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Monday, December 5, 2011

Former HP chair Dunn, 58, dies after cancer bout (AP) : Technet

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Former HP chair Dunn, 58, dies after cancer bout (AP) : Technet

Former HP chair Dunn, 58, dies after cancer bout (AP)

Posted: 05 Dec 2011 08:19 PM PST

By JORDAN ROBERTSON, AP Technology Writer Jordan Robertson, Ap Technology Writer – 59 mins ago

SAN FRANCISCO – Patricia Dunn, the former Hewlett-Packard Co. chairwoman who authorized a boardroom surveillance probe that ultimately sullied her remarkable rise from investment bank typist to the corporate upper class, has died after a long bout with cancer. She was 58.

Dunn died Sunday morning at her home in Orinda surrounded by her family, according to her sister, Debbie Lammers. She said Dunn's ovarian cancer had returned.

Once one of the most powerful women in corporate America, Dunn saw her career tarnished in 2006 when she was ousted from HP and brought up on criminal charges — which were ultimately dropped — for approving the company's plan to snoop into the private phone records of board members, journalists and HP employees to catch people leaking to the media.

Dunn long maintained that she was a scapegoat. She said she was being unfairly vilified for the tactics of third-party investigators she did not hire or directly control. She emphasized that she didn't know the inner workings of the investigations and that she relied on HP's security and legal teams for assurance that the tactics were legal.

The scandal unfolded as Dunn continued to battle a disease that had haunted her through a sparkling investment banking career and a stormy nine-year stretch on the board of HP, one of the world's largest technology companies.

Dunn had spent time on philanthropic matters in the years since the scandal, Lammers said. Dunn and her husband, Bill Jahnke, endowed a faculty position at the University of California, San Francisco's Department of Surgery named in honor of her mother, who also died of cancer.

Lammers said she wanted people to remember her sister's "incredibly influential rise in her professional life and her courage and valiant battles over the course of her treatments."

"Her example of leadership, courage and poise throughout her professional and personal life was exemplary," Lammers told The Associated Press on Monday.

Dunn's time at HP coincided with some of the most contentious and challenging periods since the Palo Alto-based company was founded in 1939.

Dunn joined HP's board in 1998 and was instrumental in the hiring and firing of CEO Carly Fiorina, whose flamboyant personality and ferocity in securing the $19 billion purchase of Compaq Computer Corp. ultimately helped hasten her ouster amid a sagging stock price and disappointing results from the combined company.

Dunn was the one who announced Fiorina's ouster in February 2005 and named her low-key successor, Mark Hurd, previously CEO of NCR Corp. Hurd himself was ousted last year after an investigation into a sexual harassment claim found inconsistencies in expense reports filed.

Dunn also assumed Fiorina's role as chairwoman at the time. Dunn was forced out in that role in September 2006 in an embarrassing scandal involving spying on the telephone records of board members and journalists to ferret out the source of leaks to the media.

Just a month later, California's attorney general charged Dunn and four others with four felony counts each — conspiracy, fraud, identity theft and illegally using computer data — for their roles in the probe. That came just two days before she started chemotherapy treatments for advanced ovarian cancer.

The criminal charges against Dunn were eventually dropped, as prosecutors said she had little involvement in the actual "pretexting" — the ruse used by investigators to view private telephone records by pretending to be someone else — and because of her ailing health. Charges against the other defendants were also dropped, with a Santa Clara County Superior Court judge calling their conduct "a betrayal of trust and honor" at worst that was not criminal behavior at the time it occurred.

Once an aspiring investigative reporter, Dunn, a graduate of the University of California, Berkeley, found more immediate and lucrative work in the financial world and made her mark in investment banking.

After working briefly as a part-time reporter for a community newspaper in San Francisco, Dunn began her corporate climb by capitalizing on a temporary typist gig that she landed at an investment firm in the 1970s.

She was able to turn the two-week typing assignment into full-time work and managed to quickly rise through the ranks by earning a reputation as a hard-edged businesswoman. That reputation eventually helped her earn the promotion to CEO of fund management behemoth Barclays Global Investors in 1995.

Dunn's life had been far from charmed.

Financial difficulties dogged her family throughout her childhood, and her father, a vaudeville actor, died of a heart attack before she was a teen. After the death, the family moved to Marin County, north of San Francisco, and her mother's emotional health deteriorated.

Dunn's mother later died of breast cancer.

It was at the height of Dunn's corporate success when she was diagnosed with cancer herself, forcing her to step down in 2002 from her role as Barclays CEO to fight breast cancer and melanoma.

Two years later, she was diagnosed with ovarian cancer, and in fall 2006, she underwent surgery for a metastasized tumor — three weeks before the public learned of the HP investigation that spawned congressional investigations, criminal probes and forced Dunn's resignation.

As Dunn and others involved in the probe grappled with the fallout, the public was given a rare view of the workings of a board consumed with bitter rivalries and dysfunction.

The probe Dunn authorized ultimately identified renowned physicist and former presidential adviser George Keyworth as the director who spoke anonymously to a technology news website about a confidential board retreat. Some viewed the article as innocuous. Venture capitalist Tom Perkins resigned from the board in protest over the investigators' tactics.

Dunn's family is planning a memorial service in San Francisco.

Dunn is survived by her husband, Jahnke; three adult children, Janai Brengman, Michelle Cox and Michael Jahnke; ten grandchildren; a brother, Paul Dunn, and a sister, Lammers.

iPads become child's play (AP)

Posted: 05 Dec 2011 12:14 PM PST

By JOSEPH PISANI, AP Business Writer Joseph Pisani, Ap Business Writer – Mon Dec 5, 3:14 pm ET

NEW YORK – Make room in the toy box for the iPad.

Crayola allows tots to doodle on the iPad using its iMarker just as they would a crayon on a coloring book. Tweens are able to belt out their favorite Miley Cyrus and Selena Gomez tunes on a Disney microphone that turns the tablet into a karaoke machine. And technology accessories company Griffin enables teens to fly its toy helicopter by using the iPhone as a remote control.

This holiday season, toy makers have turned Apple Inc.'s pricey tablet and smartphone into playthings for kids. They figure in this weak economy, parents will be willing to splurge on toys for their children that utilize devices they already have — or want — themselves.

Tiffany Fessler of Gainsville, Ga., certainly was willing to do that even though when she initially bought her $829 iPad she never imagined she'd be sharing it with her 20-month-old son. But whenever she sat down to check emails on the iPad, he'd climb into her lap wanting to use it.

So, Fessler decided to get him the $29.99 Crayola iMarker, which transforms the iPad into a digital coloring book using a Crayola's free ColorStudio HD application that parents can download. Kids can draw and color using the iMarker, which has a soft tip so it doesn't scratch the tablet's glass screen.

"When you have a screaming toddler in a restaurant or any public area, you want to have something to calm him down with," says Fessler, 39. "This is just another way to keep him entertained."

