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Tuesday, June 28, 2011

Co-founder Biz Stone leaving Twitter (AP) : Technet

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Co-founder Biz Stone leaving Twitter (AP) : Technet

Co-founder Biz Stone leaving Twitter (AP)

Posted: 28 Jun 2011 08:03 PM PDT

– 1 hr 34 mins ago

LOS ANGELES – Isaac "Biz" Stone is moving on from Twitter, just five years after co-founding the microblogging site that has become integral to the social media scene around the globe.

Stone, 37, said Tuesday on his blog that he will work with the company "for many years to come," but that the most effective use of his time now is to "get out of the way" of Twitter's crew and leadership team until he's called upon to be of some specific use.

Stone says he plans to focus on helping schools, nonprofits and company advisory boards. He's also relaunching Obvious Corp. with fellow Twitter co-founder Evan Williams to develop new projects.

The move comes as Twitter has been trying to build upon its popularity to make more money by selling more ads. The privately held company doesn't disclose its finances, but research firm eMarketer Inc. estimates Twitter will bring in advertising revenue of about $150 million this year.

Stone's departure caps a year of executive changes at the San Francisco-based company. Last fall Williams handed over the reins to Twitter's current CEO, Dick Costolo, and moved on to explore new business ideas. In March, Twitter's third co-founder and original CEO Jack Dorsey returned to oversee product development as executive chairman.

Google unveils latest social networking feat (AP)

Posted: 28 Jun 2011 03:16 PM PDT

By BARBARA ORTUTAY, AP Technology Writer Barbara Ortutay, Ap Technology Writer – Tue Jun 28, 6:16 pm ET

NEW YORK – Online search leader Google Inc. is taking yet another stab at social networking, as it tries to go up against Facebook in this wildly popular and lucrative segment of the Internet. This time the project is called Google+ and it aims to make online sharing more like real life.

"We think people communicate in very rich ways," said Vic Gundotra, senior vice president of engineering at Google. "The online tools we have to choose from give us very rigid services."

Other social networking tools make selective sharing within small groups difficult. They don't allow for the nuances that people are used to in offline communication and because they call so many acquaintances "friends," said Gundotra in a blog post announcing the service.

Many Facebook users, for instance, find it difficult to limit their status updates to small groups of people so that their coworkers aren't exposed to party photos or their parents aren't privy to flirtatious posts on their "wall." Though Facebook has tried to address this with a much-hyped "Groups" feature, it's not clear how many people use it.

Gundotra's criticism seems aimed squarely at Facebook, the world's largest online social network. Facebook has become synonymous with online sharing since its founding seven years ago.

In a prepared statement, Facebook said only that "we're in the early days of making the web more social, and there are opportunities for innovation everywhere."

Google, which dominates Internet search with a firm hold on two-thirds of the U.S. market, has been experimenting with different social tools since late 2009 with limited success. "Buzz" was one major mishap. The product was a social network attached to Google's popular Gmail service, and it wound up exposing email contacts that users did not want to share. Google eventually agreed to submit to independent audits of its privacy controls every other year for the next two decades as part of a Federal Trade Commission settlement.

Google shut down another attempt at online sharing, Google Wave, last August after unveiling it with much fanfare in 2009. The service, which let users chat, share files and collaborate on documents in real time, didn't gain enough fans.

More than a year in the works, the project Google unveiled Tuesday lets users share things with smaller groups of people through a feature called "Circles." This means only college buddies, say, or your favorite co-workers can see the photos, links our updates that you post.

Another feature called "Sparks" aims to make it easier to find online content you care about, be it news about surfing or barbecue recipes. You can then share this with friends who might be interested in it. In an online video, Google calls it "nerding out" and exploring a subject together.

There's also a group messaging service called "Huddle" and a feature that lets users instantly upload photos that they take with mobile phones. The photos are stored in a private photo album on Google's remote servers, and users can access them and share them as they see fit.

Altimeter Group analyst Charlene Li has high hopes for the friend grouping feature. She said that her biggest pet peeve with Facebook is its existing friend management tools. She noted that millions of people already use Google to share things with others via email, and Google+ looks like a natural extension of this type of sharing, making it more functional and organized.

