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Saturday, October 15, 2011

Report: Jobs memorial planned at Stanford Sunday (AP) : Technet

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Report: Jobs memorial planned at Stanford Sunday (AP) : Technet

Report: Jobs memorial planned at Stanford Sunday (AP)

Posted: 15 Oct 2011 08:21 AM PDT

– Sat Oct 15, 11:21 am ET

NEW YORK – Apple is holding a memorial service for Steve Jobs on Sunday at Stanford University.

The Wall Street Journal says invitations have gone out to Silicon Valley luminaries and other people close to Jobs. Apple tells the newspaper that the evening event is private.

Apple has said that no public services are planned.

Jobs, who co-founded Apple and was the mastermind behind popular gadgets such as the iPhone and the iPad, died Oct. 5 at 56 after struggling for years with pancreatic cancer.

The Journal says a small private funeral was held a week ago. Apple is also holding an event this Wednesday for employees at its headquarters in Cupertino, Calif. It's billed as a celebration of his life.

New iPhone launch turns into remembrance for Jobs (AP)

Posted: 14 Oct 2011 04:54 PM PDT

By CHIP CUTTER, AP Business Writer Chip Cutter, Ap Business Writer – Fri Oct 14, 7:54 pm ET

NEW YORK – It wasn't just the latest iPhone that drew people to Apple stores Friday.

Many consumers waited in lines for hours — sometimes enduring chilly temperatures and overnight thunderstorms — to remember Steve Jobs, Apple's visionary who died last week.

The company's first iPhone release since Jobs' death turned into another tribute. Some customers even joked that the new model 4S stood "for Steve."

Tony Medina, a student from Manhattan, stood outside Apple's flagship store on New York's Fifth Avenue for nine hours, waiting through rain. He had originally planned to order the phone online but decided to join a crowd of about 200 people to honor Jobs.

"For loyalty, I felt I had to do the line," he said. "I had to say thank you."

The new phone, which went on sale Friday in seven countries, is faster than the previous model and comes with better software and an improved camera. Yet the unveiling comes at a time when Apple is finding it difficult to maintain the excitement of previous iPhone introductions.

For starters, the phone is more widely available than in the past. In addition to Apple stores, it's also sold by three wireless carriers: AT&T Inc., Sprint Nextel Corp. and Verizon Wireless. Some Best Buy, Target and Walmart stores also carry the phones, as do authorized resellers.

Buyers were also able to preorder the phone on Apple's website and have it shipped to their homes or offices.

Many die-hard Apple fans and investors were disappointed that Apple did not launch a more radically redesigned new model — an iPhone 5. It's been more than a year since Apple's previous model was released.

That also may have contributed to smaller gatherings at some Apple locations.

"People are not as excited about this version as they might have been" if an iPhone 5 came out," said Charles Prosser, a retired teacher and computer technician from Tuscaloosa, Ala.

Even so, hundreds of buyers camped out in front of stores for hours to be among the first to get an iPhone 4S.

Steve Wozniak, who created Apple with Jobs in a Silicon Valley garage in 1976, was first in line at a store in Los Gatos, Calif., having arrived on his Segway the afternoon before.

Wozniak, who typically waits in line for new Apple products, said he barely slept Thursday night as he was busy chatting with Apple fans, taking photos and giving autographs. Wozniak pre-ordered two new iPhones. He bought two more Friday.

"I just want to be part of an important event, so I feel it more deeply," he said.

Many said the event resembled a remembrance to Jobs, who died a day after Apple Inc. announced the new phone.

Emily Smith, a Web designer, checked in to the line in New York on the location-centric social network Foursquare. She got a virtual Steve Jobs badge that read: "Here's to the crazy ones. ThankYouSteve."

In Chicago, Nicole Pacheco dragged her brother and a friend out to buy Apple's latest gadget.

"I wanted to see how it was, to come out here for once," she said as she looked at the line that stretched past her. "We're kind of a memory for Steve Jobs. It's one of his last inventions. It kind of motivated me to get the next one."