That the iPad and iPhone have infiltrated the $22 billion toy market this season is no surprise. Smartphones and tablets — particularly Apple products — are more popular than ever with people of all ages. This year, Apple is expected to double the number of iPhones sold to 90.6 million worldwide, according to research firm Gartner, while the number of iPads sold is expected to triple to 46.7 million.

And Apple products have a certain "cool factor" with kids that toy companies, which can make up to half of their revenue during the holidays, are hoping to tap into. In fact, the iPad and iPhone are among the most coveted electronics this holiday season among kids. About 44 percent of 6- to 12-year-olds want the iPad this year, according to a survey by research firm Nielsen. The iPod touch came in the No. 2 spot with 30 percent, followed by the iPhone at 27 percent.

Not to mention, anyone who's a parent knows all too well that babies and older kids alike love to fiddle with or drool all over mommy's iPad. Nearly 40 percent of 2-to 4-year-olds have used a smartphone, iPad or video iPod, according to a survey by nonprofit group Common Sense Media. That number rises to 52 percent for 5- to- 8 year olds. And even 10 percent of infants have used one of the devices before their first birthday.

"It's mostly something for kids to use in the car or at the doctor's office," says Chris Baynes, a toy analyst. "It's a way to get the kid to be quiet."

With that in mind, Crayola teamed up with Nashville, Tenn.-based Griffin Technology, which is mostly known for selling iPhone and iPad cases and car chargers, to make the iMarker and the ColorStudio HD app for kids. The iMarker, which is like a stylus that resembles a Crayola marker, is targeted at children ages three and up.

"Regardless of who they buy it for, once it is in the household, we know that kids use it," says Vicky Lozano, vice president of marketing at Crayola, which makes the iMarker.

Other toy makers also have gotten into the game:

• Griffin's $49.99 remote-controlled toy helicopter is aimed at teens over 14. Called the "HELO TC," it flies using a device that plugs into an iPhone, iPad or iPod. A free app turns the touchscreen of the devices into a cockpit that controls the helicopter.

• Mattel Inc.'s Fisher-Price unit is selling "The Laugh and Learn Apptivity Case" aimed at babies for $15. The case locks the iPhone into a colorful, easy to grab case that looks like a big round rattle. The case stops babies from making unwanted calls and protects the iPhone from something else: drool. Parents can open up three free apps that play music, read words aloud and count numbers. The company plans to release an iPad version of the case this spring.

• Disney has three offerings. The "Disney Spotlight" microphone, which is $69.99 or $99.99 for a wireless version, plugs into the iPad and allows kids to sing along to Disney songs from shows such as "Hannah Montana" — or to their own music — and record their own music video. Disney's $79.99 AppClix digital camera enables kids to upload their pictures to an iPad and a free app allows them add Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck into the photos. And Disney teamed up with Canadian toy maker Spin Master to create "Appmates," a toy car based on the characters from the company's "Car's 2" animated movie. One car sells for $12.99 while a two-pack goes for $19.99. Using a free app, kids can "drive" on different courses by moving the car across the iPad screen.

• Spin Master, which makes toys such as Air Hogs and Bakugan, started a new line this year of toys for the iPad and iPhone called "AppFininity." Its first toy in the line is the $19.99 AppBlaster, a plastic gun for kids over age eight. After slipping an iPhone or iPad touch on top of the AppBlaster, kids can shoot at aliens that pop up on the screen.

Analysts say these toys are just the beginning of a new niche for toy makers. Indeed, most of the companies say they plan to roll out more products for smartphones and tablets — including some that use Google Inc.'s Android software_ next year.

"I think it's going to be a growing segment," says Jim Silver, editor-in-chief at toy review website TimeToPlaymag.com. "Next year, there will be even more (products) than you can possibly imagine."

___

Joseph Pisani can be reached at http://twitter.com/josephpisani.

StumbleUpon overhaul opens more avenues to explore (AP)

Posted: 05 Dec 2011 09:01 PM PST

By MICHAEL LIEDTKE, AP Technology Writer Michael Liedtke, Ap Technology Writer – 17 mins ago

SAN FRANCISCO – StumbleUpon is adding more avenues to meander through its online content recommendation service.

The renovations, unveiled late Monday as part of a major overhaul, allow StumbleUpon's 20 million users to be more specific about their interests so they won't have to wait as long for the service's technology to figure it out.

For example, users can now tell StumbleUpon to feed them information about specific brands, such as Audi, instead of a general topic such as cars or ask to be steered to the best material from a particular website, such as FunnyorDie.com.

More than 250 brands, actors and sports figures have set up channels under StumbleUpon's new format. Besides Audi and FunnyorDie.com, StumbleUpon's initial channel line-up includes AOL Inc., Walt Disney Co.'s ESPN, Tom Hanks and Magic Johnson.

StumbleUpon also has added an "explore" option designed to make it easier to find content with a quick search.

The organizational tools bring a greater sense of direction to StumbleUpon, whose appeal has been tied to its random qualities. The free service, which makes it money from selling ads, got its name from its penchant for leading users down online corridors that they didn't even know existed.

"People are still going to experience serendipity and surprise on StumbleUpon, but they now they are going to have more control," said StumbleUpon CEO and co-founder Garrett Camp.

To herald the shift, StumbleUpon redesigned its logo. The most glaring change is the logo's color, now reddish-orange instead of blue and green.

The paint job comes nearly a decade after Camp and some friends started StumbleUpon in Canada before eventually moving to Silicon Valley in 2006. That led to StumbleUpon's sale in 2007 to eBay Inc. for $75 million. Camp regretted the decision and teamed up with several venture capitalists to buy back StumbleUpon from eBay for an undisclosed amount in 2009.

Since then, StumbleUpon's audience has tripled, helping the service emerge as one of the Web's largest catalysts for driving traffic to other sites. StumbleUpon says its recommends more than 1.2 billion pieces of content per month, doubling its volume from a year ago.

Next up: an international expansion for what so far has been an English-only service. The redesign includes technological tweaks that will make it easier to translate StumbleUpon into different languages. StumbleUpon, which is based in San Francisco, expects to expand into France and several other European countries early next year.

Another Earth? NASA confirms first planet that could support life, liquid water (Yahoo! News)

Posted: 05 Dec 2011 06:47 PM PST

Just Show Me: How to burn a DVD or CD in Windows 7 (Yahoo! News)

Posted: 05 Dec 2011 06:40 PM PST

1.8 Billion Questions Later, ChaCha has Evolved Past Text Message Roots (Mashable)

Posted: 04 Dec 2011 09:23 AM PST

Sarah Kessler Sarah Kessler – Sun Dec 4, 12:23 pm ET

When ChaCha launched in 2008, most of us were introduced to it through a friend. We added its number to our flip phones and sent our questions off via text message, gleefully showing our friends how quickly we received responses. It was like Google, only mobile. Now Google is mobile, and an estimated 35% of Americans have smartphones. But instead of becoming obsolete, ChaCha has shifted its focus toward mobile apps, Q&A as a form of content and a social redesign that could challenge crowdsourced Q&A sites such as Quora and Yahoo Answers.