"I think Facebook is going to have to up its game," she said.

Google+ is undergoing what the company calls a "field trial," so it's accessible by invitation only and not yet available to the public. The company declined to say when it'll be more widely available.

Lou Kerner, a social media analyst with Wedbush Securities, believes the game is over in the competition to become the world's global social network. With 700 million users, Facebook has won, he said.

There's a lot more to the social Web than just creating a successful social network, though, and Kerner thinks that with Google+ the search leader is trying to make its existing product offerings more social.

"I don't think they're seeing this as a direct competitor to Facebook," he said.

Google+ does have its skeptics.

"People have their social circles on Facebook," said Debra Aho Williamson, principal analyst with research firm eMarketer. "Asking them to create another social circle is challenging."

And Google is still best known for its flagship service, online search.

"The whole idea of a Google social network...they've been throwing stuff against the wall for several years and so forth nothing has stuck." Going to Google to be social, she added, is like "going to Starbucks for the muffins. Or, for that matter, going to Facebook for search."

__

AP Technology Writer Rachel Metz in San Francisco contributed to this story.

AP Source: News Corp. to sell MySpace this week (AP)

Posted: 28 Jun 2011 02:28 PM PDT

By RYAN NAKASHIMA, AP Business Writer Ryan Nakashima, Ap Business Writer – Tue Jun 28, 5:28 pm ET

LOS ANGELES – News Corp. is aiming to sell struggling social network site MySpace this week after three years of massive losses, according to a person familiar with the matter. The move will likely result in the layoff of more than half of the site's remaining 500 workers.

It's a jarring goodbye for a once-hot Internet property, which News Corp. CEO Rupert Murdoch predicted four years ago would eventually make $1 billion in annual revenue. MySpace never reached that goal. This year, MySpace is expected to make less than a fifth of that as ad sales plummet, according to research firm eMarketer.

MySpace's crash coincided with Facebook's rise — due in large part to its cleaner interface, smoother operation and better integration with other services. MySpace was generally clunky, slower and littered with display ads. It was also slower to adapt.

At least three bidders are still in the running for MySpace — online advertising network operator Specific Media, private equity fund Golden Gate Capital and Austin Ventures, an investment fund that is working with MySpace co-founder Chris DeWolfe. The company hasn't chosen a buyer yet, according to the person, who was not authorized to comment publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity.

News Corp. is looking to cut a deal Wednesday or Thursday in order to have it completed in its fiscal year, which ends Thursday.

Earlier, the News Corp.-owned website All Things D reported that MySpace was on the verge of being sold for $20 million to $30 million. The person said the deal price will likely be much higher and include a combination of cash and stock.

Any sale around that price would mark a stunning reversal from 2005, when News Corp. bought the promising startup for $580 million when social networking was in its infancy.

Facebook has turned into the dominant social media platform with more than half a billion users. A recent investment by private fund GSV Capital Corp. valued Facebook at $50 billion. LinkedIn Corp., a social network for professionals, recently went public and now has a market capitalization of about $8 billion.

The low estimate for MySpace suggests there may only be residual value in its brand, technology and declining visitor base, said Debra Aho Williamson, principal analyst with research firm eMarketer.

"It shows that this is just something that News Corp. wants to get off of its books at any price it can get," she said.

MySpace unveiled an extensive overhaul in October in an attempt to transform itself into a hub for consuming entertainment content, but it didn't help reverse visitor declines. In January, it slashed nearly half its staff, or about 500 people, in hopes of returning to profitability.

The site still lost money. For the three months through March, the News Corp. segment that includes MySpace lost $165 million. That was worse than the $150 million loss it posted a year earlier, mainly because of lower advertising revenue at the site. That marked the 11th straight quarterly loss since mid-2008, over which time the segment lost about $1.4 billion cumulatively.

MySpace CEO Mike Jones is the last remnant of a three-person executive team that came in to fix the site in April 2009. It is unclear if Jones will stay on after a sale.

According to tracking firm comScore Inc., MySpace had 74 million visitors from around the world in May, down 32 percent from a year earlier. By comparison, Facebook had 1.1 billion, up 26 percent; Twitter had 139 million, up 54 percent; and LinkedIn had 86 million.

