even see discussed. According to The Reg, the company has banned discussion of the subject from its online forums. We're sorry, but it's really not our fault In terms of excuses, Microsoft's general manager of customer experience engineering Eric Hautala lamented that pushing out an update is really, really hard when you have all these different hardware and carrier partners to sync up with. It's tough to muster too much sympathy for Microsoft here. In planning to re-enter the mobile fray, did the company fail to realize that, in addition to features like cut and paste, users would require timely updates? Can't a company with Microsoft's muscle and influence lean heavily on partners if they are, in fact, to blame for these delays? Speaking of excuses, Hautala also alluded to the February update that didn't quite reach for all users and that didn't quite work for those who attempted to install it. Well, there wasn't really an explanation as to what happened, but we're assured Microsoft is studying the process and will apply its lessons to future updates. Maybe after the delayed March update? To Microsoft's credit, it does seem to be accepting the slings and arrows from critics and dissatisfied users, such as this one from a user with the screen name vanmardigan: Eric and his team, and you and your PR staff, should apologize, for starters. Apologize for the missed deadlines, the bugs, the very serious issues being reported in these very comments. Then you'll give us a full change log of the update that's coming (allegedly) at the end of this month. Then, you will give us a target date, thank us for hanging tight and not throwing our phones out in the direction of Redmond. Then you will apologize again. The self congratulatory, condescending, long-form blog post above should never have been written. There is absolutely no new information in that blog post, nor is there any sort of action plan there that tells us users that you've got a fire lit under you that won't be extinguished until we are happy. This story, "Apple vs. Microsoft: A tale of two mobile updates," was originally published at InfoWorld.com. Get the first word on what the important tech news really means with the InfoWorld Tech Watch blog. For the latest business technology news, follow InfoWorld.com on Twitter. |
| Made-for-Internet movie debuts on YouTube (AFP) Posted: 11 Mar 2011 12:35 PM PST WASHINGTON (AFP) – YouTube on Friday began showing what it said was the first feature-length Hollywood movie created specifically for the Internet. "Girl Walks Into A Bar" is a comedy starring Carla Gugino, Zachary Quinto, Rosario Dawson, Danny DeVito, Josh Hartnett and Emmanuelle Chriqui, YouTube's entertainment marketing manager Nate Weinstein said in a blog post. The movie is described as "a comedy about a seemingly unrelated group of characters spending a single night at 10 different bars throughout Los Angeles." It was directed by Sebastian Gutierrez, who wrote the screenplay for "Snakes on a Plane" starring Samuel L. Jackson, and produced by Gato Negro Films and Shangri-La Entertainment. It can be watched at youtube.com/ytscreeningroom. YouTube, which was bought by Google in 2006 for $1.65 billion, has been adding professional content such as full-length television shows and movies to its vast trove of amateur video offerings in a bid to attract advertisers. |
| Big crowds greet Apple's iPad 2 (Reuters) Posted: 11 Mar 2011 07:56 PM PST SAN FRANCISC0/NEW YORK (Reuters) – Thousands of people thronged Apple stores on both U.S. coasts as the iPad 2 went on sale on Friday, signaling a strong appetite for a device that dominates the fledgling market it created. Hordes of fans -- some of whom had queued up overnight -- formed raucous pre-sale lines, and attracted curious onlookers, in the chilly rain in Manhattan, and in San Francisco. The crowds erupted as a sea of blue-shirted Apple staff threw open the doors at 5 p.m. and gave high-fives to the first iPad shoppers in Manhattan and San Francisco. The turnout underscores how demand for Apple's tablet remains strong nearly a year after the original proved a smash hit, single-handedly creating the tablet market, and inspiring a wave of imitators from Motorola to Research in Motion. More than 800 queued outside the Apple store on Manhattan's Fifth Avenue ahead of the launch, hoping to be among the first to get the thinner, lighter and faster iPad that Chief Executive Steve Jobs unveiled last week to strong reviews. "I wanted to be a part of it," said Andrew Christian, 26, a pharmacy technician from the Bronx who was No. 11 in line after waiting all night in the rain. He lined his sneakers with plastic Apple bags. Shares of Apple rose, $5.32, or 1.5 percent, to close at $351.99. Wall Street anticipates a strong start to the iPad 2, on par with the original iPad, though some analysts were more bullish. Ticonderoga Securities' Brian White said Apple could potentially sell 1 million iPads over the weekend -- roughly matching sales in their first month on the market in 2010. "It looks to me like it's going to be a very strong launch," he said. More than 500 people descended on Apple's flagship San Francisco store. Andrew Lee and his wife got to the store at 4 a.m. and each bought two iPads -- the maximum allowed. "One for me, one for my wife, one for each of our kids," Lee said as he gamely posed for a picture from the crowd of swarming photographers. The lines were in themselves a spectacle. More than 100 onlookers gathered just to watch the activity outside the store in Manhattan. "It's curious to see how people can get so fanatic. It's interesting. I don't know whether it's good or not," mused Giordano Cioni, 23, who is on vacation. APRIL 2010, REDUX Wal-Mart spokesman Ravi Jariwala said the world's largest retailer expected to sell every iPad it can get from Apple, from