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Google 2Q results show company thriving under Page (AP) : Technet |
- Google 2Q results show company thriving under Page (AP)
- Digital music service Spotify launches in US (AP)
- Inquiring minds want to know? Google it! (AP)
- 5 steps to getting started in Spotify, the iTunes of streaming music (Yahoo! News)
- How to sync Spotify with your smartphone to listen to music offline (Yahoo! News)
- Now You Can Screen Calls On Your Cellphone (Mashable)
- Lady Gaga's YouTube account is suspended (AP)
- Google going social as profit soars (AFP)
- Update: Verizon likely not policing user phones and removing tethering apps (Digital Trends)
- Winnie the Pooh, NASA top Android Apps of the Week (Appolicious)
- Spotify vs. Pandora vs. Grooveshark (Digital Trends)
- Benign Brain Tumors Not Linked to Cell Phones (LiveScience.com)
- Netflix announces price hike, infuriating customers over a matter of $6 (Appolicious)
- Report: FBI Investigating News Corp. Over Possible 9/11 Phone Hacking (PC Magazine)
- Spotify debuts; Pandora falls (Investor's Business Daily)
- TSMC in trial manufacture of Apple chips: source (Reuters)
- June video game retail sales drop 10 percent (AP)
- EA to shut down online servers for 13 of its games (Digital Trends)
| Google 2Q results show company thriving under Page (AP) Posted: 14 Jul 2011 05:03 PM PDT SAN FRANCISCO – Google Inc. CEO Larry Page's traditionally frosty relationship with Wall Street turned into a warm embrace Thursday after the Internet search leader released strong financial results for its latest quarter. The results represented Page's first report card since he became CEO at the start of the second quarter in April, ending the decade-long reign of his mentor, Eric Schmidt. Although he established himself as engineering and entrepreneurial genius as Google's co-founder, Page has made it clear since the company went public in 2004 that he is more interested in innovation than focusing on the short-term earnings targets set by stock market analysts. Page's standoffish attitude had raised concerns that Google might not exceed expectations as consistently as it did under Schmidt. The concern had been weighing on Google's stock, causing it to lag well behind the technology-driven Nasdaq composite index. But the second-quarter results at least temporarily erased the doubts about whether Google can thrive under Page's unorthodox leadership. Investors signaled their approval by boosting Google's stock by more than 12 percent. That restored the stock price to where it stood before Page became CEO on April 4. Page made analysts even happier by sticking around for the company's hour-long conference call with analysts. That was a contrast to a cursory appearance he made at Google's first-quarter call three months ago, which had fed perceptions that Page considered investor relations to be a waste of his time. In his remarks, Page stressed that he intends to be a "careful steward of shareholders' money," while reiterating his intention to invest heavily in hiring more employees and expanding into other markets in pursuit of even bigger profits in the future. "I see more opportunities for Google today than ever before because, believe it or not, we are still in the very early stages of what we want to do," Page, 38, said. Page's demeanor and commentary "hit all the right notes," said BGC Financial analyst Colin Gillis. "It made people feel like maybe things are going to be OK and that (Page) isn't going to be so hostile toward shareholders after all." Google earned $2.5 billion, or $7.68 per share, in the April-June period. That's a 36 percent increase from $1.84 billion, or $5.71 per share, a year ago. If not for costs covering employee stock compensation, Google says it would have earned $8.74 per share. That figured easily topped the average estimate of $7.84 per share among analysts surveyed by FactSet. Revenue increased 32 percent to $9 billion, the first time in Google's 13-year history that it has brought in that much money in a quarter. After subtracting Google's advertising commissions, revenue stood at $6.9 billion — nearly $400 million above analyst projections. Google shares soared $66.36, or 12.6 percent, to $595.30 in extended trading after finishing the regular session at $528.94. The stock price stood at $591.80 when Page became CEO. The results are the latest indication that the Internet remains a bright spot in an otherwise lackluster economy. The contrasts between online and offline commerce during the last few years is like what happened in the Great Depression of the 1930s when "people sold horses and bought cars, so car companies did great," Patrick Pichette, Google's chief financial officer, said in a Thursday interview. "There is a fundamental shift in how the economy runs and we are living that through the digital economy today." Google fared so well because advertisers were willing to pay higher prices to promote their products on the Internet's largest marketing network. The average price paid per advertising click on Google's network rose 12 percent from last year. Web surfers also found the ads more enticing, clicking on them 18 percent more than they did at the same time last