Apple and phone companies started taking orders for the iPhone 4S last Friday. Apple said Monday that more than 1 million orders came in, breaking the record set by last year's model, which was available in fewer countries and on fewer carriers.

And a representative for AT&T said Friday that as of 4:30 EDT, it had activated a record number of iPhones and was on track to double its previous single-day record for activations.

Jobs' death could be helping sales. Marketing experts say products designed by widely admired figures such as Jobs usually see an upsurge in sales after their death.

The base model of the iPhone 4S costs $199 in the U.S. with a two-year contract. It comes with 16 gigabytes of storage. Customers can get 32 gigabytes for $299 and 64 gigabytes for $399. The phones come in white or black.

The phones also debuted Friday in Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Japan and Britain. They are coming to 22 more countries by the end of the month.

Besides a better processor and camera, the new phone has a new operating system that allows users to sync content without needing a computer. It also includes a futuristic, voice-activated service that responds to spoken commands and questions such as "Do I need an umbrella today?"

The new features appealed to Dina Nguyen, who came to the Apple store in Palo Alto, Calif., the same location where Jobs was known to show up on sale days. She and her brother, Kennedy, picked up four iPhones for their family.

The siblings said it was a bit sentimental to get the phones now, right after Jobs' death.

"He left a good legacy. He had a good life. He wanted to make people happy," Kennedy Nguyen said. "It's good to support that."

___

Associated Press writers Barbara Rodriguez in Chicago, Brooke Donald in Palo Alto, Calif., and Rachel Metz in San Francisco contributed to this report.

Sprint customers line up as it gets 1st iPhone (AP)

Posted: 14 Oct 2011 05:01 PM PDT

By PETER SVENSSON, AP Technology Writer Peter Svensson, Ap Technology Writer – Fri Oct 14, 8:01 pm ET

NEW YORK – Apple stores got the longest lines as the new iPhone model launched Friday, but there were lines at Sprint stores too, as the carrier got a chance to sell the phone more than four years after the first model was launched.

Product chief Fared Adib said that by midday, the iPhone had broken Sprint's record for first-day sales of any phone. Sales were above the company's expectations, he said, without giving any figures.

Sprint Nextel Corp. joined bigger carriers AT&T and Verizon Wireless as a seller of the phone. Spot checks in Philadelphia and San Francisco showed that the lines outside Sprint stores were longer than at its rivals.

Meanwhile, a representative for AT&T said that as of 4:30 EDT, it had activated a record number of iPhones and was on track to double its previous single-day record for activations.

Sprint is struggling to compete with the bigger carriers and expects the iPhone to help it keep subscribers.

In Chicago, 18-year-old Torian Marshall was among the 150 or so people lined up outside an Apple store on Friday morning. He had been holding off on getting an iPhone until his service provider, Sprint, got it.

"I'm so excited. I've been waiting forever," he said.

Kaufman Bros. analyst Ben Abramovitz said talks with about 50 people in line for the phone at a Sprint store revealed that most of them are current Sprint customers looking to upgrade, particularly BlackBerry users looking for a more Internet-friendly phone. He also found some AT&T Inc. and T-Mobile USA customers looking to switch.

Sprint will be paying a lot of money to put iPhones in customer hands: It's subsidizing each iPhone 4S by about $400 to get it down to the $200 price for the 16 gigabyte version. It's also selling the cheaper iPhone 4.

Credit ratings agency Moody's Investor Service on Friday downgraded Sprint's debt, sending it further into speculative-grade, or "junk" territory. Part of the reason is the cash drain that iPhone sales will cause before they start paying off through higher monthly service fees.

The chief reason behind the downgrade, however, is Sprint's decision to upgrade its wireless network for faster data speeds, Moody's said. Sprint revealed that decision a week ago, to the dismay of investors.

Sprint's stock increased 1 cent to close Friday at $2.79.

___

AP Writer Barbara Rodriguez in Chicago contributed to this report.