[More from Mashable: Reddit Co-Founder Alexis Ohanian Answers Reader Questions [LIVE CHAT]]

As the company continues to answer one million to two million questions every day by text message, it answers about as many through its web and mobile presences. In the last year, it has answered about 800 million questions -- bringing its all-time total to 1.8 billion. It recently started answering questions for large municipalities' 311 initiatives.

Here's how ChaCha has stayed relevant as smartphones have proliferated and a barrage of Q&A apps -- highbrow, social, local and otherwise -- have launched their own takes on Q&A.

[More from Mashable: Take the Interview Enhances Job Candidate Screening With Video]

Remaining Different

What separates ChaCha from other Q&A services is that its answers are not crowdsourced, but researched by a swarm of about 180,000 freelancers who are paid up to 20 cents per question. Some of them pull answers to repeat questions from ChaCha's ever-growing database. Others specialize in a particular topics. All need to take a training course and pass a test before they can participate.

The result is nearly instant, usually correct answers, something that other Q&A platforms that rely on goodwill don't often provide. And creating them is almost exactly the same process no matter what platform they are delivered to.

Going to the Web and Mobile Again

ChaCha's Android app launched last week. Mobile apps for iPad, BlackBerry and Windows are also in the works.

While much of ChaCha's perserverence can be attributed to an answering system that has stayed the same, to stay relevant, it made big changes. One year after it launched its text message service, it launched a website. A year after that, it launched its first app. With each new platform it has inched further into becoming a service that is just as much about reading other people's questions as it is about asking them.

The website, which had 18 million unique visitors in October and 25 milliion in November, allows users to browse questions by categories. The iPhone app added the ability to browse recent and nearby categories.

ChaCha CMO Shawn Schwegman says, "70% of the people who use the apps don’t ask a question. They’re looking at the categories that they’re interested in."

That, and probably at questions such as "If a vampire and a zombie get in a fight, who wins?" that are mixed in with those from students obviously cheating on tests ("What challenges did President Truman face after World War II?") and from those who haven't gotten over the magic ("ARE YOU a REAL PERSON?").

Trending topics on ChaCha often mirror news events. After it was announced that Steve Jobs had died, for instance, ChaCha got 18,000 questions about his life and death.

"People hear things on TV and then they ask the question of ChaCha," Schwegman says.

That this sounds a bit like Twitter hasn't been lost on the company. Its wheels have been spinning on the social question for some time.

Planning For a Social Twist

To cater to users' demonstrated interest in what their friends are asking questions about, ChaCha has put a number of interactive features in the pipeline. For starters, it plans to add a scalable map that shows where the millions of questions per day are coming from.

"The big difference here is that when questions are popping, they're answered," says ChaCha Head of Mobile Product Mick Oppy. "It's not like, oh, here's a question.' We've actually completed an answer."

Schwegman says that the company has also been thinking of ways in which it will allow users to communicate with each other for the first time at some point next year.

"There's a huge barrier to entry for the kind of answering that we do," he says. "For other Q&A platforms to move into the real time Q&A space would be very difficult. However, it's not that difficult for us to move into the crowdsourcing space."

This story originally published on Mashable here.

First-class mail: Just a little bit s-l-o-w-e-r (AP)

Posted: 05 Dec 2011 08:47 PM PST

By HOPE YEN, Associated Press Hope Yen, Associated Press – 31 mins ago

WASHINGTON – Already mocked by some as "snail mail," first-class U.S. mail will slow even more by next spring under plans by the cash-strapped U.S. Postal Service to eliminate more than 250 processing centers. Nearly 30,000 workers would be laid off, too, as the post office struggles to respond to a shift to online communication and bill payments.

The cuts are part of $3 billion in reductions aimed at helping the agency avert bankruptcy next year. They would virtually eliminate the chance for stamped letters to arrive the next day, a change in first-class delivery standards that have been in place since 1971.

The plan technically must await an advisory opinion from the independent Postal Regulatory Commission, slated for next March. But that opinion is nonbinding, and only substantial pressure from Congress, businesses or the public might deter far-reaching cuts.

Many postal customers will be upset.

"The post office is a mainstay of America, and the fact that these services will no longer be available is absolutely crazy," said Carol Braxton of Naperville, Ill., as she waited in line at a mail sorting center Monday with the holiday shipping season picking up steam.

"Well I'm not happy about them, but what else can you do with this economy? If they're getting ready to go bankrupt, it's better to cut back than to go totally bankrupt," said Deborah Butler of Brandywine, Md., who was at a Washington, D.C., post office. "You still need them. Because everybody can't afford the other ones, like express mail and things like that. .Even though the world is computer literate, everybody doesn't have computers."

At a news briefing in Washington, postal vice president David Williams said the post office needs to move quickly to cut costs as it seeks to stem five years of red ink amid steadily declining mail volume. After hitting 98 billion in 2006, first-class mail volume is now at less than 78 billion. It is projected to drop by roughly half by 2020.

The agency already has announced a 1-cent increase in first-class mail to 45 cents beginning Jan. 22.

Williams said in certain narrow situations first-class mail might still be delivered the next day — if, for example, newspapers, magazines or other bulk mailers are able to meet new, tighter deadlines and drop off shipments directly at the processing centers that remain open.

But in the vast majority of cases, everyday users of first-class mail will see delays. The changes could slow everything from check payments to Netflix's DVDs-by-mail, add costs to mail-order prescription drugs and even threaten the existence of newspapers and time-sensitive magazines delivered by postal carrier to far-flung suburban and rural communities.

The Postal Service faces imminent default — this month — on a $5.5 billion annual payment to the Treasury for future retiree health benefits and expects to have a record loss of $14.1 billion next year.

"Are we writing off first class mail? No," Williams said. "Customers are making their choices, and what we are doing is responding to the current market conditions and placing the Postal Service on a path to allow us to respond to future changes. We have to do what's in our control to put the Postal Service on sold financial ground."

The cuts would close 252 of the nation's 461 mail processing centers beginning next spring. They would result in the elimination of roughly 28,000 jobs. The number of employees varies by processing facility but generally ranges from about 50 to 2,000. Cincinnati, Boston, Orlando and New Orleans are home to some of the largest centers.

Because the consolidations typically would lengthen the distance mail travels from post office to processing center, the agency also would lower delivery standards. Currently, first-class mail is supposed to be delivered to homes and businesses within the continental U.S. in one to three days. That would lengthen to two to three days, meaning mailers no longer could expect next-day delivery in surrounding communities. Periodicals could take two to nine days.