year. Page delivered the impressive results even while standing by his vow to invest in projects that may take several years to pay off. Google's newest venture, a Facebook-like social network called Plus, debuted two weeks ago and has grown quickly amid positive reviews. Page said Thursday that more than 10 million people already have joined Plus even though it still requires an invitation to get into it. By comparison, Facebook has more than 750 million users. Google is hoping Plus can become as big a hit as its Android software for mobile phones and tablet computers. Although Google gives away the software, it has enabled Google to expand its advertising dominance into the mobile market as more people increasingly connect to the Web away from their home and office computers. Page said more than 550,000 devices relying on Android are being activated each day. Google estimates there about 135 million devices that rely on Android. "All of us at Google want to create services that people in the world use twice a day, just like a toothbrush," Page said. To help carry out its ambitious agenda, Google increased its payroll by 9 percent, or 2,452 employees, in the quarter to bring its workforce to nearly 28,800 people. The additions included 450 workers inherited as part of the company's $700 million acquisition of airline fare tracker ITA Software. Through the first half of the year, Google added nearly 4,400 workers. That's well ahead of its pledge to hire at least 6,200 employees this year. Even Page indicated the hiring is occurring a little faster than he anticipated. |
| Digital music service Spotify launches in US (AP) Posted: 14 Jul 2011 10:57 AM PDT LOS ANGELES – Digital music service Spotify arrived in the United States on Thursday, aiming its addictive, free song service at American listeners in the hope that they will then pay for more features, just as nearly 2 million have done in Europe. Spotify gives people access to more than 15 million songs on computers for free as long as they listen to a few 15-second ads. It then tries to persuade them to pay $5 a month for a computer-only version that strips out the ads, or $10 a month for one that can be used on mobile devices including iPhones and Android-powered devices. "The key is to get them invested in the experience," Ken Parks, chief content officer and managing director of Spotify North America, said in an interview. "You spend 1,000 hours in an experience like Spotify building playlists, it sort of becomes part of your life." "Suddenly the question about whether you pay the equivalent of two or three fancy coffees a month to take that collection on your mobile device becomes a much easier question to answer," he said. The Swedish company has more than 10 million registered users and 1.6 million paying customers in the United Kingdom, Sweden, Finland, Norway, France, the Netherlands and Spain. It added the United States as its eighth market on Thursday as it launched for invited users in a test period. Spotify is the latest in an array of companies to offer a subscription music plan with the cooperation of the major music labels. The competing plans include Rhapsody, MOG and Rdio. All offer a $10-a-month plan that allows for unlimited listening to millions of songs and the ability to save songs on phones for playback when outside of cellphone range. So far, such plans have not been popular enough to reverse a decade-long slide in music sales, which has been mainly caused by piracy. Last year, revenue from paid subscription plans fell 5 percent from a year earlier to $201 million, even though the number of subscribers grew about 25 percent to 1.5 million, according to the Recording Industry Association of America. Including CD sales, downloads and other forms of music, the value of U.S. music shipments fell 11 percent to $6.85 billion, the RIAA said. The most popular of the subscription services, Rhapsody, has more than 800,000 paying subscribers. But none of the existing plans have what Spotify offers: an enticing free service that offers a huge chunk of listening and gets consumers to bond with its interface. Others have trial services that last from a few days to a week. Pandora, a popular Internet radio service, allows for unlimited free listening to songs with audio ads, but it doesn't allow users to pick specific tracks and its library of songs is far smaller. On Spotify, European users are allowed to listen for free for 20 hours a month for the first six months, after which their free listening is capped at 10 hours a month with a limit of five plays per song. Spotify said it will study how U.S. users adopt the service before it decides on free usage caps here. Parks boasted that the application offered "instantaneous" access to songs with no data buffering. In a brief test of the computer-only application, song plays were extremely snappy. The program also quickly dug through a user's existing iTunes program to find playlists and identify purchased music and favorites. The interface resembled Apple Inc.'s iTunes program but with less clutter. ___ AP Technology Writer Joelle Tessler in Washington contributed to this report. |
| Inquiring minds want to know? Google it! (AP) Posted: 14 Jul 2011 11:32 AM PDT |