News Corp. shares rose 25 cents, or 1.5 percent, to close Tuesday at $17.17.

Pope sends first tweet, does so using iPad 2 (Yahoo! News)

Posted: 28 Jun 2011 06:26 PM PDT

Review: HTC Evo 3D brings 3D to your mobile phone (Yahoo! News)

Posted: 28 Jun 2011 06:02 PM PDT

Scan-to-Pay Features Coming Soon To a Mobile App Near You (Mashable)

Posted: 27 Jun 2011 04:24 PM PDT

Jennifer Van Grove Jennifer Van Grove – Mon Jun 27, 7:24 pm ET

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: Card.io

[More from Mashable: Read & Write Album Reviews on "Yelp for Music" Site]

Quick Pitch: Fast and easy mobile credit card scanning.

Genius Idea: Pay by credit card without the manual entry.

[More from Mashable: What's Happening Around You? Banjo Knows]

It stands to reason that we're likely to buy and spend more when there's less friction involved in the purchase experience.

Former AdMob product manager and current Card.io co-founder and CEO Michael Mettler know this all too well. At AdMob, Mettler saw firsthand how mobile consumers were quick to spend $0.99 on apps but much more reluctant to make big-ticket purchases.

"One key to getting better performance in mobile advertising … was getting commerce to move from the web to mobile," says Mettler. "But, the purchasing experience on the phone is still very poor, and we wanted to build something really simple and really elegant to try and fix it."

So Mettler and co-founder Josh Bleecher Synder, also formerly of AdMob, came up with the idea to scan credit cards to make mobile application payments faster.

"Card.io is mostly about taking friction out of the purchase process," says Mettler.

Card.io is a software development kit for mobile application developers. Developers sign up, download the SDK, copy and paste some code into their apps, and can then begin to accept credit card payments by scan from within their applications.

For application users, Card.io means a faster way to pay -- simply hold your credit card up to your mobile phone's camera instead of manually entering your credit card information.

Card.io's scanning technology resembles something you might find in other mobile applications, and there are a few off-the-shelf optical character recognition (OCR) solutions available to app makers. But Card.io has built its own computer vision and machine learning algorithms to read cards quickly, Mettler says.

Still, Card.io only addresses part of the friction in the mobile credit card payment process. One must still have an actual credit card handy; there's no avoiding that trek across the room to locate your wallet, at least for the time being.

"Eventually, if we can make it so that all your payment information is stored on your phone, it's all secure, and you're comfortable provisioning it out, we can hopefully fix that purchase experience on your phone," Mettler says.

Select developers were granted access to Card.io's SDK last week, so we'll start to see the startup's credit card scanning technology inside applications in the very near future. Mettler says several, including Card.io-enhanced versions of MogoTix and TaskRabbit, are nearing release.

Card.io has raised $1 million in a seed round led by former eBay executive Michael Dearing.

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.

This story originally published on Mashable here.

Google goes social with Facebook rival (AFP)

Posted: 28 Jun 2011 07:43 PM PDT

by Chris Lefkow Chris Lefkow – 1 hr 54 mins ago

WASHINGTON (AFP) – Google, the king of Internet search but a bust on the social front, has launched its rival to Facebook, a social networking service called Google+.

"Online sharing is awkward. Even broken. And we aim to fix it," Google's senior vice president for engineering Vic Gundotra said in a blog post about the long-awaited social networking initiative from the Internet giant.

Unveiling Google+, Gundotra stressed the ability it gives users to separate online friends and family into different "Circles," or networks, and to share information only with members of a particular circle.

"We'd like to bring the nuance and richness of real-life sharing to software," he said. "We want to make Google better by including you, your relationships and your interests."

One of the criticisms of Facebook is that updates are shared with all of one's friends unless a user has gone through a relatively complicated process to create separate Facebook Groups.

"Not all relationships are created equal," Gundotra said. "So in life we share one thing with college buddies, another with parents, and almost nothing with our boss.

"The problem is that today's online services turn friendship into fast food -- wrapping everyone in 'friend' paper -- and sharing really suffers," he said.

