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Google founder hopes to prove he's ready to be CEO (AP) : Technet |
- Google founder hopes to prove he's ready to be CEO (AP)
- Japan disaster sparks social media innovation (AP)
- April Fools' Day noted online with spoof redesigns (AP)
- New York Public Library Invites 500 to Overnight Scavenger Hunt (Mashable)
- April Fool's jokes range from hilarious to disastrous (Reuters)
- LizaMoon Pay-Up Scareware Spreads To 500,000 Sites (NewsFactor)
- Review: Mozilla Firefox 4 Android Mobile Browser (LiveScience.com)
- Africans Use Mobile Phones for Roles Beyond Communicating (PC World)
- Tweeting Bronx Zoo cobra's wanderings are hissstory (Reuters)
- Check Your Settings: Cell Phone Pictures Are Risky Business (NewsFactor)
- RockMelt Reboots Its Social Web Browser With New Beta Version (Mashable)
- Amazon considering joining NFC rush (Appolicious)
- LogMeIn wins legal challenge (Investor's Business Daily)
- Rebecca Black a Modern-Day Girl with True Grit (ContributorNetwork)
- Remains of the Day: I saw the news today, oh boy (Macworld)
- Malicious attack hits a million Web pages (Reuters)
- HP EliteBook ultraportables getting Sandy Bridge (Digital Trends)
| Google founder hopes to prove he's ready to be CEO (AP) Posted: 01 Apr 2011 01:48 PM PDT SAN FRANCISCO – Google co-founder Larry Page is known for his vision, passion and intelligence. Yet there is a fair amount of concern that Page's other known traits — his aloofness, rebellious streak and affinity for pursuing wacky ideas — might lead the company astray. Page takes over as CEO on Monday as fast-rising rivals and tougher regulators threaten Google's growth. Investors used to Google Inc.'s consistency in exceeding financial targets worry that new leadership will bring more emphasis on long-term projects that take years to pay off. And many people still aren't sure he has enough management skills to steer the Internet's most powerful company. Page already has learned that smarts alone won't make him a great leader. Although Page impressed Google's early investors with his ingenuity, they still insisted that he step down in 2001 as Google's first CEO. He turned over the job to Eric Schmidt, a veteran executive who began working in Silicon Valley in the early 1980s while Page was still in grammar school. Page's admirers say that at 38, he is more mature and less apt to be chronically late to meetings or tune out of conversations that don't stimulate his intellect — habits that he fell into during his first stint as CEO. "There are parts of being CEO that don't fit Larry's personality," said Craig Silverstein, the first employee that Page and Google's other founder, Sergey Brin, hired when they started the company in 1998. "You wear a lot of different hats when you're CEO. Some of them are very interesting to Larry and some of them, presumably, are less interesting." True to his taciturn form, Page hasn't said much publicly since Google made its stunning announcement in January that he will replace Schmidt as CEO. Google said Page wasn't available for an interview. Page, though, has left little doubt about his top priority: to dissolve the bureaucracy and complacency that accompanied the company's rapid transformation into a 21st-century empire. Google is expected to end the year with more than 30,000 employees and $35 billion in annual revenue. In Page's mind, the 13-year-old company needs to return to thinking and acting like a feisty startup. Rising Internet stars such as Facebook, Twitter and Groupon, all less than 8 years old, are developing products that could challenge Google and make its dominance of Internet search less lucrative. Page has drawn comparisons to two high-tech geniuses who are even more accomplished: Microsoft Corp. co-founder Bill Gates and Apple Inc. co-founder Steve Jobs. Like those two pioneers in personal technology, Page invented and cultivated a product that changed the world. But Page has yet to match them in this respect: as CEOs, Gates and Jobs brought out the best in the companies that they created, delighting stockholders as their investments soared. Page doesn't fit the CEO mold, even by the standards of Silicon Valley's free-wheeling culture. He dropped out of graduate school at Stanford to start Google and doesn't have a business degree. Science and technology, though, seems to be in his DNA even though he grew up in Michigan, where automobiles rule. His late father, Carl, was a computer scientist and pioneer in artificial intelligence, and his mother taught computer programming. Page began working on personal computers when he was just 6 years old in 1979, when home computers were a rarity. The geeky impulses carried into his adulthood, leading him to once build an inkjet printer out of Legos. Page relishes challenging the status quo and encourages his employees to do so, too. Those who know Page suspect he picked up the anti-establishment mindset as a boy who attended Montessori schools, which discourage structured curricula and encourage independent activities. Page has wanted to control his own destiny — and legacy — since reading a biography of the inventor Nikola Tesla before he was even in high school. Tesla wasn't rewarded or widely recognized for his breakthroughs in X-ray, wireless communications and electricity. Page didn't want that to happen to him as an entrepreneur. For that reason, Page embraced the chance to be Google's CEO when the company started in a rented garage not far from the company's current headquarters in Mountain View, Calif. It also helps explain why he and Brin created a separate class of stock with greater voting power so they and Schmidt could remain in charge after the company went public in 2004. Page's stake in Google has made him one of the world's wealthiest people with an estimated fortune of $20 billion. Although the contours of his personality and background are known quantities, Page remains an enigmatic figure on Wall Street. To some, he remains best known for uncompromising idealism, reflected in his embrace of his company's "Don't Be Evil" motto and his pledge to never cater to investors' desire for ever-rising quarterly earnings at the expense of long-term investments. Page already raised concerns by pushing Google into renewable energy and robotic cars. Those who know him say he has discussed even more far-flung projects behind closed doors. "Sometimes his ideas are just way out there and you're kind of like, 'Wow, that came out of left field,'" said Ethan Anderson, a former Google product manager who now runs Redbeacon, a startup that operates a search engine for finding neighborhood businesses. Uncertainty about whether Page will be as interested as Schmidt in appeasing Wall Street has contributed to a 6 percent drop in Google's stock price since the CEO change was announced Jan. 20. The technology-driven Nasdaq index has added 3 percent during that time. BGC Financial analyst Colin Gillis doesn't believe it's a coincidence that Google revealed it would hire more than 6,200 employees this year — a 25 percent boost, and the most in its history — less than a week after it announced Page's comeback as CEO. "Don't be surprised if Google's spending goes up, even it means its earnings per share might