| 5 steps to getting started in Spotify, the iTunes of streaming music (Yahoo! News) Posted: 14 Jul 2011 05:31 PM PDT |
| How to sync Spotify with your smartphone to listen to music offline (Yahoo! News) Posted: 14 Jul 2011 05:09 PM PDT |
| Now You Can Screen Calls On Your Cellphone (Mashable) Posted: 13 Jul 2011 05:08 PM PDT That landline you never use probably has caller ID showing the caller's name, but what about that mobile device you always tote around with you? Not so much. Wednesday, T-Mobile USA is rolling out a pay-per-month service that allows its customers to start screening calls from their cellphones. [More from Mashable: 5 Trends Shaping the Mobile Gaming Industry] The service, called Name ID and built by Cequint, will display an incoming caller's name, phone number, and city and state, should the phoning party not already be in the user's address book. T-Mobile, soon to be the property of AT&T, says it's the first major wireless carrier in the U.S. to support a Caller ID service that can show a caller's name. [More from Mashable: Historypin Launches, Shows Your World As It Was] "Before Name ID for mobile phones, deciding whether or not to answer an unfamiliar call often left customers guessing. Now Name ID allows T-Mobile customers to more easily determine which calls to answer, and whether they want to immediately add the new caller's information to their list of contacts," said Brad Duea, senior vice president, T-Mobile USA. "Providing the names of previously unknown callers simply gives our customers more control over incoming calls." Well, it's about time a cellphone provider offered this service. What took them so long? As the popular Spiderwebs song -- released in 1996 by No Doubt long before the ubiquity of the cellphone -- reminds us, sometimes "No matter who calls. I gotta screen my phone calls." Name ID costs $3.99 per month and is available now for T-Mobile customers using Samsung Exhibit 4G handsets. Additional handsets, including the myTouch 4G Slide, will support Name ID later this month. [via Electronista] Image courtesy of iStockphoto, Joas This story originally published on Mashable here. |
| Lady Gaga's YouTube account is suspended (AP) Posted: 14 Jul 2011 08:43 PM PDT NEW YORK – Even one of online video's biggest stars isn't immune to copyright claims. Lady Gaga's YouTube account was suspended Thursday. The notice read that the suspension was due to "multiple or severe violations of YouTube's copyright policy." By late Thursday, the account had been restored, much to the glee of Gaga's Little Monsters. The Google Inc.-owned YouTube declined to comment. It's YouTube policy to remove accounts after three copyright violations. Reports have suggested that the infringing video was a recently uploaded clip of Gaga's performance on Fuji TV. Messages left with Gaga's publicist and record label, Interscope, weren't immediately returned Thursday. The account, "ladygagaofficial," is one of two for Gaga. The removed channel is run by Gaga's camp, while she also has an unaffected Vevo account. The Vevo account, which has more than 1.6 billion views, generally debuts her music videos. Co-owned by Universal Music Group and Sony Entertainment, Vevo is a music video platform that also distributes videos on YouTube. On Thursday, Gaga's HBO concert special "Monster Ball Tour at Madison Square Garden" earned five Emmy Award nominations. ___ Associated Press writer Mesfin Fekadu contributed to this report. ___ Online: |
| Google going social as profit soars (AFP) Posted: 14 Jul 2011 07:04 PM PDT SAN FRANCISCO (AFP) – Google released blockbuster earnings figures along with word that more than 10 million people have already joined its freshly-launched online social network. Google stock prices climbed more than 12 percent to $595.80 after release of the earnings figures by executives who effused about Google+, YouTube, Android and other products promising even better days ahead for the company. "If you look at the arsenal we are building it is really quite formidable," Goggle chief financial officer Patrick Pichette said during an earnings conference call. Google reported that its profit climbed to $2.51 billion in the recently-ended fiscal quarter on record-high revenue. "We had a great quarter, with revenue up 32 percent year-on-year for a record-breaking over $9 billion of revenue," Google co-founder and chief executive Larry Page said on the call. Slightly more than half of Google's revenue, $4.87 billion, came from outside the United States, the company reported. Paid "clicks" on Internet ads at the heart of the Mountain View, California company's money-making machine were 18 percent higher than in the same quarter last year. Google reported that as of June 30 it had 28,768 full-time employees as compared to the 26,316 workers on the company's global payroll at the end of the first three months of this year. Compensation increases put in place at Google early this year to attract and retain workers worked surprisingly well, according to Page. "A lot more people want to work at Google and stay working at Google than we expected," Page said. "I think we are at the edge of what we can add." Page was happy with management restructuring instituted after he took the