Google+, located at plus.google.com, is currently being tested by a small number of people or is available by invitation only.

But Google said in a message on the site that it "won't be long before the Google+ project is ready for everyone."

Google unveiled several new tools integrated into Google+, including "Hangouts," which allows for video chatting among friends, "Mobile" for location-sharing and "Huddle" for group text messaging.

Photos and video can be uploaded and shared among Circles using a feature known as "Instant Upload," while an online sharing engine called "Sparks" delivers content from the Web into a user's feed.

Google dominates Internet search but the Mountain View, California, company has failed to make inroads on the social networking front, where Facebook has accumulated nearly 700 million users and Twitter around 200 million.

Former Google chief executive Eric Schmidt, speaking at the AllThingsD technology conference last month, took responsibility for the company missing the wave when it came to making services social, saying "I screwed up."

Google's last major foray into social networking -- Google Buzz, launched in February 2010 -- spawned a slew of privacy complaints and led to a slap on the wrist from the US Federal Trade Commission.

Under a settlement between the US regulator and Google announced in March, Google is required to implement a comprehensive privacy program and will be subject to independent privacy audits every two years for the next 20 years.

Google+ makes its debut as Google and Facebook wage a fierce battle over online advertising dollars and how people navigate the Internet.

Google does not send people to Facebook and vice versa, and both companies are seeking to become the chief gateway to the Internet.

In May, Facebook was left red-faced after acknowledging it had hired a prominent public relations firm to draw attention to privacy practices at Google.

Danny Sullivan, editor-in-chief of technology blog SearchEngineLand.com, said in a blog post it was "anyone's guess" as to whether Google+ would be successful.

"If you're happy using Facebook, there seems relatively little to make you want to switch over to Google Plus, at the moment," said Sullivan, who received an early glimpse of the new service from Google.

"Perhaps if there are people who want a Facebook alternative, Google's now got a core to build on for them."

Baidu keen on Shanghai international board listing: paper (Reuters)

Posted: 28 Jun 2011 07:28 PM PDT

– 2 hrs 9 mins ago

SHANGHAI (Reuters) – Baidu Inc, China's top search engine, wants to be one of the first companies to list on Shanghai's international board when it is launched, a business daily quoted the firm's chief financial officer as saying.

Li Xinzhe also told the China Securities Journal Baidu's share price had been affected by worries over the accounting practices of overseas-listed Chinese firms, but that its fundamentals were solid with good long-term growth prospects.

"We have repeatedly expressed that we will be pleased to return to the A-share market when we communicate with the government," Li was quoted as saying in the interview.

"And we also wish that we can be in the first batch (of listings on the international board), but details have to depend on the rules of the international board," she added.

China has yet to announce details of the board, which will allow foreign firms to sell yuan-denominated shares for the first time, including its launch date.

Domestic media have reported the securities regulator is planning to allow about 10 foreign companies in the first batch of listings.

Multinationals such as HSBC, Unilever and Standard Chartered Plc have said they want to list on the Shanghai Stock Exchange when rules allow.

Many foreign-incorporated Chinese companies, known in China as red-chips, also want to return to the mainland stock market via the international board.

Baidu, which is focusing more on e-commerce and online video, dominates China's search engine market after Google Inc pulled out following a high-profile fallout with Beijing over censorship last year.

On Friday, Baidu announced it would buy the country's leading travel website Qunar to strengthen its foothold in the competitive Internet sector.

(Reporting by Yixin Chen and Kazunori Takada; Editing by Jonathan Hopfner)

MacBook Air rumor roundup: Sandy Bridge, Thunderbolt, and back to black? (Digital Trends)

Posted: 28 Jun 2011 06:00 PM PDT

Kelly Montgomery Kelly Montgomery – Tue Jun 28, 9:00 pm ET

It's become evident in the last month or so that an update to Apple's popular MacBook Air laptops is likely just around the corner. Releasing newer, updated models around this time of year would be in keeping with the company's prior patterns, and rumors have been coming at us left and right. Something else that has bolstered these rumors is the fact that Best Buy is no longer shipping the most popular MacBook Air models. The most expensive version of the laptop is still available, and the computers can be purchased in-store, but it's pretty clear that Best Buy is trying to clear out its stock of MacBook Airs, meaning that they must be expecting to receive updated models in the very near future. The update seems like more of an inevitability now than a rumor, but there are still no concrete details on what improvements and changes to expect. While we won't know for sure until the official announcement, we've rounded up some of the rumors on what the new MacBook Airs might have in store.