go down," Gillis said. Page's supporters believe Google's current market value of about $190 billion will climb even higher under his leadership. That would mirror what happened after Jobs finally got his chance to run Apple in 1997 after a decade in exile. Since then, Apple has brought out the iconic iPod, iPhone and iPad devices and created more than $300 billion in shareholder wealth. But the returns of company founders haven't always been triumphant. Consider Yahoo Inc. co-founder Jerry Yang's second stint as CEO from June 2007 to January 2009. Yahoo's stock fell 56 percent during that period, larger than the 41 percent drop for Nasdaq. Unlike the rest of the Nasdaq, Yahoo shares aren't close to rebounding to their June 2007 levels. Hoping to smooth the transition to a new CEO, Google is keeping Schmidt, 55, in a prominent role as executive chairman and chief liaison with lawmakers and regulators around the world. That's an important job as Google faces growing scrutiny over its ambitions to use its dominance in search to enter new markets. Brin, 37, intends to focus on long-term projects, leaving Page to manage Google's daily operations. "I am quite convinced that this change will result in faster decision-making, better success for the business and ultimately greater value for the shareholders," Schmidt told The Associated Press after Google announced its shake-up in January. In the past, the three made key decisions by committee, though Schmidt was the one responsible as CEO. Schmidt guided Google through an uninterrupted stretch of prosperity that has topped the performances of other technology trailblazers, including Apple and Microsoft, at similar stages of their corporate lives. Page is better prepared to be CEO after a decade as Schmidt's apprentice, said Douglas Merrill, who worked with both executives before leaving Google in 2008 as vice president of engineering. "Larry has grown over time," Merrill said. "He has learned how to make projects work. He has learned how to make sure things happen on time and in a predictable fashion. Larry is a sort of a learning machine." ___ AP Technology Writer Rachel Metz in San Francisco contributed to this report. |
| Japan disaster sparks social media innovation (AP) Posted: 01 Apr 2011 05:45 AM PDT TOKYO – As Japan grapples with an unprecedented triple disaster — earthquake, tsunami, nuclear crisis — the Web has spawned creativity and innovation online amid a collective desire to ease suffering. Once the magnitude of the March 11 disaster became clear, the online world began asking, "How can we help?" And for that, social media offered the ideal platform for good ideas to spread quickly, supplementing efforts launched by giants like Google and Facebook. A British teacher living in Abiko city, just east of Tokyo, is leading a volunteer team of bloggers, writers and editors producing a collection of reflections and images of the earthquake that will be sold in the coming days as a digital publication. All proceeds from the "Quakebook" project will go to the Japanese Red Cross, said the 40-year-old, who goes by the pseudonym "Our Man in Abiko." The entirely Twitter-sourced project started with a single tweet exactly a week after the earthquake. Within an hour, he had received two submissions, which soon grew to the 87 that now comprise the 98-page book. It didn't take long for others to notice. Best-selling novelist Barry Eisler and musician and artist Yoko Ono wrote pieces for the book, titled "2:46: Aftershocks: Stories from the Japan Earthquake." Amazon.com and Sony agreed to offer the download through their respective e-book platforms. "I just thought I want to do something," he said in a telephone interview. "I felt completely helpless." Another project, "World's 1000 Messages for Japan," is an effort to convey thoughts from around the globe. Writers can leave short notes on Facebook or through e-mail, which a group of volunteers then translate into Japanese. The translations are then posted on Twitter as well as the group's website. "The news of the earthquake, tsunami, and meltdown in Japan has mostly been horrifying. But it has also served as a reminder of the strength and resolve that comes out of Japanese culture," said one recent message on the project's Facebook page. The calamitous events that transfixed people worldwide led to a jump in traffic among social networking sites — typical after recent major disasters elsewhere. In the immediate aftermath of the disaster that likely killed more than 18,000 people, phone and cellular networks were either down or overwhelmed with traffic. So people turned to the Internet to track down friends and family, and connect with those who saw the disaster unfold firsthand. In Tokyo, which suffered minimal damage, commuters wanted to know if their trains were running, and whether their neighborhoods would be subject to rolling electricity blackouts due to damage to nuclear and conventional power plants. Figures released this week show that millions flocked to sites like Twitter following the earthquake and tsunami. Its audience grew by a third to 7.5 million users during March 7-13 compared with the previous week, according to the Nielsen NetRatings Japan. Video streaming provider Ustream and Japanese video sharing platform Nico Nico Douga also saw viewership climb. Ustream's audience more than doubled to 1.4 million, driven largely by public broadcaster NHK's channel featuring live coverage online, the report said. The numbers underscore the increasingly valuable role that social media, particularly Twitter, can play in the wake of natural disasters. The microblogging site helped drive fundraising after the earthquake in Haiti last year, and it served as a critical communication tool after the New Zealand earthquake in February. Twitter was already a big hit in Japan, where more than three-quarters of the population is connected to the Internet. The earthquake convinced even more users of its value as a communication lifeline. "Many people signed up for Twitter after the earthquake, and that's because they wanted to exchange information," said Nobuyuki Hayashi, a prominent Japanese tech journalist and consultant. "Twitter played a great role in the first few days" after the quake, he said. He added, however, that the surge of activity also brought to light some of Twitter's shortcomings during disasters. As helpful as Twitter was after the quake, it also helped propagate a number of unfounded rumors and fears. A post-quake fire at an oil refinery east of Tokyo led to a torrent of tweets that incorrectly claimed the blaze would result in toxic rain. Some people moved to Facebook "because they can access more trusted information and engage in more topic-based conversation," Hayashi said. That's something that concerns Web designer Qanta Shimizu as well. But he sees a greater good in embracing social media in times of crisis. In 1995, when a massive earthquake devastated the western city of Kobe, the Internet was in its infancy and the mass media controlled the flow of information. National consciousness of the disaster shifted too quickly, Shimizu said, as the media moved on to new topics. "Society has changed now, and through the Internet, I wanted to find a way to offer