Google helm from Eric Schmidt in April. "We have increased our velocity of execution this quarter, which has been a key goal of mine," Page said. "The new management team is working together fabulously." His stated goals included simplifying and streamlining Google's product line, putting "more wood into fewer arrows." Google is building on its strong suit, Internet search and advertising, while investing in video-sharing service YouTube, mobile platform Android, and Chrome web browsing software that hold revenue generating potential, Page said. Google is nurturing new products to capitalize on the unrelenting popularity of smartphones and tablet computers as well as online social networking. Google+, a rival to Facebook, launched on June 28 and has been a hit despite the fact that membership is invitation-only while the service remains in a test phase. "Over 10 million people have joined Google+," Page said. "That is a great achievement for the team." Google+ users can separate online friends and family into different "Circles," or networks, and share information only with members of a particular circle such as family or friends. 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," senior vice president of engineering Vic Gundotra noted when Google+ launched online at plus.google.com. Google+ is becoming a viable threat to Facebook, according to analyst Rob Enderle of Enderle Group in Silicon Valley. "We may have another Facebook-MySpace event in play," Enderle said, referring to Facebook seizing the social network throne from MySpace. "If Google+ gets to critical mass, Facebook is going to have a race." Google+ also promises to be a hub fueling use of YouTube, Offers, Android, Chrome and other products from the company. "It is very strategic," Enderle said of Google+. "Facebook and Microsoft should be very concerned." |
| Update: Verizon likely not policing user phones and removing tethering apps (Digital Trends) Posted: 14 Jul 2011 04:57 PM PDT
Yesterday, a report from Business Insider issued a "WARNING" to all readers that Verizon Wireless was in the process of pushing out an over-the-air update to all Android users who had installed illegal tethering apps that would remove those apps from their phones. "If you already have a tethering app, it'll be removed without your permission when Verizon issues an update to your phone," wrote Dylan Love of Business Insider. We believed this story ran corollary to previous reports that Verizon had removed the HTC ThunderBolt's free Wi-Fi hotspot ability in a recent update after a free trial period ended for users. However, a persistent reader has pointed out that we may be mistaken. Digging further into the situation, we believe there is no evidence that Verizon is taking further action and we apologize for our mistake. While Verizon is likely capable of remotely removing tethering apps, and got Google to remove all unauthorized Internet tethering apps from the Android Market, we can find no evidence outside of this one BI article that indicates they have begun purging user phones of unauthorized tethering apps via OTA updates. With that said, an unauthorized tethering app we used no longer works after an OTA update sometime between March and June and others have reported similar tethering updates being released. The extent of Verizon's disabling of "illegal" tethering outside of previously stated devices is unknown. For reference, a tethering app is an application that allows a phone to share its Internet connection with another device or multiple devices–usually a PC. Newer phones like the HTC ThunderBolt have the built-in ability to tether wirelessly by turning themselves into a Wi-Fi hotspot, much like an Internet router that your computer would connect with at home. AT&T seems to be tackling the tethering issue as well, but instead of removing the feature, it is telling users who tether that they will be charged a tethering fee should they continue. We've put out a request to Verizon to comment on this issue, but have not heard back yet. Update 2: 7/14/2011: This article has been rewritten due to doubt of its source material. Update 1 7/14/2011: We've changed the source to Business Insider, as the claims of remote app removal originated from that source. DSL Reports and other sites reported on the subject, but do not specifically mention a broad app removal update. |
| Winnie the Pooh, NASA top Android Apps of the Week (Appolicious) Posted: 14 Jul 2011 02:00 PM PDT |
| Spotify vs. Pandora vs. Grooveshark (Digital Trends) Posted: 14 Jul 2011 06:53 PM PDT After years of anxious anticipation, the hottest music streaming service in Europe, Spotify, has officially launched in the US. Spotify boasts that it will "change how you enjoy music." And many in the media have already declared Spotify an [insert competitor's name here]-killer. I thought I'd test out that theory. So I've put Spotify head-to-head with the two services that most closely resemble the offerings of Spotify (translation: they all have a free option): Pandora and Grooveshark. (Yes, I've heard of Rdio, MOG and Rhapsody, too. But we're leaving those comparisons for another day.) Here, a quick guide to each of these services, and how they stand against one another.