Tecca TV: TechLife on iOS 5, Japanese face monsters, unleashing the kraken, and more! (Yahoo! News)

Posted: 14 Oct 2011 06:42 PM PDT

Just Show Me: How to import photos on your Mac (Yahoo! News)

Posted: 14 Oct 2011 04:08 PM PDT

Fashion RSS Reader Bloglovin' Signs Up 1 Millionth Member (Mashable)

Posted: 14 Oct 2011 04:00 PM PDT

Lauren Indvik Lauren Indvik – Fri Oct 14, 7:00 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: Bloglovin'

[More from Mashable: CircleMe Is a Social Network That Connects You to Yourself [INVITES]]

Quick Pitch: A visual RSS reader and community for style blogs.

Genius Idea: Bloglovin', a web and mobile-based newsreader and community centered primarily around fashion, celebrated its 1 millionth user registration this week.

[More from Mashable: Giftiki: The Social Gift For the Facebook User Who Has Everything]

With 2 million user-submitted blogs, it is the largest single blog index in the fashion category, pulling in approximately 3.5 million uniques and 65 million pageviews per month, says Stockholm-based founder and CEO Mattias Svenson. Its audience is, predictably enough, young women obsessed with style: the average visitor is a 22-year-old female who visits 50 times per week, according to Bloglovin's advertising page.

Svenson says the idea for Bloglovin' came out of a coffee meeting with style blogger Carolina Engman in late 2008. During breaks in the discussion, she would pull up dozens of blogs in separate browser windows to see if any of her favorites had been updated -- something that struck Svenson and his co-founder, CTO Patrik Ring, as a process that could be improved.

Two weeks later the pair launched a beta version of Bloglovin', which brought in more than 1,000 signups in its first week. The site's growth has been driven largely by widgets bloggers have posted on their own sites, urging readers to subscribe to them on Bloglovin', says Svenson.

Beyond its visual RSS reader for the web, iPhone and Android phones, Bloglovin' also functions as a discovery vehicle. Users can browse a feed of popular posts by category, such as lifestyle or photography, and see which blogs have built the largest followings on Bloglovin' and/or are quickly amassing them.

The bulk of Bloglovin's undisclosed revenue is advertising. The startup has worked with numerous large brands, including L'oreal, MTV, H&M and Levi's to develop display campaigns, as well as facilitate partnerships with various bloggers. Svenson acts as the go-between for said partnerships, connecting brands with bloggers not only with the largest audience, but also ones that are a good fit for the brand in question.

Svenson says that right now the startup is focused on improving the mobile reading experience, which he doesn't believe is as easy or seamless as it could be.

How It Works: Video

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.

Farm groups turning to Web to burnish image (Reuters)

Posted: 15 Oct 2011 08:06 AM PDT

By Carey Gillam Carey Gillam – Sat Oct 15, 11:06 am ET

KANSAS CITY, Missouri (Reuters) – October is a busy month for Kansas farmer Darin Grimm. With 2,000 acres of corn and soybeans to harvest, the third-generation family farmer is running a combine nearly dawn to dusk.

But he still makes time to tweet.

Whether it's touting the benefits of a new fertilizer, sharing photos of a newborn calf, debating genetically modified crops or discussing modern-day hog farming, a growing legion of farmers and ranchers like Grimm are increasingly turning to Facebook, Twitter, and personal web blogs to try to connect with consumers, educators and others about agriculture.

"We all eat," said 37-year-old Grimm, who helps run the 18-month-old AgChat Foundation, teaching other farmers how to use online social media to tell their stories to a sometimes skeptical public.

"Food is important to everybody but very few people produce that food," he said. "We farmers need to connect with consumers ... whether it's a mom in New York or a teacher in Chicago."

Calling themselves "agvocates," these tech-savvy farmers and their supporters are hoping their efforts counter images of animal abuse, environmental damage and health problems that have become associated with industrial agricultural practices.

"There are lots of perceptions about what I do. I would like to have a voice in that perception," said 31-year-old Mike Haley, who keeps his Twitter followers up to date as he plants soft red winter wheat on his Ohio farm.

The fight for hearts and minds in agriculture on the Web is also being taken up by agribusiness in a big way.

A new organization backed by some of the most powerful corporate names in agriculture hopes to swing public opinion with a mix of social media and conventional marketing methods.