support indefinitely," he said. Shimizu created a Twitter application to remind Internet users to do their part, however small. "Setsudener" — a play on the Japanese term for "save energy" — automatically darkens a user's profile picture from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m., symbolizing the need to cut back on power consumption during peak demand. Japanese Web developer Yusuke Wada created "Anpi Report" to gather and organize information posted on Twitter about missing individuals. Through Facebook and Twitter, he has found more than 200 volunteers to manually sift through tweets to enter into a database. Anpi Report says it hopes to expand its service in the near future by linking its information with Google's "person finder" database for people who are either seeking information about a missing person or have information to provide about someone affected by the disaster. For others, especially local governments and agencies, simply venturing onto social media has been a big step. Mitaka city in western Tokyo decided to start a Twitter account after the earthquake. Announcements of the possible rolling blackouts led to a huge spike in traffic on the city's website that it could not handle, said spokesman Shinichi Akiyama. One of the city's recent posts informed residents that The Tokyo Electric Power Co. had called off blackouts for Wednesday — an essential piece of information for businesses and households. The information is posted on the city's Website, but putting it out on Twitter enables the city to keep residents informed in real-time, Akiyama said. "We're using social media a bit differently than what it was probably intended for, like having a conversation," he said. "But it has helped us realize that it's possible to use social media as a tool." Mitaka's neighbors took note almost immediately. Nearby cities like Musashino and Koganei have also signed up for Twitter, as have numerous municipalities in the hardest-hit areas of northeast Japan. |
| April Fools' Day noted online with spoof redesigns (AP) Posted: 01 Apr 2011 01:48 PM PDT NEW YORK – The online world got an April Fools' Day makeover as YouTube rolled out 1911 viral videos and the Huffington Post put up a mock pay wall. Lighthearted pranks are an annual Web tradition on April Fools' Day, with jokey redesigns and parody products. Comedy video website Funny or Die, which last year became "Bieber or Die," turned into "Friday or Die." The site's home page was taken over by teenage viral video star Rebecca Black, complete with "Behind the Music"-style featurettes on her song "Friday." Escape was futile: Even pressing "back" in one's browser only added Black's lyrics to the address bar. Google, always one of the most ardent April Fools' Day celebrators, launched "Gmail Motion," which allows users to mime directions to their email. Google also played a trick on typeface fans, claiming that after extensive research, it would on Monday make Comic Sans the default font across all Google products. Search the more beloved "Helvetica" on Google, and results come in the less esteemed Comic Sans. YouTube remade viral videos like the Annoying Orange and the Keyboard Cat in scratchy black-and-white silent clips, purportedly from 1911. (Keyboard Cat became Flugelhorn Feline.) Hulu took a similar approach, dating their video repository to the Web's dial-up days of 1996, and fittingly promoting then-contemporary shows like "The X-Files" and "News Radio." The Huffington Post presented one of the most pointed gags in erecting a fake New York Times-style pay wall, but only to employees of the Times. It follows the Times' recent, much-watched shift to charging readers for digital subscriptions. In a blog post, Arianna Huffington outlined the specifics of the pay wall, including that only the first six letters of each word could be read at no charge. The HuffPost joke hints at a growing feud between the two media outlets. Times executive editor Bill Keller recently wrote a column critical of news aggregators, in which he specifically cited the Huffington Post (recently purchased by AOL). Eileen Murphy, a spokeswoman for the Times, said the HuffPost spoof was "funny, but it was funny the first time around." Murphy noted that the political science blog The Monkey Cage already did a very similar mock pay wall — in which it said it would charge Times employees for access — on March 20. "It seems that the HuffPo even aggregates their quips," Murphy said. There were further media machinations in other April Fools' jokes, too. Cable network Animal Planet sent out a joke press release announcing a deal for the famous escaped Bronx Zoo cobra — news that some outlets reported earnestly. Grace Suriel, a spokeswoman for the network, said it was merely "wishful thinking" if anyone took the release seriously. Most of the April Fools' pranks were harmless, though. The business-centric social networking hub LinkedIn offered unusual connections in its "people you may know" section, including Groucho Marx and Albert Einstein. Kodak debuted a "Relationshiffft" app to quickly remove ex-boyfriends and ex-girlfriends from photos and videos. The consumer review website Yelp announced a new deal: monthly puppy rentals. The software developer Atlassian launched its own version of the enormously popular mobile game Angry Birds: "Angry Nerds." ___ Online: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/arianna-huffington/a-word-about-digital-subs_b_843385.html http://mail.google.com/mail/help/motion.html http://www.youtube.com/watch?vCNm8ZCJ7Fx8 http://officialblog.yelp.com/2011/04/going-national-with-yelp-deals.html |
| New York Public Library Invites 500 to Overnight Scavenger Hunt (Mashable) Posted: 01 Apr 2011 07:10 AM PDT The New York Public Library, which became the first public library to launch a Foursquare badge this week, is going one step further in mobile innovation by inviting 500 people to compete in a smartphone-based challenge for a library game night. "Find the Future: The Game," devised by renowned game designer Jane McGonigal, is a series of "quests" delivered via an app on players' mobile devices that can be completed at the Library's 42nd Street location. A group of 500 players will be invited to play the game for the first time at 8 p.m. on May 20 to tackle a list of 100 overnight challenges. The challenges are designed to encourage players to explore and reflect upon the objects from the library's collections. A player might be tasked, for instance, to scan a QR code located at the Declaration of Independence, and then respond to a creative essay prompt. Once enough quests have been completed, they will be "unlocked" for the public, who can begin playing the game online May 21. "There is something to be said for being in the presence of rare, historic objects," says Caro Llewellyn, producer of the Library's Centennial celebration. "Wikipedia and Google are fantastic, but to see objects like these in the flesh has enormous power and can truly inspire creativity." To sign up to become one of the first 500 participants, interested parties are asked to go to nypl.org/game to complete a "top secret" quest for entry. Judges will invite the authors of the 500 most "innovative and creative" entries to the event.