Music catalogWhen it comes to depth of library, Spotify is hard to beat. The company says its catalog already includes more than 15 million songs, and users can upload their own catalogs to the service as well. Pandora, by comparison, has somewhere around 800,000, as of February, when it launched its IPO. That number has likely increased in recent months, but we haven't been able to find a more up-to-date, verifiable figure.Grooveshark is a different beast entirely; since its catalog is made up of user-uploaded songs, it could potentially have an infinite number of available tracks. It also means many of the more obscure tracks and mixes show up on Grooveshark, but not on Spotify or Pandora. The downside to a user-generated catalog is that naming for songs artists and albums is highly inconsistent, and the quality of the tunes is all over the place. On top of that, there's the potential illegality of Grooveshark as a whole. (Neither Spotify nor Pandora have such legal woes.) If we were judging simply on the number and variety of songs — a perfectly valid benchmark — Grooveshark would have it in the bag. But we're not, so we have to give this one to the more tightly controlled Spotify, and its 15 million high-quality tracks. Winner: Spotify
Social featuresSince the only real social feature to Pandora is the ability to connect with Facebook and see what your friends are listening to, we're not even going to pretend they have a dog in this fight. So the social battle really comes down to Spotify and Grooveshark. In Spotify's corner, users connect with each other via Twitter, Facebook and Windows Live Messenger. Spotify users can quickly, simply and easily share playlists with their friends through Facebook, Twitter, email and SMS text messages. And with an even deeper level of integration for Facebook, pretty much everything you do on Spotify can be seen by your friends, if you like. (We'll get into this more later.) In short, Spotify has an extremely respectable set of social features, and by far the most polished functionality in this area.That said, Grooveshark still has Spotify handily beat at this game. Users can connect with both Facebook and Google. Just right click on any song or playlist, and you can share it via email, Twitter, Facebook, StumbleUpon, Reddit, an embeddable widget, or just link to it in with an automatically generated URL. With Grooveshark's newly-added Community feature, it's easy to add friends, comment each other's tracks and see other activities. Winner: Grooveshark
Music discoveryDiscovering new music is one of the best, and most interesting, parts about fully-connected music streaming services. Both Spotify and Grooveshark show users the most popular songs on the site. And Spotify makes suggests for music you might like, but these are often way off the mark and seem to have nothing to do with what you actually listen to on a regular basis. (Sorry, Spotify, I actually hate Bruno Mars with the fire of a thousand suns.) Grooveshark's Community and sharing features make discovering new music fairly easy, especially if you have some super in-the-know friends. The same goes for Spotify and its Facebook integration.The hands-down winner in the music discovery category is Pandora. As you likely already know, Pandora doesn't offer the ability to listen to exactly the song you want, when you want it. Instead, it allows you to create "stations" based on a particular song or artist. From there, songs are played automatically (like a regular radio station) that are tailored to suit your taste. This is made possible with the Music Genome Project — the heart of Pandora — which analyzes over 400 different attributes to every song in the Pandora catalog to help deliver music that you will like, without you having to know about it already. Spotify does offer a "radio mode," but pales in comparison to Pandora. Winner: Pandora
Free versionsAs I mentioned before, all three services have a free option. In the world of music streaming, however, you get what you pay for.Spotify gives non-paying customers the ability to listen to any song in the catalog for up to 20 hours per month, for the first six months. After that, they'll only have 10 hours of listening time per month, and they can't listen to a track more than 5 times. Free users are also limited to using the desktop client only, have no offline mode, nor a variety of other smaller features, and they are almost constantly bombarded with advertising. But other than that, it's a damn good deal! Grooveshark does quite a bit better in the pay-nothing category. Users can listen to whatever they want, whenever they want, for as long as they want, and still not have to pay a dime. They can even upload their entire iTunes library to the Grooveshark cloud for free. And since Grooveshark is a Web app, users can access the same service they use at home anywhere in the world. The primary downside to free Grooveshark is, as expected, a lot of obnoxious advertising. Last is Pandora, which falls somewhere in the middle. The free version is ad-supported, so users have to deal with periodic interruption. And users are limited to a total of 40 hours per month of listening time. Still, they can access Pandora for free on their mobile device, which is something neither Grooveshark nor Spotify offer with their free service. But for me, that's still not enough to push it to the top spot. Winner: Grooveshark