The U.S. Farmers and Ranchers Alliance (USFRA), which boasts Monsanto, the world's largest seed technology company, and DuPont, one of the world's biggest chemical and seed producers, as members, has a multi-year agenda.

The aim is to address consumer attitudes and opinions about food production by farmers, ranchers and their suppliers.

"We've sensed some concerns ... about what is going on about food safety and food quality," said communications director Ken Colombini at the National Corn Growers Association.

DuPont, which has contributed $500,000 to the effort, said the need for such a dialogue was "glaringly obvious."

"There is a growing disconnect," said Bill Even, DuPont senior manager of biotech and regulatory affairs. "People have lost touch with modern agriculture. This isn't an event. It is more of a process, more of a movement."

With more than 50 national, regional and state agriculture groups as members and a projected budget above $11 million, USFRA has hired a veteran marketing expert as general manager and begun national advertising and marketing efforts.

Last month the group debuted an online "Food Dialogues" townhall-style discussion and website project, and the group has a list of bloggers and others seen as influential voices targeted for the ongoing campaign.

A recent sampling of some of the queries posted to a USFRA Food Dialogue website covered a gamut of issues, from a request that USFRA members disclose the amount of government subsidies they receive to complaints about "factory farms."

There were posts relaying concerns about nitrogen fertilizer run-off affecting the Gulf Coast and waterways, worries about antibiotics and hormones given to livestock, a question about funny-looking carrot sticks, and even one query from someone seeking the "best method to build a grain drill."

The organization acknowledges up front the animosity obvious in many of the postings about farming. "When did agriculture become a dirty word?"it asks on its website.

For some critics, agriculture is not the problem, but the practices of certain players are.

The fact that some of the key players in USFRA are opposed to food labeling proposals, yet are saying they want to communicate more openly with consumers, particularly rankles.

"They want to tell consumers how their food is produced, well, let's really tell consumers how their food is produced," said National Organic Coalition Director Liana Hoodes.

"It's great to have a dialogue," Hoodes said. "We hope it will be an honest dialogue."

(Editing by Peter Bohan)

Google to kill Buzz, focus social efforts on Plus (AP)

Posted: 14 Oct 2011 01:45 PM PDT

By MICHAEL LIEDTKE, AP Technology Writer Michael Liedtke, Ap Technology Writer – Fri Oct 14, 4:45 pm ET

SAN JOSE, Calif. – Google is getting ready to press the mute button on Buzz, an online social networking service that turned into a massive faux pas.

Buzz will be shut down within the next few weeks, according to a Friday post on Google Inc.'s blog.

The 20-month-old service probably won't be missed. If anything, Buzz is destined to be remembered as Google's botched attempt to build a social network to rival Facebook's online hangout.

Google now is focusing its social networking efforts on Plus, a 3 1/2 month-old service that has been catching on quickly. Plus already has more than 40 million users, and Google CEO Larry Page seems confident that it will become an effective weapon for fighting the threat posed by Facebook and its audience of 800 million users.

In a conference call Thursday to discuss Google's third-quarter earnings, Page promised the company will be weaving more of the company's products into Plus to ensure that users get an "automagical" experience.

Many of Buzz's early adopters felt betrayed.

Buzz got into trouble because of the way Google tied it to its email service. After it was activated, Buzz automatically created social circles that exposed users' most frequent Gmail contacts for everyone to see. That kind of transparency didn't go over well with people whose contact lists included secret lovers, ex-spouses, doctors and prospective employers.

Google overhauled Buzz to give people more control over their information, but the changes came too late to placate outrage users and privacy watchdogs.

The uproar triggered an investigation by the Federal Trade Commission, which reprimanded Google for violating its own privacy policies. Google apologized for its lapse and entered into a settlement requiring Google to submit its privacy program to independent audits every other year for the next two decades. The company, which is based in Mountain View, Calif., also agreed to give $8.5 million to Internet privacy and policy organizations to settle a class-action lawsuit filed by Gmail users.