Image courtesy of Flickr, Vincent Desjardins |
| April Fool's jokes range from hilarious to disastrous (Reuters) Posted: 01 Apr 2011 04:19 PM PDT CHICAGO (Reuters) – Internet business networking service LinkedIn allowed users to connect with Ernest Hemingway. Coupon hawker Living Social offered salami-based spa treatment. Photography giant Eastman Kodak offered pain-free permanent photo tattoos. Has the world gone mad? No. It was just another April Fool's Day, the international day of tomfoolery when pranks, hoaxes, and practical jokes remind us not to take ourselves too seriously. And April 1, 2011 fit the bill with a wide range of good humor-and a few mishaps. First the humor. Search engine giant Google, whose April 1 antics have been widely noted for a decade, opened things up with an absurd and hilarious "motion-controlled" e-mail system that allows users to write emails using elaborate gestures rather than antiquated keyboards and mice. Google-owned YouTube offered its round-up of viral videos from 1911 and The Huffington Post put up a mock pay wall-solely for New York Times employees (who did the same in real life on Monday). Animal Planet sent out a joke press release announcing a deal for the famous escaped Bronx Zoo cobra, which one news outlet reported as fact. If it manages to escape again, the New York Hilton offered the highly venomous Egyptian cobra its "Penthouse ssssuite," via Twitter. Even earnest Whole Foods was in on the April Fool's action, featuring "Insects Raised With Compassion," "Save Money with Refurbished Spices," and a new option to "have your whole paycheck automatically converted to a Whole Foods Market gift card." (Clearly, Whole Foods has heard that some of its customers refer to it as "Whole Paycheck.") But April Fools day isn't all fun and games: sometimes people get fired, or hurt, for their pranks. A filming of an improvisational joke by the comedy group Improv Everywhere made headlines when a troupe member dressed as "Stars Wars" character Jar Jar Binks boarded a New York City subway car and was accosted by burly train riders for invading their space. The Troupe's founder, Charlie Todd, appeared at the end of the video telling viewers the skit did not go as planned. Claims have been made that at least one of the assailants was an actor in an affiliated comedy troupe. Hmmmm, a prank within a prank. In another gag gone awry, a columnist from a suburban newspaper of the Chicago Sun-Times wrote an online blog jokingly asserting he'd been fired for juxtaposing Christian extremist militias with radical Islamic terrorist groups. In the column he asked readers to e-mail him -- after which they would promptly receive the auto-reply: APRIL FOOLS. Mayhem ensued. He received a bevy of emails, phone calls, text messages, and online posts, including one from his worried mother begging: "is it true?" (Editing by Greg McCune) |
| LizaMoon Pay-Up Scareware Spreads To 500,000 Sites (NewsFactor) Posted: 01 Apr 2011 01:50 PM PDT Websense Security Labs has updated its Tuesday alert concerning a malicious mass-injection scareware campaign it has dubbed LizaMoon -- an SQL injection attack that adds a line of JavaScript code to web pages that redirects users to a bogus web page that rotates on a periodic basis. Based on Google search results Thursday, more than 500,000 URLs had a script link to lizamoon.com, which has since been changed, Websense said. Though search results aren't always great indicators of the scope of an attack -- Google search lists each unique URL rather than each domain or site -- they do provide some indication of the scope of the problem when the numbers go up or down, Websense observed. "We have also been able to identify several other URLs that are injected in the exact same way, so the attack is even bigger than we originally thought," Websense security analysts wrote in a blog Thursday. "All in all, a Google search reveals over 1,500,000 URLs that have a link with the same URL structure as the initial attack." Bogus Malware Reports A user who visits a web page with the injected code is redirected to a bogus Internet site. "Just like most other scareware and rogue AV sites, it shows a pop-up warning saying that your security is at risk and that you have malware and other security issues," said a Websense spokesperson. "And when you click OK, it displays a scanning tool that looks like its going through the hard drive and finding all sorts of malware, but it's all fake, of course." Users who click "remove all" to fix their fake problems end up downloading an executable rogue AV to their machines. Then when the unsuspecting user starts the rogue tool, it kills whatever program is currently running. Nothing else happens until the user tries to start the legitimate program again, at which point the scareware displays a fake Trojan alert. If the user then clicks "remove," the rogue AV escalates to the next stage by prompting the user to install the full-blown scareware app. This second-stage software, which displays the bogus name Windows Stability Center, warns that there are lots of problems on the user's PC. "To fix them you have to pay for the full version of the app," Websense explained. Antivirus Engines Still Vulnerable Though the LizaMoon threat is global, Websense reported nearly half the traffic to the scareware's bogus web sites is coming from U.S. Internet users. Other nations where a considerable number of PC users are falling prey to LizaMoon include Canada (9.23 percent), Italy (8.89 percent), Brazil (7.92 percent) and the United Kingdom (7.92 percent). Websense said there really hasn't been anything this big before and the threat isn't expected to go away anytime soon. The problem is that only 17 out of 43 of the currently available antivirus engines -- from Kaspersky, Microsoft, Sophos, Symantec, Trendmicro, VIPRE and others -- were able to detect the LizaMoon rogue AV as of Friday afternoon, according to web-security firm VirusTotal. Websense said it's still analyzing the scareware to see how it infects web pages. However, the security firm's researchers suspect that the attack has gained such widespread traction because it has been able to exploit "vulnerabilities in the web systems used by these sites, such as outdated CMS and blog systems." |