About 42 percent of first-class mail is now delivered the following day. An additional 27 percent arrives in two days, about 31 percent in three days and less than 1 percent in four to five days. Following the change next spring, about 51 percent of all first-class mail is expected to arrive in two days, with most of the remainder delivered in three days.

The Postal Service initially announced in September it was studying the possibility of closing the processing centers and published a notice in the Federal Register seeking comments. Within 30 days, the plan elicited nearly 4,400 public comments, mostly in opposition.

Catalogue companies worry they won't be able to predict when their catalogues will arrive and therefore when to add staff to handle increased call volumes. Small business owners say sluggish first-class mail will slow their businesses because merchandise and payments will spend more time in transit.

On Monday, postal customers said they valued having mail service but also acknowledged the realities of the Internet in everyday life.

"The post office services that we need as a nation are just too big at this point, so things have to be cut and there is nothing that can be done to change it other than email goes away," Ron Connor of Naperville, Ill., said as he walked into a local post office branch.

Lily Ickow, from Silver Spring, Md., said the post office needs to find other ways than wide-scale cuts to reach profitability. "It's definitely too bad," she said at a Washington post office. "I think the Postal Service is necessary personally. ...It would be useful to see if there are ways that they could innovate and come up with other types of services."

Separate bills that have passed House and Senate committees would give the Postal Service more authority and liquidity to stave off immediate bankruptcy. But prospects are somewhat dim for final congressional action on those bills anytime soon, especially if the measures are seen in an election year as promoting layoffs and cuts to neighborhood post offices.

Postmaster General Patrick Donahoe has been pushing for congressional changes that would give the agency more authority to reduce delivery to five days a week, raise stamp prices and reduce health care and other labor costs.

But the agency also opposes current provisions in the House and Senate legislation that would require additional layers of review before it could close post offices and processing centers.

The Postal Service, an independent agency of government, does not receive tax money, but is subject to congressional control on major aspects of its operations. The changes in first-class mail delivery could go into place without permission from Congress.

Maine Sen. Susan Collins, the top Republican on the Senate committee that oversees the post office, believes the agency is taking the wrong approach. She says service cuts will only push more consumers to online bill payment or private carriers such as UPS or FedEx, leading to lower revenue.

The Senate bill would refund nearly $7 billion the Postal Service overpaid into a federal retirement fund, encourage a restructuring of health benefits and reduce the agency's annual payments into a future retiree health account. No other agency or business is required to make such health prepayments.

Dennis Kucinich, D-Ohio, a member of the House committee that oversees the agency, said he would fight the postal changes.

"This privatization plan is bad for Americans, bad for businesses, bad for the economy and bad for workers. We can do better than to dismantle the Postal Service and privatize its operations," he said.

Ruth Goldway, chair of the Postal Regulatory Commission, said the commission will be reviewing the proposal closely to ensure that the Postal Service can continue its mission of providing adequate, effective service in a fair manner to all parts of the U.S. She said, "I think if the Postal Service does not respond to public concerns, it will bear the consequences of that itself."

___

AP video journalist Robert Ray in Naperville, Ill., AP television producer Kelly Daschle in Washington and business writer Jonathan Fahey in New York contributed to this report.

___

Online:

List of facilities to be closed:

http://about.usps.com/news/electronic-press-kits/our-future-network/study-list-110915.pdf

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More TV Channels Coming To Xbox Live (NewsFactor)

Posted: 05 Dec 2011 03:55 PM PST

Adam Dickter, newsfactor.com Adam Dickter, newsfactor.com – Mon Dec 5, 6:55 pm ET

A week after Microsoft and Verizon announced that FiOS channels are coming to the Xbox 360, the software giant is unleashing more apps to allow TV viewing online via the hit gaming console.

As of Tuesday, Dec. 6, Xbox Live subscribers in the U.S. will be able to watch EPIX, ESPN, Hulu Plus and the Today show on MSNBC, the partnership channel between Microsoft and NBC.

Customers in Japan will get Hulu, while German viewers will have Sky Go, United Kingdom viewers will have LOVEFiLM and Italian viewers will be able to watch Premium Play. Spanish Xbox users can watch Telefonica Espana. Netflix, available already to U.S. users, will be accessible in Canada as well.

'More Social and Personal'

Twenty-seven more channels will debut later this month. For U.S. users, they include iHeartRadio, Sony Pictures' Crackle, more programming from MSNBC and Wal-Mart's Vudu movie rental service. YouTube will be available in 24 countries, and more programming, including content from HBO and Xfinity, will debut in 2012.

Together with the Kinect voice and motion control system and the Bing search engine to find and select programs, Microsoft hopes the Xbox will transform the way consumers aggregate their entertainment.

"A new era in entertainment begins where all your entertainment is together in one place: your games, movies, TV shows, music and sports," said Don Mattrick, president of the Interactive Entertainment Business at Microsoft. "With this update, Xbox 360 system owners will experience Kinect voice control integrated with Bing search, making your TV and entertainment experiences more social and personal than ever."

The announcement is a landmark because media companies have been slow to allow their content to stream on the Internet and away from airwaves, where advertising rates still command the highest rates.

"Microsoft is moving aggressively to extend its network of TV and online video partners, improve search with voice and gesture controls, and make the Xbox 360 more compelling," said Sam Rosen, a senior digital home analyst with ABI Research.

Still, Rosen considers the new Xbox features "evolutionary and not revolutionary."

He notes that it's a step away from free TV via the Internet because much of the content will require Xbox Live Gold membership, which starts at $5.00 per month.

"Most of these content features sit behind the Xbox Live paywall, so it's another annual subscription fee hitting your credit card," he said. "Many of the offerings -- Netflix, Hulu Plus, Vudu, Sky Go, etc -- are available on other platforms, i.e., Samsung or Sony Connected TVs or Blu-ray players."

Channel-Surfing, Old School

Rosen also said Kinect has a way to go before it replaces your handy remote control.

"While Siri has shown what a well-designed voice control system can do, the Kinect remote control, in our experience, has proved less effective," Rosen said. "For gesture controls, not everyone's living room has the ideal spacing of 6 to 8 feet to work well. For voice controls, it may need a remote control/microphone integration to really get past noise and distance issues and work well."

Average consumers, used to surfing TV with buttons, may be initially reluctant, Rosen said.

"To make a change in users' behaviors is going to take a good amount of time, or a compelling experience much like the shift to touchscreens on cell phones," he said.