Sandy Bridge

The most pervasive rumor about the new MacBook Air models is that they will all include the latest-generation Intel CPUs, which use the "Sandy Bridge" platform. The second-generation of Intel's Core i-series processors are designed to use up less power as well as provide enhanced graphics and of course, speed. If none of the other rumors are true, this one seems the most likely to be included on the new machines.

Thunderbolt

The other likely-to-be-true rumor floating around is that the new MacBook Air models will include Thunderbolt ports like its big brother the MacBook Pro. If you're unfamiliar with Thunderbolt, it serves the same function as a USB port, but allows for much, much faster transfer of data. Thunderbolt ports are able to transfer data at up to 10GBps, which is pretty much lightning-speed in comparison to your typical USB port.

Color

We've heard several rumors that the new MacBook Airs will be available in a black finish, but we've also heard mutterings that Apple tested out the darker color and that it was nixed by the big bosses. Contrasting rumors make us think this is probably just wishful thinking and speculation, but it won't be a shocking move either way. With the sleek aluminum body, we're not sure who would pick a black model over the original finish anyway.

Timeline

With the rumor mill running strong and several legitimate hints at an imminent release, Apple fans are waiting with bated breath for an official announcement. While there have been several false alarms from faulty sources in the past couple weeks, many think that Apple won't release the new MacBook Airs until they can be preloaded with the new Mac OS X Lion. The launch date for the new operating system is set for sometime in July, so we're expecting that the new Macbook Air models will start shipping soon or immediately after the Lion launch.

Price

There has been talk about Apple lowering the price point on the MacBook Air, but all it really amounts to is analysts debating whether that would help Apple's market share or not. We haven't heard any actual hints that the price will go down, so we chalk this up to analysts having fun with all the Apple speculation and coming up with things to talk about. If Steve Jobs wanted to eat into the PC market, a $799 price point (what analysts say would be the 'sweet spot') might do the trick, but we're not sure that fits with Jobs objectives anyway. Since most of this is all talk, we're expecting that the new MacBook Airs will come in at the same prices they are selling for now.

While there is always potential for surprise, we expect that Apple will play it safe by introducing updated MacBook Airs, complete with Sandy Bridge processors and Thunderbolt ports, alongside the launch of Mac OS X Lion. The rest we will brush off as typical Apple speculation and rumor-generation. In the meantime, we suggest you take a look at the previews of Mac OS X Lion, because it doesn't look like there will be any new Apple laptops today.

Google touts Android success (Investor's Business Daily)

Posted: 28 Jun 2011 03:20 PM PDT

– Tue Jun 28, 6:20 pm ET

More than 500,000 Android-based devices are being activated every day, a 25% increase from just 7 weeks ago, said Google's Android chief Andy Rubin. Sales of Android devices are rising 4.4% a week, he said, without disclosing specifics. He did not reveal how many devices being activated are smartphones or tablets. Google offers the software to phone makers for free, but makes money of ad-supported applications and by driving traffic to its sites. Shares rose 2.3% to 493.65.

Social networking browser backed by Khosla, Accel (Reuters)

Posted: 28 Jun 2011 09:24 PM PDT

By Sarah McBride Sarah Mcbride – 13 mins ago

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – RockMelt, a Web browser that integrates Facebook and other social media, reeled in two more Silicon Valley heavy hitters in a new $30 million round of financing.

Accel Partners and Khosla Partners joined existing investor Andreesen Horowitz in this latest round, the company and investors said. Accel's Jim Breyer and Khosla's Vinod Khosla will take observer roles on RockMelt's board.

Rockmelt lets Facebook users send messages from their main browser screens and signals when there is news a reader wants -- a new Tweet or an update on a favorite website. The idea is to make the Web browser, increasingly the portal for applications as well as Web surfing, a one-stop shop for people hooked on social media.