about 2,300 stores across the country. Best Buy spokeswoman Paula Baldwin said some of its outlets ran out of the tablet and its accessories within 10 minutes. Analysts say the 10-inch touchscreen iPad 2 has been improved incrementally, not reinvented wholesale. It is thinner, faster and adds a pair of cameras for video chat. Like its predecessor, the iPad 2's main chip is designed by Apple. The iPad 2 also includes chips from Broadcom and Texas Instruments, as well as flash memory from Toshiba Corp, according to an analysis by iFixit, a company which provides repair services for Apple products. The benchmarks for the iPad 2 are clear. The first iPad sold 300,000 units on its first day, 500,000 in the first week, and crossed the 1 million unit mark in 28 days. Given that the iPad 2 will be available in far more stores to start than the original model, Wall Street would be surprised if the device fails to outpace its predecessor in the early going. In addition to being sold at more than 200 Apple outlets in the United States, the iPad 2 was available starting on Friday in the stores of AT&T and Verizon Wireless, as well as Best Buy, Target Corp and Wal-Mart Stores Inc. Unlike last year, Apple did not take orders ahead of the release, so anyone wanting to be among the first to get the new iPad will have to journey to a store. That may help bulk up store lines, providing Apple the buzz it craves and is expert at generating. That buzz may prove important as rivals gear up for their own full-blown assault on the same market. Tablet sales are expected to surge to more than 50 million units this year, with Apple capturing more than 70 percent of the market. The iPad 2 hits store shelves in more than two dozen additional countries on March 25. Apple is releasing the second version of the iPad before many of its rivals have even brought their first tablets to market. Apple sold 15 million iPads last year, generating $9.5 billion in sales, and had the tablet market largely to itself. The iPad remains the most affordable tablet on the market, starting at $499. JPMorgan analyst Mark Moskowitz warned this week of a potential bubble forming in the market as early as this year, as Apple's rivals make more tablets than consumers will buy. He said supply could outstrip demand by as much as 36 percent in 2011 -- a whopping 17.2 million units. Blackberry maker RIM and Hewlett-Packard Co are set to release tablets in coming months. Some analysts believe RIM and HP could provide Apple with some competition, because both devices offer unique software, and both have formidable sales channels. And although Samsung Electronics and Motorola have launched tablets, neither appears to poised to give the iPad a run for its money. (Additional reporting by Dhanya Skariachan in New York) (Editing by Edwin Chan, Richard Chang and Carol Bishopric) |
| Microsoft Delays Phone 7 Update After Prior Snafu (NewsFactor) Posted: 11 Mar 2011 02:00 PM PST Microsoft has decided to "take some extra time" in rolling out a much-anticipated update for its Windows Phone 7 operating system to make sure an embarrassing software snafu won't be repeated. The update is now expected toward the end of March. A February "under the hood" update that was supposed to tweak the smartphone firmware to better receive future update -- including Marketplace search and cut-and-paste functionality -- caused problems for an undisclosed number of Samsung phone users, ranging from failed updates to bricked, or useless, phones. Microsoft said only about 10 percent of Windows Phone 7 users experienced the difficulties and of those, half did not have enough data storage space or enough bandwidth to receive the update, which requires USB connection to a computer. The update was resumed a couple of days later. Being Prudent Writing on the official Microsoft Windows Phone 7 blog Thursday, Eric Huatala, who is in charge of the updates team, said "We have the next update waiting in the wings. It delivers copy and paste, better Marketplace search, and other key improvements." He continued, "But I believe it's important that we learn all we can from the February update. So I've decided to take some extra time to ensure the update process meets our standards, your standards, and the standards of our partners. As a result, our plan is to start delivering the copy-and-paste update in the latter half of March." Huatala, who couched the disappointing news in a long post about the complicated process of delivering updates, added "This short pause should in no way impact the timing of future updates, including the one announced recently at Mobile World Congress featuring multitasking, a Twitter feature, and a new HTML 5-friendly version of Internet Explorer Mobile." Microsoft is banking on Phone 7 to get a foothold in the exploding smartphone operating system market beyond the two percent share it was estimated to have at the end of 2010, when the new system was in its infancy, and as Android and Apple duke it out for the top slot. Microsoft is believed to be spending more than $1 billion in a deal to put Windows 7 on phones made by Nokia, which us struggling to keep its leading share of the global mobile phone market. Much To Do To Get Ahead The cause of the Samsung snafu has yet to be revealed, but Microsoft will likely double and triple check its updates from now on since it can ill afford more bad publicity. "Whether this update succeeded or failed, Microsoft has much to do," said wireless analyst Ken Dulaney of Gartner Research. "I don't think we will see much progress [in sales] until they get at least 30,000 apps in the Marketplace. They need to work on their user interface and they need to move to match Android and Apple features." But they're not alone. "RIM has much catch-up to do on touchscreens as well," said Dulaney. |