Starbucks mobile apps account for 26 million transactions over 2011 (Digital Trends)

Posted: 05 Dec 2011 07:35 PM PST

Mike Flacy Mike Flacy – 1 hr 43 mins ago

Starbucks-Mobile-Payment

Launched during January 2011, Starbucks Mobile Pay allows customers of the coffee chain to make purchases with an iPhone, Android phone or BlackBerry using a mobile application. The initial launch allows customers to make mobile payments at approximately 6,800 Starbucks locations as well as 1,000 Target locations. However, this number has climbed to 10,000 locations over the past eleven months by adding Safeway Starbucks stores and locations in Canada. Nine weeks after the company initially launched the apps, Starbucks processed three million mobile payments. In the past nine weeks, the company has processed approximately six million mobile payments, double the volume of the initial nine weeks. In total, the company has processed 26 million transactions since launch.

Starbucks-mobile-paymentsWhile Starbucks won't divulge how many people have downloaded the mobile application across the various smartphone platforms, Adam Brotman, senior vice president and general manager of Starbucks digital ventures, did say that over 90 percent of the people that downloaded the app have used it at least once. Cities with the highest percentage of people using a smartphone at the register include Chicago, San Francisco, New York, San Jose and Seattle. Brotman also mentioned that mobile devices make up 10 percent of digital gift card purchases. Customers are also using the mobile app to reload physical gift cards and have added over $100 million to the cards in the past eleven months.

The mobile payment program is expanding in January 2012 and will roll out at 700 locations in the United Kingdom. Starbucks doesn't have any current plans for an application on Windows phones, but is watching the development of that application store as well as the growth of the Kindle Fire for potential areas of expansion. Starbucks is planning to update the application in the coming weeks across all three platforms. If you are interested in learning how to make purchases at Starbucks with your iPhone, check out our guide here.

This article was originally posted on Digital Trends

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South Korea's net nirvana spawns good, bad and ugly results (Reuters)

Posted: 05 Dec 2011 08:43 PM PST

By Jonathan Hopfner Jonathan Hopfner – 36 mins ago

SEOUL (Reuters) – On a single, dimly-lit floor in the towering central Seoul headquarters of Korea's National Police Agency, dozens of hard drives and mobile phones sit on shelves awaiting dissection.

Officials flit between cubicles, comparing notes, as above their heads massive LCD screens churn out graphs and charts for experts to interpret as all-clear signals or dire warnings.

It may lack the chaos of a physical battlefield, but the agency's Cyber Terror Response Center is the front line in South Korea's growing struggle against computer and Internet-related crime.

Established more than a decade ago, the response center now commands a network of 1,000 officials nationwide who monitor computer systems for viruses, hacking and related attacks and who conduct post-mortem investigations into those systems that have been compromised.

In one of the world's most wired countries, the center has no shortage of work.

South Korea, with its near-ubiquitous Internet access and lightning-fast broadband connections, was ranked by the United Nations Telecommunication Union recently as the world's most advanced nation in terms of information and communication technology usage.

The country is also known as the home of such technology giants as Samsung Electronics and LG Electronics.

Unfortunately, the country also holds less laudable titles. Data from U.S.-based Internet security research firm Team Cymru indicates South Korea is, by far, Asia-Pacific's leading host of peer-to-peer "botnets," compromised, Internet-connected computers typically used for illegal activities and usually without the owner's knowledge.

Steve Santorelli, Team Cymru's director of global outreach, says this represents the downside of being "one of the most connected places on the planet."

"Peer-to-peer based botnets are virtually impossible to kill...(the number in South Korea) is deeply disturbing," he said.

Computer security firm Symantec ranked South Korea seventh worldwide in terms of malicious online activity last year, up two notches from 2009 and trailing only far larger China and India in Asia.

"The cybercrime problem is constantly increasing," sighed Jung Suk-hwa, the Cyber Terror Response Center's soft-spoken investigation director. "Basically, Korea is a good place for it."

CYBERCRIME EPIDEMIC

A series of high-profile attacks this year have highlighted vulnerabilities in South Korea's cherished communications infrastructure and thrust cybercrime squarely into the public spotlight.

In late November a hacking attack that targeted Korea-founded, Japan-based online gaming firm Nexon Co exposed the personal information of more than 13 million subscribers to one of its popular titles, casting a pall over its up to $1.3 billion Tokyo IPO.

That followed a data breach of record scope in July at Nate and Cyworld, popular social networking sites operated by SK Communications. The incident affected the accounts of some 35 million users, equivalent to around 70 percent of the country's entire population.

In April hackers managed to access data on 23 percent of the 1.8 million customers of Hyundai Capital, a joint venture of GE Capital and Hyundai Motor.

The Nexon and SK Communications cases are still being investigated with the trail in the latter leading to China, where most attacks against Korean firms appear to originate, according to Jung.

Cybercrime has also rocked the political and national security spheres.

Police are currently investigating a distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack that crippled the National Election Commission's website during October by-elections, which the opposition alleges was the work of ruling party officials. And authorities in South Korea have linked North Korea to a series of hacks affecting financial, government and military websites.

Hacking and data theft have been issues for some time in South Korea's highly wired society, but "this is the first time we're seeing crimes of this magnitude," Jung says.

The local operations of global firms have not been immune. An August attack on a hosting provider temporarily brought down the local website and online banking operations of HSBC, while the same month an intrusion into Epson's Korea website exposed the personal details of around 350,000 customers, according to a company spokesman.

REAL NAME CONTROVERSY

The spike in personal data leaks this year has fueled the debate over the country's real name verification rules, which have been controversial since their introduction in 2005 in an attempt to moderate online discussions during election periods.

These require websites with more than 100,000 visitors daily to collect the names and personal details of users before the users can upload content or post comments.

By amassing private data, usually national resident registration numbers, on hundreds of thousands of people, South Korean websites create a tempting target for cybercriminals, says Park Kyung-sin, a professor of law at Korea University.

While the real name rules do not specifically require companies to store personal data, according to Park they are left with little choice in practice.

"If websites require identification each time people log on, people won't use them," Park said. "This makes it economically impractical for them to use one-time identification. The rules practically require the accumulation of personal data and also make it enormously profitable for companies to retain it."

Politicians such as Kim Sung-hoon, head of the digital policy committee of Korea's ruling Grand National Party (GNP), have campaigned for real name verification to be revoked.

In addition to restricting freedom of expression, the rules leave "no company safe at the moment, and we have to take fundamental action by abolishing them immediately," he said.

The country's Internet regulator, the Korea Communications Commission, is sticking to its guns. The agency acknowledges "questions over the effectiveness and suitability" of the rules and is "investigating every single step toward their improvement," said Oh Jung-taek, chief of the KCC's Network Ethics Department.

But real name verification is needed to discourage the online dissemination of defamatory remarks or rumors, particularly concerning North Korea, which "could give rise to serious trouble or social turmoil," Oh said.

"Given the special situation we have, it's inappropriate to talk about revoking the rules just a few years after they were implemented."

TAKING MATTERS INTO THEIR HANDS

With the rules unlikely to disappear anytime soon, many companies are developing their own responses. Epson Korea no longer collects resident registration numbers, the company spokesman said. Hyundai Capital has established a separate information security unit and now assigns more than 10 percent of its IT budget to security, according to spokeswoman Fiona Bae.