Paid versionsOnce you commit to actually spending money on the music you listen to (crazy, I know), a whole world of opportunity presents itself. Spotify offers two levels of paid service: a $4.99 per month offering, which allows unlimited listening time, access to Spotify radio mode and completely removes all advertising from the service; the $9.99 per month offering gives you all that, plus enhanced sound quality, desktop offline mode, and the very awesome ability to play Spotify on your mobile device (both streaming over Wi-Fi or 3G, or downloading tracks straight to your device for offline mode). It is this last feature that gives Spotify the edge.Grooveshark also has two tiers: $6 per month for Grooveshark Plus, which strips away all the ads, allows for customizable skins and other features, gives access to the Grooveshark desktop client, and makes it easier to get in touch with customer service if things go awry. For $9 per month, users are upgraded to Grooveshark Anywhere, which simply adds the ability to access Grooveshark on a mobile device — any enabled Blackberry, Nokia, or Palm handset. Grooveshark has an Android app, too, but it's not available in the Marketplace due to legal complications. And there is no official iPhone app (it was also removed from the App Store), so iPhone users have to jailbreak if they want access to Grooveshark. Pandora is the most straightforward, when it comes to a paid subscription: $36 per year for unlimited playtime, and no ads. While this is far cheaper than the other services, you don't really get that much more for your $36. And because of the mobile and desktop offline modes offered to paid Spotify customers, I have to give that service the gold medal, even if it is the most expensive. Winner: Spotify
PlatformsGrooveshark has the most options when it comes to platforms: the standard website access, a desktop client, and apps for the various mobile devices. Unfortunately, it also has the least polished user interface of all the services. Now, some of you may not care about this at all, especially since the functionality is still strong, despite how it looks. But for a lot of people, design can make all the difference in terms of how they feel about using the service.Spotify comes in two flavors: desktop and mobile app. Both of these have absolutely beautiful UI, and work smoothly and easily. The desktop client works very much like iTunes, so most people should find using it intuitive and fairly straightforward. I also found the mobile app quite easy to use. And, as I mentioned above, the offline feature and ability to stream cleanly over 3G is really what gives Spotify its award-winning value, since listening to music on the go is essential. Pandora also has two options: website and mobile. Both work fine, and look OK. It's not really fair to compare Pandora's UI to either Spotify or Grooveshark, however, since we know it's about to get a major upgrade to something that appears to look strikingly similar to Spotify. So, realistically, we'll just have to wait and see how that turns out, but there's a good chance that the new Pandora will look good and work well. Winner: Spotify
ConclusionSpotify took three out of six categories, more than either Grooveshark or Pandora, which makes it my winner in the streaming showdown. And I must admit, it really is all that the hype builds it up to be (and possibly more). That said, Grooveshark is a very, very close second. It doesn't have the buffed UI or the approved iPhone app to make it popular with the mainstream crowd. But it has solid functionality, and a lot of sweet features. Pandora certainly seems like the loser in this whole bit, but that's mainly because it serves a different purpose than the other two, and which it does better than any other service: letting you listen to consistently good music, without having to either own the music already or do any of the time-consuming curation required of Spotify and Grooveshark — a major downside to both services. |
| Benign Brain Tumors Not Linked to Cell Phones (LiveScience.com) Posted: 14 Jul 2011 04:31 PM PDT Using a cell phone for many years does not increase the risk of developing a benign type of brain tumor, a new Danish study finds. Those in the study who used cell phones for 11 years or more were no more likely to develop these tumors, known as vestibular schwannomas, than those who used cell phones for a shorter period or not at all. The finding of the study, which involved data from close to 2.9 million Danes, contradicts some previous studies. The researchers also said they found no link between long-term cell phone use and the development of these brain tumors on the right side of the head, where it is supposed most people hold their cell phones. Vestibular schwannomas originate in a part of the brain that theoretically would absorb the most energy from cell phones' electromagnetic field, the researchers said. Previous studies that had linked cell phone use to an increased risk for vestibular schwannomas contained flaws, including inaccurate reporting of