| Review: Mozilla Firefox 4 Android Mobile Browser (LiveScience.com) Posted: 01 Apr 2011 04:30 PM PDT The stock Internet browsers that come with smartphones are usually barebones apps with limited functionality. That's why many fans of the Mozilla Firefox browser have eagerly anticipated the release of Firefox 4 for Android phones. We took a look at Mozilla's latest version of the Firefox mobile browser to see how it stands up to the stock Android browser. The Good: Speed and Plug-ins There are a lot of things to praise in the Firefox 4 mobile browser. It has a nice minimalist interface that is definitely more useful than the stock browser experience. Swiping to the right reveals a vertical panel with all the open tabs. Switching or closing them is simple and fast. Swiping to the left reveals a different panel with options to go forward or back, favorite a page and change the settings. The interface is intuitive and easy to remember. The Firefox 4 browser for Android also seems to load pages just a bit faster. Everything feels a little speedier with it. Panning and zooming is smoother, and the entire interface is responsive. But none of these things are the biggest reason to use Firefox 4 for Android. The single most attractive thing for us was the ability to install plug-ins and add-ons that increase the functionality of the browser. Add-ons are one of the single best things about the full Firefox browser on computers so it's only appropriate that they should be included in the mobile version. To be fair, the mobile add-ons are far fewer in number than those found for the full browser, but many of the same important functions are still available, including ad blockers and interface customization. The stock Android browser can't compete with these options. The Bad: No Flash Yet However, things aren't perfect with this little browser, either. For instance, some of the most important plug-ins aren't yet compatible with Firefox 4. The most egregious example is the Adobe Flash plug-in. Flash is basically a requirement for normal browsing habits, so the lack of it is pretty jarring, especially when there's a Flash option for the standard Android browser. Other major plug-ins aren't yet compatible with Firefox 4 mobile, too. This will change with time, but for now it's a huge hole in Firefox 4 for Android functionality. Summary Mozilla Firefox 4 for Android has many improvements to bring to the browser market, unfortunately some of the best ones aren't fully formed yet. Perhaps, the real idea to take away here is that it's a diamond in the rough. It's good, but with some time and better support, it will be great. This story was provided by TechNewsDaily, a sister site to LiveScience.
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| Africans Use Mobile Phones for Roles Beyond Communicating (PC World) Posted: 01 Apr 2011 02:40 PM PDT African mobile-phone users are increasingly turning to their devices for functions beyond making calls, said speakers at a Massachusetts Institute of Technology panel discussion on Friday. In a continent with limited infrastructure, phones serve as income boosters, a teaching tool and wallets, according to speakers during a session at the Africa 2.0 forum. The predominance of pre-paid phones in Africa means that "air time is exactly equivalent to cash," said Nathan Eagle, CEO of Txt Eagle, a company he started in 2008 that aims to help mobile-phone users in developing nations earn income with their handsets. With Africans spending 10 percent of their yearly income on air time, Eagle said the question becomes: "How can we think of the phone as a mechanism to compensate people?" For Txt Eagle, this means compensating users for providing the company with data. While working on a health-care project that called for nurses in rural Kenyan hospitals to send a text message on blood supply information to a central database, Eagle discovered that paying the nurses for their messages and giving them air time credit directly affected their participation. Not covering the cost of a text message was "essentially asking them to take a pay cut," he realized when participation plummeted after one month. Txt Eagle's data on its approximately 2.1 billion users will also help companies advertise their products to developing markets, a critical space for corporations since mature markets will not yield additional buyers, Eagle said. "Right now this is the way to engage them," he said. "For many of them, it is the only way. There is a fundamental lack of data in emerging markets." The effects of mobile communications' high cost was also witnessed by Jenny Aker, an assistant professor of development economics at Tufts University whose work includes studying how Niger farmers used mobile phones to obtain information on what markets paid for crops. "Mobile phones are reducing communication costs, allowing people to get access to information," she said. In Niger, sending text messages is cheaper than making a phone call, she said. But with a national illiteracy rate of 80 percent, the country's farmers were unable to utilize the more cost-effective communication method. "The question was: Could we harness a simple phone as an educational tool?" she said. Aker and her team developed a literacy class centered around mobile phones and included lessons on how to use handsets as well as how to convey basic written information. After eight months, the farmers achieved elementary-school education levels in reading and writing, Aker said. Basing the class on mobile phones "allowed the adults to learn more quickly and learn skills for use outside the class," she said. In addition to obtaining information, mobile phones can help business owners improve inventory and foster jobs, Aker said. Rural shop keepers can call suppliers and order goods instead of waiting for them to approach the store. The use of pre-paid phones has spawned side businesses vital to keeping the devices working, such as phone charging services and air time vendors. Mobile carriers have also realized that handsets can fulfill many roles. In 2007 Safaricom, which offers phone service in Kenya, launched the M-Pesa mobile banking service for people to pay back microloans. The service was expanded and now it's mainly used for transferring money, said Waceke Mbugua, M-Pesa marketing manager. Currently 90 percent of all transactions on the service are for sending and receiving money, she said. Safaricom discovered that "if you can reduce time and make it easy, people will use it," she said. The payment services M-Pesa offers were further expanded and people can now use their phones to buy air time, pay bills and buy items at the grocery store, said Mbugua. M-Pesa service offers are set to grow again, but Safaricom needs third-party help first. "The key growth area is partnerships," said Mbugua. "Partners can help add more services like bill paying." Smartphone adoption will further the concept of a multi-faceted mobile device, said Eagle. However, he noted that the mobile application craze will most likely pass over Africa. "You need to have a lot of money to partner with a mobile provider," he said, adding that carriers aren't interested in working with developers. Greater business and user opportunities lie in mobile cloud computing, he said. "You'll see growth in the mobile Web, applications that run on a browser," as African cloud computing services "are going to explode." |