Many of these features are the result of a partnership of RockMelt and Facebook, which is also backed by Andreesen Horowitz.

Breyer called a browser built to optimize social media "a compelling opportunity."

The company helps to use better timing and execution to avoid the fate of Flock, a browser that integrated social media but never achieved a critical mass of users, said RockMelt co-founder and Chief Technology Officer Tim Howes. Social-gaming company Zynga bought Flock earlier this year, and then announced in April it would discontinue support of the browser.

"They were just simply too early," said Marc Andreesen of Andreesen Horowitz, one of RockMelt's early backers, about Flock.

The cash will allow the roughly 40-person company to grow faster and develop partnerships in areas such as music, e-commerce and gaming, company executives said.

RockMelt's goal is to amass "hundreds of millions" of users as use of social media like Twitter and Facebook becomes increasingly pervasive, but its executives declined to specify a time frame or be more specific about numbers.

Currently, about 1 million customers have tried RockMelt, of which several hundred thousand are active users, said RockMelt Chief Executive and co-founder Eric Vishria and co-founder and chief technology officer Howes.

The average person uses it for 6.5 hours a day, and more than half of users are 24 years old or younger, according to the two co-founders.

The company previously raised $8.2 million in September 2009 and $1.7 million in an angel round in February 2009. The company declined to give its latest valuation.

RockMelt is based on Chromium, the same technology as Google's Chrome browser. On Tuesday, Google announced a Facebook competitor called GooglePlus.

(Editing by Steve Orlofsky)

Resident Evil: The Mercenaries 3D review (Digital Trends)

Posted: 28 Jun 2011 05:34 PM PDT

Ryan Fleming Ryan Fleming – Tue Jun 28, 8:34 pm ET

To call the Nintendo 3DS' lineup of games "suspect" is being generous. The 3D console offers a handful of decent games, but there has yet to be a single great original title designed solely for the system that really makes playing it fun. So when a new Resident Evil game was announced, people took notice. Unfortunately, Resident Evil: The Mercenaries 3D is basically just a mini-game that costs $40.

If you played "The Mercenaries" mini-game on previous Resident Evil titles, then you know what to expect. You are put in a scenario where you must survive waves of enemies. It is a fun mini-game, but that is all it was, and that is all it remains. Within 20 minutes of playing, you will have seen almost everything RE:TM3D has to offer. The gameplay is fun and the 3DS does a solid job with the graphics, but the missions get old fast. You play through six sections, each with a handful of missions types, and as you progress you unlock eight characters in total, each with one variant costume that you can also unlock. But that's it. There is no real story, and besides the addition of skill slotting — a new addition that allows you to select three out of thirty perks — there really isn't much progression to the game either.

But if you were obsessed with the previous Mercenaries games — and there were plenty of people that were – -the gameplay is actually fairly solid, and it is easy and satisfying to pull off headshots or long range snipes while maneuvering through levels based on Resident Evil 4 and 5. The touchscreen makes inventory and navigation a simple task, and taking on waves of enemies as the clock winds down is tense and exciting.

The addition of a co-op both online and locally is nice, but there are some loading screens you will come across during matches that make it seem like a grudging addition, and not something Capcom really cared about. When it works, it is fun though.

"The Mercenaries" is one of the best mini-games available, but on its own it lacks anything resembling depth and becomes a superficial experience. The technical side — the graphics, sound and gameplay — are all very good, but there just isn't enough here to justify the full price tag.

 

Score: 7 out of 10

 

Plants vs. Zombies, Peggle and other great titles from soon-to-be acquired PopCap Games (Appolicious)

Posted: 28 Jun 2011 04:00 PM PDT

FCC's Wireless Competition Report Gets Some Frowns (NewsFactor)

Posted: 28 Jun 2011 02:51 PM PDT

Mark Long, newsfactor.com Mark Long, newsfactor.com – Tue Jun 28, 5:51 pm ET

The Federal Communications Commission has released its latest annual report on competition in the U.S. wireless market, as mandated by Congress. Though the report's findings demonstrate that the number of carriers serving the nation in specific markets is on the rise, some commissioners were clearly troubled about certain aspects of the report compiled by the FCC's staff.