"Changing the world takes focus on the future, and honesty about the past," Bradley Horowitz, a Google vice president, wrote in Friday's blog post. "We learned a lot from products like Buzz, and are putting that learning to work every day in our vision for products like Google Plus."

Buzz will join more than 20 other products and services that Page has closed since he replaced Eric Schmidt as CEO in April. Page says he wants to "put more wood behind fewer arrows" as Google tries to maintain its dominance of Internet search and advertising while it duels with Apple Inc. for supremacy in the increasingly important smartphone market.

The strategy seems to be paying off so far. Google third-quarter earnings rose 26 percent to $2.7 billion to blow past analyst estimates. The performance lifted Google's stock price by $32.69, or nearly 6 percent, to close Friday at $591.68.

Congress questions Amazon on the privacy of the Silk browser (Digital Trends)

Posted: 15 Oct 2011 10:30 AM PDT

Mike Flacy Mike Flacy – Sat Oct 15, 1:30 pm ET

Amazon Kindle Fire - hand modeled

Earlier this week, both Democrat and Republican members of Congress expressed concern over privacy of users that browse the Web through the Amazon Silk browser on the currently unreleased Kindle Fire. Since the Kindle Fire uses less expensive hardware than a typical tablet, the split version of Silk sends all Web activity through the cloud-based Amazon Web Services and speeds up the process considerably. Page rendering and general processing of a Web page occurs in the cloud, thus the Kindle Fire doesn't need to process the data. Officials in Congress are concerned about what data Amazon will retain about a user's activities as well as how that data will be used in the future.

Amazon-silk-browserRep. Ed Markey of Massachusetts is the co-Chair of the Congressional Bi-Partisan Privacy Caucus and sent off a letter to Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos regarding privacy concerns. Markey wants to know what Amazon plans to do with the data and if the company plans to sell or rent the data to third-party companies such as advertisers seeking to place ads on the Kindle Fire. Markey is also concerned about Amazon's plans to convey the privacy policy to Kindle Fire users as well as the ability for new customers to opt into the data sharing program. Amazon claims that all data collected through the split version of the Kindle Fire browser will be anonymous and only available in a bundled, collective form.

Users do have the ability to turn off the split version of the Silk browser and run the program as a traditional browser. However, running Silk as a traditional browser will significantly slow down the speed of leading Web pages. Since the split version of the browser is turned on by default when a consumer purchases the Kindle Fire, it's highly unlikely that new users will opt for the slower version of the Silk browser.

Android App Tablet Review: Rhapsody (Appolicious)

Posted: 15 Oct 2011 02:20 AM PDT

Can Google Plus Catch Facebook? (ContributorNetwork)

Posted: 15 Oct 2011 12:00 PM PDT

One in five considering ditching BlackBerry after service problems (Digital Trends)

Posted: 14 Oct 2011 07:53 PM PDT

Trevor Mogg Trevor Mogg – Fri Oct 14, 10:53 pm ET

New BlackBerry 7 smartphonesEuropean price comparison website Kelkoo said that in a survey of more than a thousand BlackBerry users, 19 percent are considering moving to another smartphone manufacturer.

The survey was conducted in the wake of a three-day global service outage that knocked out email, Internet and messaging services for millions of BlackBerry smartphone owners.

The problems suffered by Research In Motion (RIM), the company behind the BlackBerry, came just a few days before Apple launched its new iPhone 4S smartphone. No doubt the long lines outside Apple stores around the world contained more than one or two BlackBerry owners who had decided to jump ship.

The results of the survey will make grim reading for RIM executives. Besides the 19 percent who are considering ditching their BlackBerry soon, 42 percent are thinking about doing so next time the contract comes up for renewal. At least that gives RIM a window of opportunity where it can offer up some incentives to encourage current BlackBerry users to stay. Any more service problems like the one earlier this week though and it'll be bye-bye to BlackBerry for many.

Interestingly, of 4,000 people asked, 54 percent said that if they experienced service problems with their phone, they would want some form of compensation; 65 percent would want to be told about the problems straight away; and 67 percent would expect regular updates. RIM came under fire for its seemingly slow response in explaining to customers what was happening during the outage. Finally acknowledging the seriousness of the situation, RIM co-CEO Mike Lazaridis issued a video apology on Thursday.