| Wall Street Beat: IBM, Apple Riding High (PC World) Posted: 11 Mar 2011 02:00 PM PST Passing the second anniversary of the Great Recession's market low this week, the technology sector remains a pillar for corporate revenue and investor confidence, as industry bellwethers like IBM and Apple make impressive share gains. On March 9, 2009, the tech-heavy Nasdaq hit 1268.64, its lowest point in seven years. In afternoon trading Friday, the index was at 2718.80. The sort of share value increases that tech companies experienced since the market bottom of two years ago is hard to maintain, and growth of IT stocks, on average, has flattened out somewhat recently. But IT sector financial news this week shows that corporate demand for IT and consumer demand for mobile devices remains high. A jump in IBM shares, to a record level, was just one marker of confidence in corporate IT. Analysts met with IBM management Tuesday and issued a raft of upbeat reports about what they heard. At least four analysts upgraded their recommendations or price targets, and as a result IBM shares surged by $3.58 to close at a record US$165.86 Wednesday. IBM's high-end services business and its emphasis on high-margin software and hardware has impressed market watchers. "We get the sense IBM has rejuvenated pride in its massive $6 billion annual research and development spend, in contrast to more standards/commodity-reliant competitors, seeing continued opportunities toward ever-higher margin mix," said Robert Cirha, in a Caris & Co. research note. IBM, a major bellwether for the enterprise market, kicked off a strong tech earnings season in January, reporting that net income for the fourth quarter rose 9 percent year over year to $5.3 billion, while revenue increased by 7 percent to $29 billion. It was the strongest quarterly sales increase for IBM in almost 10 years, and in line with predictions that enterprise sales, particularly software, will be a key driver of growth for IT for the foreseeable future. Mobile devices including tablets will also fuel growth for tech, according to a slew of recent reports. For example, 10.1 million media tablets were shipped in the fourth quarter of 2010, more than double the 4.5 million shipped in the third quarter, according to an IDC report Thursday. The report also said that the eReader market jumped up in the fourth quarter. Strong sales of Amazon's Kindle and gains from Pandigital, Barnes & Noble, Hanvon, and Sony also contributed to market growth, IDC said. The eReader market in the fourth quarter more than doubled in volume from the previous quarter, with more than 6 million units shipped, IDC said. "Strong holiday sales of media tablets were in line with IDC projections and strong consumer interest in the category while device vendors scrambled to offer products competitive with Apple's iPad and now iPad 2," said Loren Loverde, an IDC vice president, in the report. Apple, which has more than 90 percent of the tablet market at this point, is releasing the iPad 2 Friday and is basking in the glow of its latest hit product. Apple shares were up by $4.89 to $351.52 in late afternoon trading. Increased uptake of tablets and high-end smartphones is also having a positive effect on corporate equipment sales, as companies scramble to update networks to handle an increase in traffic from the new devices. For example, global WLAN (wireless LAN) equipment sales jumped by 28 percent to $769 million in the fourth quarter of 2010 compared to the same period in 2009, according to a report last week from Infonetics Research. On Wednesday, a report from Dell'Oro Group said that for all of 2010, WLAN equipment sales jumped 25 percent to surpass $5 billion. "We believe this to be a another sign of the continued importance of wireless LAN to companies; networking infrastructures, and of a worldwide economy that is on the upswing," said Loren Shalinsky, senior analyst of Wireless LAN research at Dell'Oro, in the report. With attention on corporate software and mobile devices, the PC sector hasn't gotten much respect lately. But iSuppli this week pointed out that global PC shipments in the fourth quarter of 2010 totaled 93.1 million units, up 5.7 percent from 88.1 million in the third quarter of 2010, and a 4.7 percent increase from 88.9 million in the fourth quarter of 2009. PC shipments during the fourth quarter hit a new quarterly record, "blowing past" the prior record of 88.9 million units set in the fourth quarter of 2009, the report said. "With its record performance during the last three months of 2010, the worldwide PC business took another step toward becoming a market generating 100 million units per quarter," said Matthew Wilkins, principal analyst at iSuppli. "With the market coming back strong amid growth in the mid-teens, the PC industry will look back on 2010 as a year that exceeded expectations." Though much of the growth in the last two years took place in the quarters immediately following the 2009 low point, the tech sector is still looking up. By the third quarter last year, the Nasdaq and the other major U.S. exchanges were already back up to the level they were at before Wall Street imploded in September 2008. Tech had a lot to do with instilling confidence in the markets. Though tech stocks slumped for most of the third quarter last year as fears of a double-dip recession took hold, IT companies, reporting strong sales especially to businesses, started to lead markets after the U.S. Labor Day holiday at the beginning of September. Now, computer shares on the exchange are up an average of 1.56 percent since Jan. 1 and telecom stock are up 0.13 percent -- both better than any other major sector aside from industrials. The Nasdaq itself is up 1.82 percent since the beginning of the year and 14 percent for the last 12 months. |
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