For example, Commissioner Michael Copps highlighted the trend concerning industry consolidation as well as the fact that U.S. consumers are no longer enjoying falling prices, based on the consumer price index (CPI) for cellular services.

"If we want Americans to continue to enjoy innovation, affordability and improved mobile coverage, we must heed these facts and continue to examine areas where the commission can act to encourage mobile competition," Copps observed.

Rural Coverage Still Lagging

According to the FCC's 15th annual report, as of the third quarter 28 percent of wireless network subscribers were equipped with smartphones and 41 percent of all recent handset buyers purchased smartphones. Moreover, during the first eight months of last year, Android's share of the smartphone market rose from five percent to nearly 20 percent.

The percentage of the U.S. population served by four or more providers increased from 58 percent in November 2009 to 68 percent in August 2010. Moreover, the percentage of the U.S. population served by three or more providers increased from 76 to 82 percent.

In rural areas, 69 percent of the population had a choice of two or more providers and 38 percent could choose from among three or more providers, noted Commissioner Robert McDowell. "To put this progress in a historic context, for 2008 these numbers were 62 and 29 percent, respectively," McDowell said.

Nevertheless, millions of Americans living in rural areas still cannot enjoy the competitive choices available elsewhere in the nation. "More than seven million Americans still live in rural census blocks with two or fewer mobile-service providers," McDowell explained. "In addition, more than 37 million Americans live in rural census blocks that have two or fewer choices when it comes to mobile broadband services."

Other Issues

Commissioner Mignon Clyburn noted that the FCC's staff was unable to calculate unit price measures for mobile broadband data services [or] calculate unit prices for text messaging. "The commission needs revenue information specifically about mobile broadband use and text messaging so that it can thoroughly evaluate if consumers are benefiting from lower prices for mobile data services," he said.

Copps expressed concern that the FCC's ability to arrive at intelligent decisions concerning wireless competition is being constrained by the staff's reliance on pricing and investment data gathered by third parties. He also noted that the new report incorporates coverage maps that simply reiterate the mobile provider information gathered by American Roamer. "I would prefer to have the commission gather and verify this data ourselves," Copps said.

The report avoids the issue of just what constitutes the 3G and 4G services being touted throughout the U.S. wireless industry. Instead, the authors point to an International Telecommunication Union statement from last December: "While undefined, [the term 4G] may also be applied to the forerunners of these technologies, LTE and WiMAX, and to other evolved 3G technologies providing a substantial level of improvement in performance and capabilities with respect to the initial third-generation systems now deployed."

According to industry observers, however, the ITU's proclamation does nothing to help American consumers arrive at intelligent decisions about which system to select. For example, Clearwire, T-Mobile, AT&T and Verizon Wireless refer to their WiMAX, HSPA+, and LTE networks as 4G -- despite different performance characteristics offered by each of these technologies.

The top 10 singles and albums on iTunes (AP)

Posted: 28 Jun 2011 02:26 PM PDT

By The Associated Press The Associated Press – Tue Jun 28, 5:26 pm ET

iTunes' top 10 selling singles and albums of the week ending June 27, 2011:

Singles:

1. "Last Friday Night (T.G.I.F.)," Katy Perry

2. "Moves Like Jagger (The Voice Performance) (feat. Christina Aguilera)," Maroon 5

3. "Party Rock Anthem (feat. Lauren Bennett & GoonRock)," LMFAO

4. "Give Me Everything (feat. Ne-Yo, Afrojack & Nayer)," Pitbull

5. "Super Bass," Nicki Minaj

6. "Rolling In the Deep," ADELE

7. "The Edge of Glory," Lady GaGa

8. "Tonight Tonight," Hot Chelle Rae

9. "How to Love," Lil Wayne

10. "Honey Bee," Blake Shelton

Albums:

1. "Bon Iver," Bon Iver

2. "21," ADELE

3. "The Light of the Sun," Jill Scott

4. "Hell: The Sequel," Bad Meets Evil

5. "Planet Pit," Pitbull

6. "Outlaws Like Me," Justin Moore

7. "Sigh No More," Mumford & Sons

8. "Sorry for Party Rocking," LMFAO

9. "Modern Love," Matt Nathanson

10. "Nothing But the Best — The Frank Sinatra Collection," Frank Sinatra

___

iTunes is owned by Apple Inc.