past cell phone use, the researchers contended. The findings are the latest to weigh in on the issue of the potential health risks of cell phones. In May a World Health Organization panel classified cell phones as "potentially carcinogen," citing evidence that the phones may be linked to an increased risk of brain cancer. But to date, no adverse health risks from cell phones have been established, the agency says. In fact, researchers are gathering increasingly complete and credible evidence that cell phones do not post health risks, said Brown University's David Savitz, a professor of community health who served on the WHO panel. These latest findings provide one more piece of reassuring evidence, said Savitz, who was not involved in the Danish study. However, research should continue, he said. Vestibular schwannomas are not cancerous, but they grow around brain cells involved in hearing and balance, according to the National Institutes of Health. As a result, they can cause hearing loss, dizziness or loss of balance. If the growths become large, they may press against critical brain regions and become life-threatening. The Danish study is one of the biggest on this particular issue, Savitz said. Because of the national databases available in Denmark, the researchers were able to link specific cell phone subscribers with cases of this type of brain tumor. However, the researchers took into account only how long a person had a cell phone subscription, not how often that person used his or her phone. In addition, these tumors are very slow-growing, so it's possible they could show up sometime after 11 years. Participants should continue to be monitored for the development of vestibular schwannomas, the researchers said. Pass it on: There is no evidence that long-term cell phone use increases the risk of vestibular schwannomas, according to a new study. This story was provided by MyHealthNewsDaily, sister site to LiveScience. Follow MyHealthNewsDaily staff writer Rachael Rettner on Twitter @RachaelRettner.
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| Netflix announces price hike, infuriating customers over a matter of $6 (Appolicious) Posted: 14 Jul 2011 11:30 AM PDT |
| Report: FBI Investigating News Corp. Over Possible 9/11 Phone Hacking (PC Magazine) Posted: 14 Jul 2011 10:12 AM PDT The FBI is investigating reports that the News of the World cell phone hacking scandal extends to victims of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, the AP reports. Citing a official who requested anonymity, the AP said the agency has opened an investigation into whether the phones of 9/11 victims were compromised. The FBI did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The move comes after several high-profile members of Congress expressed concern that the UK phone hacks—which affected family members of the July 2005 London terror bombings, as well as a young murder victim and celebrities—also included 9/11 victims. Rep. Peter King of New York reportedly asked the FBI to investigate the accusations, while Sens. John Rockefeller and Barbara Boxer also asked the Department of Justice and the Securities and Exchange Commission to investigate reports of police bribery, which could violate the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, they said. "The reported allegations against News Corporation are very serious, indicate a pattern of illegal activity, and involve thousands of potential victims," Boxer wrote. "It is important to ensure that no United States laws were broken and no United States citizens were victimized." "This raises serious questions about whether the company has broken U.S. law, and I encourage the appropriate agencies to investigate to ensure that Americans have not had their privacy violated," Rockefeller said. If the hacks involved 9/11, "the consequences will be severe," Rockefeller warned. The hacking controversy, meanwhile, prompted News Corp. parent company News International to shut down the News of the World; its last issue was on Sunday, after 168 years in circulation. News Corp. also abandoned plans to acquire BSkyB. |
| Spotify debuts; Pandora falls (Investor's Business Daily) Posted: 14 Jul 2011 03:26 PM PDT Shares of online music streaming website Pandora Media (NYSE:P - News)retreated as Spotify, a European music streamer with more than 10 mil registered users, launched its service in the U.S. Privately held Spotify has about 1.6 mil paid members, who get added features like higher speeds and offline access to music. Pandora, which this week said it had reached 100 mil total users, went public in June at $16 a share and its share price has fluctuated wildly since. Pandora closed down 0.8% at 17.79. |