| Tweeting Bronx Zoo cobra's wanderings are hissstory (Reuters) Posted: 01 Apr 2011 06:23 PM PDT NEW YORK (Reuters) – Found: One tweeting Egyptian cobra that slinked out of its cage at the Bronx Zoo a week ago and fascinated more than 210,000 people following its Twitter feed as it traveled around New York. The Bronx Zoo's venomous cobra was found on Thursday just about 200 feet from its cage to the relief of neighbors but the likely disappointment of those following lighthearted tweets from @BronxZoosCobra -- a Twitter feed created a few days after the snake's disappearance. Lured with wood shavings reeking of mice and rats, the cobra was trapped in a dark corner of the Reptile House, its home since it arrived at the zoo in February. It went missing last week, prompting the zoo to close its reptile enclosure. "We are delighted to report that the snake has been found alive and well," said Bronx Zoo Director Jim Breheny. While a relief to the zoo, the snake's capture may mean the end of the witty feed detailing the cobra's carousing around town. Posting in blasts from trendy sights and major tourist attractions, @BronxZoosCobra managed to squeeze in a few last sights before its capture was announced by the zoo. "If you see a bag of peanuts inexplicably moving along the ground at Yankee Stadium today. Just ignore it. It's probably nothing," reads the last tweet posted on Thursday afternoon, on opening day of baseball season. (Writing by Bernd Debusmann Jr.; editing by Deborah Charles) |
| Check Your Settings: Cell Phone Pictures Are Risky Business (NewsFactor) Posted: 01 Apr 2011 01:10 PM PDT If you're like many smartphone users, you're posting images to Facebook, Picassa and other social-media networks. But did you know that the photos you upload (or even e-mail) could be putting you -- and your kids -- at risk? That's because your smartphone is equipped with technology that can allow hackers to find out where you live. Here's how it works: Smartphones have geolocation technology that tag photos with the location. Criminals can look at the information coded into those files and find out where you live, work or play (wherever you were when you took the picture). When the criminal zeroes in on the area where he lives to find images of children, all he has to do is click on the photo and select View Image Info to find out exactly where the photo was taken. An NBC Action News report offers an example in which news reporters were able to use the geolocation technology to not only locate a child's home, but also her bedroom, her day-care facility, a fast-food restaurant the family frequents, and the specific area of a park where the child plays. Although it requires a browser plug-in to fully translate the photo information into something useful, the danger is real. What Should You Post Online? McAfee confirms that location services such as foursquare, Gowalia and Facebook Places can easily search, track and plot the whereabouts of friends and strangers. In just a few clicks, cybercriminals can see in real time who is tweeting, where they are located, what they are saying, what their interests are, and what operating systems and applications they are using. McAfee Labs predicts that cybercriminals will increasingly use these tactics across the most popular social-networking sites in 2011. But the ability to access faces, not just names, is even scarier to parents. "As the Internet becomes a mechanism for people to share increasingly intimate details of their lives -- which seems to be the case in social networking and other sorts of sites -- questions arise about what you should share," said Charles King, principal analyst at Pund IT. "Especially when you get into issues of geolocation, people are not just talking about what they are doing and when they are doing it, but exactly where they are doing it." The Bigger Picture Ultimately, however, King suspects there are greater dangers than criminals searching for photos, using software to translate geolocation data into actionable information, and acting on it. Multiple studies show that most child abductions are carried out by a family member, or someone who knows the family member. "You've always got to take stories from television news outlets -- many of which seem to be more obsessed with sensationalistic stories that touch people's nerves than they are with reporting accurately -- with a grain of salt," King said. "Yes, there could be a danger. But there are other, bigger dangers." How To Protect Yourself In terms of reducing the risk related to the geotracing cell phone photos, there are simple ways you can protect yourself, your friends, and your family. For starters, you can change your social-networking settings to private so only people you invite into your network can see your photos. Unfortunately, it takes a bit of practice to find all the right settings with Facebook and some other sites, and plenty of users forget to take the time to check their privacy settings. Restricting privacy and information to friends can be critically important. You can also turn off the GPS settings on your smartphone's camera so it doesn't capture the location information. That step is important not just in terms of photos you upload to social networks, but also for photos you email, since ultimately, those travel over the web, as well. |
| RockMelt Reboots Its Social Web Browser With New Beta Version (Mashable) Posted: 01 Apr 2011 06:36 AM PDT Social web browser RockMelt started rolling out RockMelt Beta 2 on Friday. The new version is the "most significant update" yet to the Chromium-based web browser and it touts better chat, more robust Twitter integration and a new "view later" feature. RockMelt co-founder Eric Vishria walked us through the new updates and offered us some information about who is using RockMelt and where the browser is headed. When RockMelt launched in November 2010, the goal was to create a tool that would integrate social networks and feeds directly in the web browser. Our first brush with the browser left us with a lukewarm impression, but the concept, at the very least remained interesting. Tools like Flock and RockMelt face an uphill battle of balancing social functionality without making the core browsing experience sub-optimal. In that regard, Vishria told us that the team spent a lot of time looking at ways to make the interface and the interactions more seamless and less confusing. The biggest UI overhaul is related to RockMelt's popular integrated Facebook Chat feature.