Some companies have moved to bypass the rules altogether. Google, for example, has prevented users from uploading content or posting comments to the South Korean version of YouTube, stating that real name verification rules do not "fall in line with Google's principles."

The fight against cybercrime has seen some successes. In October the suspected hacker in the Hyundai Capital incident was apprehended in the Philippines. Incidents of online harassment, illegal website operations and piracy have dropped sharply over the last couple of years.

Authorities are trying to help companies shore up their online defenses, with both the KCC and Cyber Terror Response Center offering information security training. The center also plans to boost manpower and cooperation with international authorities such as the Chinese police and Interpol, the National Police Agency's Jung says.

But with the number of hacking cases continuing to climb, Jung admits agencies like his lack the resources to turn a rising tide.

Critics of the real name requirements say their abolishment would do more to bolster the country's online security than any new software or hiring spree.

"No matter how much we invest in security to prevent cybercrime, it'll make no economic sense," says the GNP's Kim. "We'd do better to revoke the real name rules."

(Additional reporting by Seongbin Kang; Editing by David Chance and Matt Driskill)

Theaters set aside "Tweet Seats" for Twitter users (Digital Trends)

Posted: 05 Dec 2011 08:02 PM PST

Mike Flacy Mike Flacy – 1 hr 16 mins ago

shakespeare-festival-tweet-seats

According to an article published in USA Today, more theaters and performing groups within the United States are reserving seats for Twitter users to live-tweet about the performance. Theaters and concert halls participating in the new trend include Raleigh's Carolina Ballet, Connecticut's Norma Terris Theater, the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, the Dayton Opera and the the Indianapolis Symphony. Twitter users that are attending a performance utilize a hashtag to link tweets together when a user searches for the performance on Twitter. For instance, the production of Hello! My Baby: The Musical encourages the use of the #hmbmusical hashtag when submitting tweets to the service.

Verona-Arena-operaThe theaters position the seats in the rear of the theater in order to limit the amount of negative feedback from other patrons. The glare from a device like a smartphone or tablet is often distracting when inside a darkened theater, both for audience members as well as the performers on stage. While the majority of productions around the United States expect people to turn off their smartphones during a performance, it's inevitable that some people will continue to use their phone to text and update social networks.

Orchestras, such as the Indianapolis Symphony and the National Symphony Orchestra, are experimenting with delivering pre-concert notes as well as real-time program notes during the performance to enhance the presentation. People that participate with tweeting during the performance see this as a way to interact with others during the show without disturbing other patrons that are watching the concert, play or Broadway-style musical. Representatives of the theaters hope that offering "tweet seats" will bring a different type of patron into the theater to watch a performance, perhaps a younger demographic of customers. People attending the show to tweet about the performance bring both smartphones and tablets to chat over Twitter.

This article was originally posted on Digital Trends

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Can Mozilla survive without Google? (Digital Trends)

Posted: 05 Dec 2011 05:06 PM PST

Geoff Duncan Geoff Duncan – Mon Dec 5, 8:06 pm ET

Can-Mozilla-survive-without-Google

Mozilla's Firefox browser occupies a unique place in the industry. Developed as an alternative to Microsoft's market-dominating Internet Explorer, Mozilla is the only major Web browser on the planet that isn't a commercial operation. Firefox aims to answer to actual Web users, rather than cow-tow to corporate goals and pursue every opportunity to capture users and (of course) make profits. And Mozilla has succeeded: the company has been operating for years and steadily eroded Microsoft's share of the browser market to become Internet Explorer's leading competitor.

However, just because Mozilla is a non-profit doesn't mean all that work happens for free. It still has to pay for office space, connectivity, servers, hosting, employee salaries and benefits, plus all the other costs of a software development operation: computers, software, licensing, and (probably) the odd Nerf gun. Mozilla gets support from contributors, but the bulk of the company's revenue comes from partnerships with search providers, which pay Mozilla the equivalent of referral fees every time someone comes to their search service through a Mozilla browser. Mozilla's biggest source of revenue is Google, which is set up as the default search on most Firefox installations.

However, Google is also the developer of one of Firefox's biggest competitors: Chrome. And Mozilla's search partnership agreement with Google expired in November.

There has not yet been any formal statement from either organization about the agreement's future, but the situation leaves one to wonder: Can Mozilla survive without Google? And does Google need Mozilla?

Mozilla's finances

Mozilla isn't exactly hurting for money. According to the company's 2010 audited financial statement (PDF) the organization pulled in just over $123 million during 2010, a revenue increase of over 18 percent from 2009. However, of that $123 million in income, more than $121 million came from "royalties," which is the category that would encompass partnerships with search-engine companies. That's more than 98 percent of Mozilla's annual revenue for the year, meaning its search partnerships are essentially the lifeline of the outfit.

How much of that money was from Google? Mozilla isn't saying, but some estimates put it around 85 percent, or over $100 million. Mozilla is quick to point out it has search agreements with a number of companies other than Google, including Bing, Yahoo, Amazon, eBay, Yandex, and "others," but Mozilla hasn't broken out royalties received from individual search partnerships since 2008. Back then, its partnership with Google accounted for 88 percent of its royalty income. It's safe to believe that proportion has changed a bit: Not only has Mozilla expanded out into new partnerships and platforms, but Microsoft's Bing search engine wasn't a blip on the horizon back in 2008. Now Bing is roughly even with Yahoo for a distant second place in search market share (and powering Yahoo behind the scenes), has its own partnership with Mozilla. Getting still cozier with Bing, Mozilla just launched Firefox with Bing that makes Bing the default search engine for both Firefox's search field and so-called "Awesome Bar."

However, it's safe to say that revenue from searches Mozilla brings to Google still accounts for the bulk of Mozilla's revenue. Although Google's deal with Mozilla has expired, Firefox downloads still have Google set as the default browser and reports say negotiations between Mozilla and Google are currently underway. It's probably safe to assume the two will reach some sort of agreement soon.

But can Mozilla survive on a revised search agreement with Google?

Mozilla without Google

Mozilla could get along for a while without a search deal from Google. According to Mozilla's 2010 tax filings (PDF) the organization had over $27 million in cash and investments and about $3.3 million in expenses; the organization's consolidated financial statement claims over $105 million in investment assets. Although the situation is complicated, Mozilla could probably coast along for a few years on its existing assets if its search deal with Google were to dry up overnight.

That's especially true considering Mozilla's income would not drop to zero if Google went away. Mozilla still has its other search partners (like Yahoo and Bing), and could presumably wring more revenue from them if it offered to make one of them the default search provider for Firefox. And Mozilla hasn't been letting efforts to solicit contributions slide: It has to receive at least 10 percent of its funding from public support to file as a publicly supported charity. In 2010, that proportion was a healthy 14.71 percent, accounting for $1.3 million from over 5,500 people. That's a 500 percent increase from 2009, showing Mozilla is getting serious about raising revenue from public support rather than relying exclusively on search partnerships.