| TSMC in trial manufacture of Apple chips: source (Reuters) Posted: 14 Jul 2011 08:32 PM PDT TAIPEI (Reuters) – Taiwan's TSMC has started trial manufacturing of next generation A6 chips for Apple Inc, a source familiar with the matter said, in a sign that the iPad maker is shifting from its traditional chip supplier, Samsung Electronics. The source said on Friday that whether TSMC would get actual orders for the chips would depend on its yield rate, or the amount of chips per batch that come out with no defects. "TSMC has got all the authorization and details ready. Whether Apple puts in a formal order will depend on the yield rate," the source said. TSMC spokeswoman Elizabeth Sun told Reuters she could not comment on this issue or on market rumors. Analysts and other sources had previously said TSMC would be supplying some processor chips to Apple, likely starting next year, however they expected the A5 orders would be still be dominated by Samsung. Any order for TSMC, the world's largest contract chip maker, would be a blow to Samsung, which is the sole maker for Apple's A5 chips, which are used in the hot-selling iPad 2. But Apple has shown signs of wanting to move away from the Korean company, one of its toughest competitors in the smartphone market and with whom it is involved in an escalating legal dispute over patents. TSMC is an obvious candidate to win processor business from Apple in the near term as it budgets $7.8 billion for capital expenditures this year to update technology and add capacity. It also has experience with ARM architecture, widely used by Apple to make power-efficient mobile chips. (Reporting by Clare Jim and Argin Chang; Editing by Jonathan Standing and Anshuman Daga) |
| June video game retail sales drop 10 percent (AP) Posted: 14 Jul 2011 04:37 PM PDT NEW YORK – U.S. retail sales of video game hardware, software and accessories dropped 10 percent in June to $995 million compared with the same month a year ago. The industry's second-straight month of sales decline was due largely to a lackluster slate of new game releases. Market researcher NPD Group said in its monthly report Thursday that sales of video game hardware fell 9 percent to $366.6 million. That includes hand-held game systems and gaming consoles such as the Wii. Sales of software, the games themselves, dropped 12 percent to $469.5 million. When including PC games, total software sales fell 10 percent to $508.9 million. Doug Creutz, an analyst with Cowen and Co., had expected June sales to disappoint, although he said several titles aimed at hardcore gamers did worse than expected. Those include "Duke Nukem Forever" from Take-Two Interactive Software Inc., and "Red Faction: Armageddon" from THQ Inc. Both were hurt by poor reviews, he said. Sales of game accessories, meanwhile, declined 11 percent to $158.9 million. The month's two best-selling games were "L.A. Noire," which is also published by Take-Two, and "Duke Nukem," which grabbed the No. 2 spot even though it didn't sell as many units as analyst expected. Sony Corp.'s "Infamous 2" was in third place. NPD does not include game downloads and online games in its monthly retail sales data, so the numbers can sometimes show a decline even if more people are playing games on Facebook, their mobile phones and elsewhere. The lackluster game sales report comes the same week as Electronic Arts Inc., the publisher of games such as "Madden" and "The Sims," said it is buying PopCap games for at least $750 million. PopCap makes popular Facebook and mobile games such as "Bejeweled and "Plants vs. Zombies." Zynga Inc., the company behind "FarmVille," filed for an initial public offering earlier this month hoping to raise at least $1 billion. Shares of GameStop Corp., the world's largest video game retailer, climbed 8 cents to $23.91 in after-hours trading. Shares of Electronic Arts rose 37 cents to $23.88 and shares of Take-Two inched up a penny to $14.50. |
| EA to shut down online servers for 13 of its games (Digital Trends) Posted: 14 Jul 2011 09:13 AM PDT
Brace yourselves, EA gamers. Electronic Arts is up to its old tricks. The publisher has announced that it will be shutting down multiplayer servers for more than a dozen of its action and sports games. These games either have low multiplayer traffic or are sports games that are being replaced with new versions. That's right: if you buy an EA Sports game, you have one year to play it online before it's shut down. These shutdowns will go into effect August 11, 2011. Last year's version of Madden and NHL will be shut down Oct. 1, 2011. In its service update, EA claims these decisions were made with much difficulty: "The decisions to retire older EA games are never easy. The development teams and operational staff pour their hearts into these games almost as much as the customers playing them and it is hard to see one retired. But as games get replaced with newer titles, the number of players still enjoying the older games dwindles below a point — fewer than 1% of all peak online players across all EA titles — where it's feasible to continue the behind-the-scenes work involved with keeping these games up and running. We would rather our hard-working engineering and IT staff focus on keeping a positive experience for the other 99% of customers playing our more popular games. We hope you have gotten many hours of enjoyment out of the games and we appreciate your ongoing patronage." Of course, 99 percent of players might not abandon last year's Madden if they knew EA wasn't going to shut it down, but we suppose that's beside the point. Without further delay, here are the closures.
August 11, 2011 Online Service Shutdown
October 1, 2011 Online Service Shutdown
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