Chat Gets Better
Vishria told us that RockMelt users use the built-in chat tool at least three times a day. With RockMelt Beta 2, the team has added a new chat bar at the bottom of the browser window. This bar lets users stay involved in multiple conversations at once. Each conversation can be parked in its own window or chat bar tab when users are browsing the web. The best feature is the new notifications -- very similar to Growl notifications in Mac OS X. When a chat window is minimized, users can still keep tabs on what is happening by way of an unobtrusive overlay.
Better Twitter Client
RockMelt says that 50% of its users have added at least one Twitter account to the browser. One of the biggest areas of user feedback was related to the Twitter app that RockMelt uses. Thus, RockMelt redesigned the app to provide a better interface and to more deeply integrate into the Twitter API. The new Twitter app supports the real-time Twitter API and also supports Twitter search.
View it Later
Vishria told us that users are increasingly using bookmarks less -- or not bookmarking content at all. Instead many users choose to save links to services like Instapaper, Readability, Pinboard and Read It Later. The advantage here is that content can be accessed for later consumption, which seems to be what users are doing more of, rather than bookmarking full sites for future reference. Inspired by some of these services, RockMelt decided to build the ability to view a site, article, video or update later. A new View Later button was added next to the bookmark icon in the URL window. Clicking this icon will add a URL to a running list tagged "View Later." This list can be accessed via the RockMelt App Edge in its own app.
The service differs from tools like Instapaper in that it isn't just for text, it can be used for videos, music, status updates -- anything in the browser. Right now there isn't a way to export any of that View Later data to other services or to integrate other services with View Later. Vishria told us that the company is planning on addressing some of those issues in the future, but for now wants a solid browser-integrated experience. I do hope the company considers taking advantage of the Instapaper or Readability APIs and at least importing the content from those services to View Later. That could be a killer feature in its own right. The new RockMelt is based on Chromium 10, which means it should be faster and more stable. The RockMelt team is pushing out the update to a few users now and everyone should have access to Beta 2 by next week. RockMelt still might be the right browser for me, but for its userbase, the new version looks like a solid update with some compelling new features. Have you used RockMelt? What do you think of custom browsers? |
| Amazon considering joining NFC rush (Appolicious) Posted: 01 Apr 2011 01:09 PM PDT |
| LogMeIn wins legal challenge (Investor's Business Daily) Posted: 01 Apr 2011 03:11 PM PDT The software maker that enables mobile devices to interact with home or work computers won a summary judgment that rejected claims of patent infringement. A U.S. court in Va. rejected a suit brought by 01 Communique Laboratory, which alleged that several LogMeIn (NASDAQ:LOGM - News) products infringed a 01 patent that covers technology that facilitates remote access to personal computers. LogMeIn leapt 9.3% to 46.08. |
| Rebecca Black a Modern-Day Girl with True Grit (ContributorNetwork) Posted: 01 Apr 2011 03:41 PM PDT Contribute content like this. Start here. COMMENTARY | Rebecca Black became an overnight household name for her rendition of a bubblegum and wholesome song called "Friday" which was released via YouTube and has garnered some 72 million hits in the past few weeks. After receiving a barrage of unmerciful and even hostile comments for what many are basically calling a "so bad it's good" music video, most 13-year-olds would crawl under a rock and hope to die. But not Rebecca Black who is fighting back with true grit in a positive, humorous and inspirational way. Hopefully, other teenagers will benefit in their own personal lives through her example. Instead of withering up in a corner, the teenager from California whose parents paid for her video music production of a song called "Friday" via Ark Music Factory, is producing another song called "LOL". Black even teamed up with the website Funny Or Die to poke fun (click here) at her music video and the lyrics which she jokingly states have much deeper meaning and symbolism than initially understood. The teenager has the support of people like Lady Gaga who called her a "genius" and even Justin Bieber who sang snippets from "Friday" for his fans. Black also has celebrity Miley Cyrus showing her true colors when (although Cyrus never mentioned Black's name) she stated to Australia's Daily Telegraph, "It should be harder to be an artist. You shouldn't just be able to put a song on YouTube and go out on tour." (Did Miley overlook her own situation there?) Also proving both maturity and class in something that might otherwise destroy sensitive teens, Black is donating the proceeds from her "Friday" song to help victims in Japan, and to her school. Said Black, "My school, El Rancho Charter is really where I started focusing on singing. I feel bad. Japan happened so close to mine, and I feel like I'm taking away attention from it. I really just want to give back." Thus even if you've found the whole Rebecca Black incident (or debacle, depending on your view) amusing, then you've got to at least give it to her for showing true audacity and mettle for getting right back out there when most would not. In fact, I don't know of many 13-year-old teenagers who have stood up so valiantly in the stinging smart of such vicious criticism and turned a negative into a positive. |