But the bottom line is that losing its search deal with Google would cause Mozilla to scramble to find new sources of revenue. The degree to which that would impact Mozilla's development plans is unclear: The organization claims its software development and fundraising processes are separated. That means programmers wouldn't be pulled out of code repositories to stand on street corners holding tin cups. But it's hard to attract (and retain) solid software talent without financing. Over time, revenue shortages would have a negative impact on Mozilla development.

Google without Mozilla

Another way of looking at Mozilla's situation is to ask: Does Google still need Mozilla? When Google and Mozilla entered into their first search arrangement five years ago, Internet Explorer was by far the market-dominant Web browser, and (of course) has always shipped with Microsoft's search services set up as the default. Google's interest in a search deal with Mozilla was to put Google services front and center in Firefox: as Firefox expanded its marketshare, it took Google services along with it.

However, things have changed since five years ago. Internet Explorer is still the world's most popular browser by marketshare, but Google's own Chrome is gaining fast: According to Irish tracking firm StatCounter, Chrome has already surpassed Firefox to become the second most-popular browser worldwide. StatCounter has Internet Explorer accounting for 40.63 percent of the global market; Chrome accounts for 25.69 percent and Firefox is at 25.23 percent.

Not all metrics firm agree with StatCounter: Net Applications has Chrome with a 18.18 percent share of the market in November, with Firefox accounting for a 22.14 percent share. However, if current trends hold, Chrome will overtake Firefox in Net Applications' analysis of the market by mid-2012.

Chrome is important in this equation because it ships with Google's search services configured as the default. Back when Google made its search deal with Mozilla, it couldn't compete with Internet Explorer with a browser of its own that had Google services set up as a default. Now it can.

Another arrow in Google's quiver is that it can count on many Firefox users sticking with Google services even if Google were to abandon the search deal with Mozilla. After all, in the last five years Google has significantly expanded the suite of Web services it offers. Very few serious Internet users are completely independent of services like Gmail, Google Docs, YouTube — heck, a few even use Google Plus. Google also now has years of experience convincing Internet Explorer users to switch away from Microsoft services to Google; it can apply the same techniques to Firefox.

Nonetheless, the worldwide expansion of the Internet means Mozilla is bringing more searchers to Google than ever before, and it's reasonably certain Google doesn't want to see those users driven to Bing. Now that Google has the number two (or number three) browser, those searchers from Firefox may not be as valuable to Google as they were five years ago, but they're almost certainly worth something.

Firefox's future

Mozilla's search provider brouhaha has served to highlight the current dilemma of Firefox as a desktop browser. Mozilla has seen some success with its recent rapid-release development cycle, which so far has seen the company roll through Firefox 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8 in 2011 alone. The release strategy has been touted as a way to get major changes to the browser out the door sooner, including performance and memory usage improvements as well as new features like tab groups, location support, the ability to opt out of Web tracking, improved add-on management, and more.

However, users have generally been underwhelmed and confused by the flurry of releases, especially since few bring high-profile new features that seem immediately useful. Instead, Firefox's release schedule brings many users disruption and annoyance — and let's not forget enterprise users who don't want to be put in a position of having to test and certify new browser releases every six weeks. While Mozilla is trying to move die-hards off old versions of Firefox 3.6 — the last old-school release — it also left many people behind who can't upgrade. For instance, while Firefox will run on Windows XP, it doesn't run on anything older than Mac OS X 10.5, leaving users of older Macs out in the cold.

Firefox also faces another challenge in that it's a desktop app… and a lot of the Web browsing world is moving off desktop and notebook computers. Firefox has been working on mobile versions of its browser, but so far it isn't even a blip on the mobile browsing radar. According to Net Applications, Apple's Safari browser is over 55 percent of the mobile browsing market, with Opera Mini as its nearest competitor at 20.09 percent and the Android browser coming in with a 16.36 percent share. Firefox and Mozilla browsers total up to less than 0.04 percent. So far, Firefox hasn't shown any convincing strategy to move forward into the mobile world — and, ultimately, that may mean fewer people give Firefox much consideration on the desktop.

This article was originally posted on Digital Trends

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FingerFace a fun way to make silly pictures (Appolicious)

Posted: 05 Dec 2011 03:30 PM PST

Facebook hires Gowalla team, will shut it down (AP)

Posted: 05 Dec 2011 01:00 PM PST

By BARBARA ORTUTAY, AP Technology Writer Barbara Ortutay, Ap Technology Writer – Mon Dec 5, 4:00 pm ET

NEW YORK – Facebook has hired the team behind Gowalla, the location service that lets people share where they are using their mobile phones.

Gowalla started out in 2009 as a way for people to share their location with friends and strangers by "checking in." Now, Facebook will wind down the service, as it often does when buying a startup to hire its talent. It did not acquire the Gowalla service or technology.

Financial terms were not given. Gowalla co-founder Josh Williams said in a blog post that Gowalla will join Facebook in California. Gowalla is currently headquartered in Austin, Texas, a city with a thriving tech scene and the site of the annual South By Southwest Interactive festival, where many startups — including Gowalla — are launched. Gowalla never quite caught on with a large audience, trailing rival Foursquare.

"As we move forward, we hope some of the inspiration behind Gowalla — a fun and beautiful way to share your journey on the go — will live on at Facebook," Williams wrote in the post.

Facebook said that Williams co-founder Scott Raymond and others at Gowalla will move to Facebook in January. The companies would not say how many employees Gowalla has and how many of them are joining Facebook.

The companies didn't specify what projects the Gowalla team will be working on, though Williams' blog post hinted that one might be Timeline. The feature, which will replace users' current profile pages, works like a virtual scrapbook. Curated by the user, it includes photos, posts and other events from the person's life.

"The Gowalla Passport has become a record of all the places we've visited, the people we were with, the photos we took, and the stories we told. Many of you even use Gowalla like a scrapbook of sorts — a place to keep all those memories," Williams wrote.

Facebook's latest hires come just days after the Palo Alto., Calif.-based company announced it is opening an engineering office in New York City. Facebook, which is widely expected to go public after next April, has about 3,000 employees and said last week it plans to add thousands worldwide in the coming years.

Facebook won't acquire data about Gowalla's users, Williams said.

New Android-powered TV line is headed to the hospital (Digital Trends)

Posted: 05 Dec 2011 06:15 AM PST

Rick Marshall Rick Marshall – Mon Dec 5, 9:15 am ET

Various versions of Android-powered televisions have tried to carve out a niche for themselves independent of the Google TV scene and had a rough time of it. A new line of HDTVs from HCI suggests that maybe the other products just weren't tapping the right market.