Of 3,000 people questioned who don't currently have a BlackBerry smartphone but are thinking about getting one, 29 percent said they would still purchase one, while the other 71 percent said they could now be put off by the recent issues.

Kelkoo's chief marketing officer, Chris Simpson, commented on the survey's findings. "This week has been incredibly difficult for Blackberry users worldwide, however, Blackberry offers a market-leading product with a unique service, which nearly a third of consumers admit they will not find with any other manufacturer."

He continued: "As such, it has a loyal following and this will stand it in good stead to retain customers. Whilst our research highlights that some consumers intend to jump the Blackberry ship, it could be a very different picture in the coming months when this week's issues become a distant memory."

RIM executives will certainly be hoping Simpson is right.

Five observations from Opera Software’s Up North Web conference (Appolicious)

Posted: 15 Oct 2011 10:00 AM PDT

Nvidia announces 3D Vision 2 glasses with improved technology (Digital Trends)

Posted: 14 Oct 2011 10:18 PM PDT

Mike Flacy Mike Flacy – Sat Oct 15, 1:18 am ET

3D_Vision_2_glasses

Announced earlier today, Nvidia revealed the second generation of its 3D Vision wireless glasses kit. Compared to the previous model, the 3D Vision 2 glasses have 20 percent large lenses allowing for a wider viewing area. In addition, the new version of the glasses offer a higher color fidelity due to a more efficient design when it comes to blocking out external light. The previous version was designed from hard, black plastic that would dig into the side of a user's head leaving indentations. The new version has been designed out of a much softer composite material and should end up being more comfortable for users. The new version of the 3D glasses are also backwards compatible and will work with previous content.

nvidia-glasses-techNvidia is hoping that more computer users will invest in 3D gaming technology and start playing the library of 550 3D-compatible PC games with the glasses. According to the company, the number of 3D-capable notebooks have increased by 126 percent over the first six months of 2011 and the number of 3D monitors has increased by 112 percent in the same time period. Nvidia is recommending pairing the 3D Vision 2 glasses with a monitor that supports the 3D LightBoost technology. Nvidia claims that the technology delivers 3D images that are twice at bright as monitors without the technology in addition to decreasing the ghosting effect.

Announced hardware that will be supporting the 3D Vision 2 glasses include the ASUS 27-inch VG278H 1080p monitor, Toshiba Qosmio X770 and 775 as well as the Toshiba Satellite P770 and P775. While the 27-inch Asus monitor comes with the 3D Vision 2 glasses for a hefty retail price of $699, consumers can purchase the glasses kit later this month with a wireless USB IR emitter for $149. The glasses can also be purchased separately for $99 through the Nvidia site or other authorized retailers. 

Spotify comes to your TV with the Boxee Box (Digital Trends)

Posted: 14 Oct 2011 09:14 PM PDT

Jeff Hughes Jeff Hughes – Sat Oct 15, 12:14 am ET

spotify logoPaying Spotify users in the U.S. can now stream the lauded music service on desktops, mobile devices television sets. Last week Spotify announced a deal with WD's TV media player, and today the streaming music company pushed further into the living room by launching an app for the Boxee Box.

The app gives premium Spotify users access to the catalog, playlists and more on the TV screen. However, it might be worthy to note that users won't be able to edit their playlists or do searches using the app. According to VentureBeat, Boxee Marketing VP Andrew Kippen believes in training people to realize "they shouldn't be doing that stuff on their TV." spotify boxeeBoxee is a set-top box, allowing you to stream from the internet to your television through the Boxee open source software. The new Spotify Boxee app allows the music service to catch up with competitors such as Pandora, Last.fm and MOG on the device. Boxee hopes to mine Spotify's European strength. Despite the image of being a video streaming device, Kippen says music is big for the Boxee Box, with the top two apps being music apps.

"Since Spotify works both in the U.S. and in eight European countries, it should help expand our music reach abroad and provide another great on-demand music service which is where we think most music consumption is headed."