| Remains of the Day: I saw the news today, oh boy (Macworld) Posted: 01 Apr 2011 04:30 PM PDT Usually we here at the remainders consider it our sacred duty to poke fun at the day's news, but for some reason, the news today just seems too outrageous to mock. Instead, we will consider them with the utmost solemnity. Here are the remainders for Friday, April 1, 2011. PLAYMOBIL(TM) Apple Store Playset (ThinkGeek) ThinkGeek is now selling a brand new $180 Playmobil Apple Store playset, complete with miniature iPads, iPhones, and MacBooks, and even a theatre featuring Steve Jobs giving one of his trademark keynotes. You can even plug in your own iPhone to act as Steve's presentation. Add-ons include a $50 "line kit," complete with Steve Wozniak atop a Segway. I'm sure it will sell well for them. iPhone 4 Oppression Kit (iFixit) If you're concerned that someone might take apart your iPhone, look no further than iFixit's iPhone 4 Oppression Kit. It comes with a pair of Pentalobe screws, two screwdrivers to let you remove and replace the iPhone 4's screws, and a card to keep in your wallet. And it's all yours for $10. Phone security is very important, so this is an important issue to keep abreast of. Oracle's Ellison accused of running executive fighting ring (InfoWorld) Oracle CEO Larry Ellison has apparently been running an underground fighting ring composed of tech industry executives. To add insult to literal injury, losers were forced to give up stock options to the winners. It seems likely that a lot of jail-time is in all of their futures. Gmail Motion Beta (Google) Google has taken a page from Microsoft's Kinect, creating a motion-based system for interacting with Gmail. In order to open a message, you make a motion like you're opening a paper message—to send one, pretend you're licking a stamp. Of course, there are many more motions as well. Really, it's quite ingenious. What will those Google folks think of next? This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| Malicious attack hits a million Web pages (Reuters) Posted: 01 Apr 2011 03:23 PM PDT SEATTLE (Reuters) – More than one million website pages have been hit by a sophisticated hacking attack that injects code into sites that redirect users to a fraudulent software sales operation. The so-called "mass-injection" attack, which experts say is the largest of its kind ever seen, has managed to insert malicious code into websites by gaining access to the servers running the databases behind the Internet, according to the technology security company that discovered it. Websense, which first found evidence of the attack earlier this week, has called it 'LizaMoon,' after the site to which the malicious code first directed its researchers. Users can see that they are being redirected when they attempt to visit an infected address, and can close the window with no ill effects, said Patrik Runald, a senior manager of security research at Websense. The attack has largely affected small websites so far, he said, with no evidence that popular corporate or government websites have been compromised. If users do not close the window after typing an infected address, or clicking an infected link, they are redirected to a page showing a warning from 'Windows Stability Center' -- posing as a Microsoft Corp security product -- that there are problems with their computer and they are urged to pay for software to fix it. Websense said the site appeared to be set up by sophisticated fraudsters out to make money, but it was not clear whether the site also planted malicious software on users' computers if they made a purchase on the site, or if the operation was linked to an identity theft scam. The presentation of the bogus website, as shown by Websense, is high quality but clearly fraudulent. Microsoft has no product called 'Windows Stability Center". The company did not immediately have a comment on the attack. Websense said some third-party Web addresses containing information about podcasts available on Apple Inc's iTunes service had been compromised, but said Apple appeared to have prevented the malicious links from working. Apple did not respond to a request for comment. The attack may take some time to be tamed, warned Runald, as researchers first have to identify the software being compromised, and then website operators have to install updated software. "Attacks like this tend to stay for a very long time," he said. "Once they are onto something, it tends to stay with us. This LizaMoon event won't disappear over a day." (Reporting by Bill Rigby; editing by Andre Grenon) |
| HP EliteBook ultraportables getting Sandy Bridge (Digital Trends) Posted: 01 Apr 2011 09:42 AM PDT Materials available from HP's U.S. (PDF) and Japanese Web sites indicate computer maker Hewlett-Packard is preparing new versions of its EliteBook ultraportable notebooks, including power-sipping versions of Intel's Sandy Bridge processors and USB 3.0 for fast connectivity to peripherals. Although the EliteBooks have historically been oriented at business and enterprise users, they've also been embraced by road warriors and travelers, who value their performance-per-ounce ratio. According to information that's come out of HP so far, the new EliteBook models—the 2560p and 2760p convertible tablet PC—will feature second-generation Intel Core processors, including the Core i5-2537M and Core i7-2617M, matching processors already available in the 15-inch EliteBook model. HP's ultraportable EliteBooks typically have 12.1-inch displays; however, material on HP's Japanese site suggests HP might be offering a model with a 13-inch display with up to 1,440 by 900-pixel native resolution. Reports also have the new ultraportable EliteBooks offering integrated 33G connectivity as an option; the current EliteBook 3540p offers 3G service from Verizon, AT&T, or Sprint as an option in the United States. Hewlett-Packard has not formally announced the systems, and no release date or pricing information is available. This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
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