Google launches tool to convert Flash into iPhone-friendly HTML5 (Digital Trends)

Posted: 28 Jun 2011 03:11 PM PDT

amalone Amalone – Tue Jun 28, 6:11 pm ET

Swiffy ExampleGoogle Labs on Tuesday launched an experimental product that promises to convert .SWF files into HMTL5, making formerly-Flash files compatible with mobile devices that include Apple's iPad and iPhone. The web-based tool, dubbed Swiffy, won't convert pages that have .SWF embedded, rather individual Flash files must be uploaded to the site and Swiffy then spits out the HTML5 code. That makes the Swiffy more suited for developers rather than for anyone with an iPhone trying to watch a flash animation.

Swiffy, as the story goes, is the result of a Google intern "hacking around" last summer in an attempt to make Flash animations playable on mobile devices that don't support Adobe's Flash Player (Google didn't explicitly say it, but we guess that Apple devices were targeted devices).

In March, Adobe unveiled its own Flash-to-HTML5 conversion program called Wallaby. Wallaby, unlike Swiffy, which is web-based, required users to download a piece of software before they could run conversions. Google also notes that Wallaby's converted product is able to be edited and reused whereas Swiffy produces a compressed format that can't be easily edited. But that also means that Swiffy's output file is only about 10 percent larger than the original .SWF file.

What does Adobe think of a third-party tool to convert its Flash files into HTML5? Google answered that very question:

"Adobe is pleased to see the Flash platform extended to devices which don't support the Flash player. The result is that anyone creating rich or interactive ads can continue to get all the authoring benefits of Flash Pro and have the flexibility to run the ad in the Flash Player or HTML depending on what's available on the system. Google and Adobe look forward to close collaboration around efforts like these."

Google notes that Swiffy is still in its early stages and won't necessarily work with all .SWF content, but should work nicely on Flash ads and animations. Swiffy is currently compatible with Webkit-based browsers: Safari, Mobile Safari and Chrome.

Mozilla: We Care About Business, Really (PC Magazine)

Posted: 28 Jun 2011 08:12 AM PDT

William Fenton - PC Magazine William Fenton - Pc Magazine – Tue Jun 28, 11:12 am ET

It looks like Mozilla public relations is a slightly less rapid than its release schedule. After a turbulent week in the news, Mozilla today issued a blog post seeking to quell its business brouhaha and reassure enterprise customers that it is, in fact, committed to their needs.

"The Mozilla Community has focused our efforts on the needs of the individual user, and prioritized the product roadmap and features accordingly. However, as is the case with many technologies, loyal Firefox users and their IT departments have sought to bring Firefox into their places of work," explained a post from Mozilla VP of products Jay Sullivan.

"A key challenge for enterprises is that they need to certify their websites, apps and add-ons each time Firefox is updated," continued Sullivan. "We are exploring solutions that balance these needs, with active discussion in our community, including valuable input from IBM. Open Source software is well-suited to these challenges, as interested parties can come together to build what is needed."

While the post fell short of a mea culpa, it's a tectonic shift from what another Mozilla exec, Asa Dotzler, communicated five days ago. Responding to the concerns of a Firefox specialist lamenting the (largely negative) impacts of Firefox's rapid release schedule on business, Dotzler assumed a decidedly combative tone in his blog post.

"Enterprise has never been (and I'll argue, shouldn't be) a focus of ours," Dotzler stated. "Until we run out of people who don't have sysadmins and enterprise deployment teams looking out for them, I can't imagine why we'd focus at all on the kinds of environments you care so much about."

After Dotzler's controversial comments, Google sought to soothe maligned enterprise customers by stressing its commitment to commercial customers. "We have been listening to admins and they have been helping drive a road map," said Glenn Wilson, product manager of Chrome for Business.

Yesterday, Mozilla outlined its vision for Firefox in Firefox flaming.
at 9:50 PM

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