Spotify's eagerly awaited U.S. launch happened earlier this year in July. The company made its way to the U.S. connected TV space via Western Digital last Thursday, though its no stranger to TV screens with its European deal with cable operator TeliaSonera. Spotify still needs to bag Roku in order to keep up with Competitors like Pandora and MOG.

 

iOS 5 arrives, but can you wait a bit longer? (Appolicious)

Posted: 15 Oct 2011 05:00 AM PDT

Google jumps as investors cheer mobile growth (Reuters)

Posted: 14 Oct 2011 02:13 PM PDT

By Alexei Oreskovic Alexei Oreskovic – Fri Oct 14, 5:13 pm ET

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Google Inc's free Android smartphone software, already a big hit with consumers, is starting to win the hearts of investors.

The world's No. 1 Internet search company offered a peek at its mobile business during quarterly results on Thursday, revealing that the business was generating revenue at an annual run rate of $2.5 billion, up from $1 billion last year.

That helped Google sail past third-quarter financial targets set by analysts, sending its shares up nearly 6 percent to $591.68 on Friday and easing some of Wall Street's concerns that mobile returns might not justify the investment.

"People just haven't given them any credit for that division. I think it could be a huge part of the overall company," said Pat Adams, portfolio manager at the Dunham Loss Averse Growth Fund, which owns Google shares.

"There are so many more mobile devices out there than there are PCs," Adams said. "What they did was brilliant to give that operating system away to get the search part of it," he added.

Google lets phone makers such as Samsung Electronics, LG Electronics and HTC Corp use its Android software for free, banking on consumers using those phones to visit Google's advertising-supported website to search for information.

The booming popularity of smartphones has frustrated many of the established giants of the computer industry, from Microsoft Corp to Hewlett-Packard Co.

For Google, whose business is built upon people using its search engine, making the transition from the personal computers to mobile devices is crucial.

The company has stepped up investments in its mobile business, which competes with iPhone-maker Apple Inc. Google's Android mobile software -- already the world's most-used smartphone platform -- powers 190 million devices, up from 135 million in mid-July.

The explosion of Android devices, as well as the availability of Google search on Apple's iPhones, has made Google even more dominant in mobile search than on the desktop PC, according to JP Morgan analyst Doug Anmuth who pegged Google's mobile search market share at 90 percent.

That strong position accounts for the sharp, 28 percent uptick in paid clicks on search ads that Google experienced during the third quarter, Anmuth said in a note to investors.

Those ads appear to command lower rates than PC search ads, analysts noted. But some analysts said they expect that to change over time, especially as Google creates new forms of advertising that take advantage of a user's location.

Mobile advertising sales is but one component of what analysts believe could be a broader wireless opportunity for Google. The company has begun offering coupon deals, and could make money through retailer loyalty programs and its recently launched Google Wallet, a free service which allows shoppers to use their mobile phones to pay for purchases.

MOTOROLA BET

More concerning for some investors is Google's plan to acquire mobile phone maker Motorola Mobility Holdings for $12.5 billion.

The deal will give Google access to one of the largest patent libraries in the wireless industry, as well as hardware manufacturing operations that will allow it to develop its own line of smartphones.

But some worry that Google is entering a low-margin hardware business in which it has no experience, and that the move could jeopardize its relationships with other phone makers that use Android.

BGC Partners analyst Colin Gillis said he did not think Google's increase in mobile ad revenue would make investors feel any better about the Motorola deal, which is expected to close this year or early in 2012.

"You could argue the Motorola deal puts some of that revenue at risk," he said, noting that some current Android phone makers might see Google as a competitor once it acquires Motorola and reduce their support for Google products. Google has said it plans to operate Motorola as a separate business.

Gillis also noted that the $2.5 billion annual run rate in Google's mobile business, while impressive, remains less than 10 percent of the company's overall revenue.

And he added that Google may not necessarily have based the $2.5 billion run rate on one quarter's worth of revenue, which would have suggested that Google made $625 million in mobile revenue in the third quarter.

"They probably took the last month and multiplied it by 12. It could be the last day," he noted. "We have no idea what that number really is."

Whatever the number though, Google's mobile revenue is clearly growing quickly, and for many on Wall Street, that's good enough for now. Many brokerages raised their price targets on Google on Friday, some by as much as 10 percent.

"We think mobile is near a massive volume inflection point," wrote Susquehanna Financial Group analyst Herman Leung in a note to investors on Friday.

"At these growth rates, we think mobile revenue could be larger than display (advertising revenue) by 2012."

(Reporting by Alexei Oreskovic; Additional reporting by Sayantani Ghosh, Tenzin Pema and Rachana Khanzode in Bangalore; Editing by Richard Chang)

Occupy Wall Street Hackathons Want to Build a Better Protest (Mashable)

Posted: 14 Oct 2011 10:50 AM PDT

Sarah Kessler Sarah Kessler – Fri Oct 14, 1:50 pm ET

Occupy Wall Street has an IT department. The movement's technologists, like their park-squatting counterparts, are a decentralized group. But they've independently started hackathons this weekend in New York City, San Francisco and Washington, D.C. Even before the first protester showed up at Wall Street on Sept. 17, a group of people had started working on the movement's technology components . The so-called Internet working group has held meetings that covered how to edit the site openly, how to run the Twitter account and what server space to use. It's not necessarily the most organized operation, but it's becoming more so.

[More from Mashable: #OccupyWallStreet Protests Grow]

"I think we're going to see a few people leading the helm really soon and saying this is what we need, this is what we're working on right now," says Occupy Together NYC Hackathon creator Andrew Gwozdziewycz, who is a casual member of several listervs that discuss the movement's technology needs. "So far that doesn't seem to be happening yet. ... They are taking over the main website and centralizing control of it."

Meanwhile, hackathoners like Gwozdziewycz are hoping to build better technologies that aid the movement and its on-the-ground protesters. He, for instance, plans to build a group messaging app that sends text messages to groups members that are in a similar location.

[More from Mashable: Occupy Wall Street Protests Sprout 928 Offshoots On Meetup.com Overnight]

"Right now they're using the people's microphone to broadcast the fact that there's a working group meeting at the library," Gwozdziewycz says. "And that's a lot of noise for no reason when people could be coordinating on their phone."

A hackathon at Meetup headquarters on Friday aims to build programs that aid the Occupy Wall Street movement.

Gwozdziewycz is a Meetup employee and is hosting the hackathon at the group meeting platform's Broadway-Avenue office on Friday. About a dozen hackathon participants are there working on communication platforms, media aggregation tools or even, in one case, a "distributed decision making platform." Aaron Williamson is working on an ongoing project that aims to preserve privacy online. He, like most of the people who are running and participating in the Occupy Wall Street hackathons, has not been very involved in the Occupy Wall Street protests.

"Honestly I haven't even gotten down to the movement," he says, "mostly because I have a full-time job."

"I don't really know a whole lot about what is going on down there," says Cameron Cundiff, who was thinking about building a tool that could sort which Tweets are most relevant to protest activities. "I've only seen what I've been able to gleen in popular forms, but I wanted to learn more and I also think it's an interesting design challenge because you don't want to screw that up, helping someone who is under pressure and the risk of being arrested. It gives you constraints that are pretty hard."

Hackathons in San Francisco and Washington, D.C., that will start on Saturday morning and Friday evening respectively are also anticipating good turnouts. Matt Ewing, a clean energy startup co-founder, started inviting people to the San Francisco hackathon on Tuesday evening and says that about 50 people have signed up. Stefan Fox, a developer for the New Organizing Institute who started the D.C. hackathon, says his RSVP list looks similarly promising. Although neither of them was aware of the other's event when they started planning their respective hackathons, they've since decided to run a common chatroom for participants.

"If you think that software and the web are powerful tools, then hackathons like this are a good way to add some value," Ewing says. "It̢۪s a 21st century movement. People are going to be taking it and tweaking it and forking it in all different directions based on what they̢۪re interested in."

This story originally published on Mashable here.

at 9:59 PM

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