In an announcement posted on the company's website, HCI outlined plans to deliver its Android-powered Roommate III televisions to hospital rooms and healthcare facilities. The wall-mounted LCD HDTVs will offer patients and facility staff a host of Android apps, as well as web-browsing functions, a whiteboard application, and a long list of other features.

The Roommate III TVs operate on an unspecified version of Android, and will feature 22- to 42-inch screens.

"We have scored another 'first in the world,'" said HCI CEO Rick Pratt in the company's announcement. "Android connectivity will provide hospital patients, visitors and staff with a built-in browser, Education and Movies on demand, Apps of all varieties, not to mention unparalleled reliability. This is truly the most advanced, most complete, Hospital grade television on the planet."

There’s no indication of which hospitals will be the first to offer the TVs.

This article was originally posted on Digital Trends

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The Sad Fliers' Crusade for Airplane Mode (The Atlantic Wire)

Posted: 05 Dec 2011 03:29 PM PST

Rebecca Greenfield Rebecca Greenfield – Mon Dec 5, 6:29 pm ET

After last week's New York Times column on the pointlessess of making fliers turns off gadgets during take-off and landing, angry technophiles have started a White House petition to get the rules changed. After two full days and a tweet from The New York Times's Nick Bilton's to his 88,879 followers, the petition only has 364 signatures.

Related: iPad Sales Have Reached a Plateau

When Bilton wrote his takedown last week, it wasn't all that convincing. In the days following his post, a few bloggers piped up to agree with Bilton, but even The Atlantic's own national correspondent and pilot, James Fallows, who admitted "the rule is pure theater," pointed out that Bilton doesn't really have a case. "[H]ere is the only, admittedly weak rationale behind the 'turn all equipment off' diktat," Fallows wrote. "If anything went wrong on a crowded airline flight, the flight crew would need everyone's full attention, now." And for that, he will keep his iPad off at the flight attendant's request.

Related: All the Ways Apple Keeps Secrets (That We Know Of)

Fallows isn't alone. A slew of commenters on Bilton's follow-up blog post note the inanity of the entire request. Some pointed out that interference can actually occur. Others suggested that a few minutes without iPad access is really a ridiculous thing to complain about. And as The Wire's Adam Clark Estes noted, one can never be too certain when an iPhone might explode. 

Related: Issa Wants to Know What Obama's Hiding on His iPad

Yet, a week later, the crusade lives on and doesn't really look like it's going anywhere. If the White House gets "enough support," it months of talk, national attention and a study that moved Europe to ban the cancerous things, the TSA still mostly uses them. 

Analysis: SAP's new cloud czar to take on Salesforce, Oracle (Reuters)

Posted: 05 Dec 2011 05:53 PM PST

By Jim Finkle and Georgina Prodhan Jim Finkle And Georgina Prodhan – Mon Dec 5, 8:53 pm ET

(Reuters) – SAP AG's purchase of Web-based software company SuccessFactors Inc could be the catalyst the old-school German technology giant needs to try to catch up to rivals in the fast-growing cloud computing market.

SAP has struggled for more than five years to create business applications that are hosted on the cloud, or Web, and the company lags behind pioneer Salesforce.com Inc and larger rival Oracle Corp in the so-called software as a service (SaaS) market, analysts say.

One of the key assets that SAP trumpets in its planned $3.4 billion purchase of SuccessFactors is the U.S. company's chief executive, Lars Dalgaard, an energetic 6'4" Dane who is one of world's top evangelists for cloud computing.

Dalgaard, 44, a former pharmaceutical sales representative, founded SuccessFactors 10 years ago and built it into a leading provider of cloud-based human resources software. It went public at $10 a share four years ago, and is now worth $40 a share under the SAP deal.

Some analysts say SAP is overpaying for SuccessFactors. SAP says it's not just buying a product line: Dalgaard will manage its cloud computing business, have a seat on its executive board and lead the charge against industry leader Salesforce.com.

"Lars is going to definitely be a change agent," said Michael Nemeroff, an analyst with Morgan Keegan who follows SuccessFactors. "The question is - how much change can SAP deal with by taking on Lars?"

At SAP, Dalgaard will face the challenge of getting the nearly 40-year-old company to change the way it develops and sells software. He will also need to figure out how to best integrate SuccessFactors' technology mesh with that of SAP to make it easy for customers to combine products from the two companies.

SAP has to sell more software as a service to fuel growth, because the cloud computing market is a rare bright spot in an otherwise lackluster tech industry. Web-based software is popular because companies can vet the products extensively before buying, pay by the month, and do not need to make expensive hardware buys.

Sales of cloud-based SaaS applications will hit $17.3 billion in 2013, up 41 percent from an estimated $12.3 billion in 2011, according to Gartner. The research firm forecasts that sales of traditional programs, which make up the bulk of SAP's revenue, will grow just 14 percent during the same period.

DISAPPOINTMENTS

After SAP launched Business By Design, an all-in-one, cloud-based business management suite for small and mid-sized businesses four years ago, it ran into problems making money off the service because it hadn't figured out a cost-effective way to host software for multiple clients.

SAP also had trouble convincing companies to buy cloud products using the sales approach it has traditionally taken, which was to establish long-term relationships with senior corporate executives instead of with users on the ground.

"For cloud computing, it's the other way around," said Forrester Research analyst Stefan Ried. "People start with free offers, then hopefully convert users into customers, and then upsell large enterprise software."

One of SAP's biggest disappointments in SaaS has been in customer relationship management (CRM) software, an area where it trails far behind Salesforce and Oracle. SAP co-CEO Bill McDermott conceded that the company's last cloud CRM product has fared poorly in the market, but said in an interview on Sunday that he expects its next one to do better.

He said that SAP plans to start heavily promoting that product, Sales on Demand, after Dalgaard takes over the cloud-computing business.

Dalgaard, who studied business at the Copenhagen Business School in Denmark and Stanford University Graduate School, told Reuters that Sales on Demand is so cool that he "went bananas" when he first saw it.

He said he spent six hours playing with it at the end of a long day of travel. "I can't wait to bring it to the world," Dalgaard said by phone.

Marc Benioff, chief executive of Salesforce.com, told Reuters that SuccessFactors uses CRM products from his company so he was "surprised" to hear Dalgaard praising SAP software.

"SuccessFactors is standardized worldwide on Salesforce.com," Benioff retorted. "To my knowledge, they don't use any SAP software of any kind." SuccessFactors did not respond to a request for comment on Benioff's statement.

The battle for CRM customers will be intense because that accounts for the largest segment of the SaaS market. About a third of the nearly $10 billion in cloud applications sales were from CRM applications, according to Gartner.

"Customers are howling for cloud solutions with Web interfaces," said M. Eric Johnson, a professor at Dartmouth's Tuck School of Business who advises large corporations on technology investments. "Happy with iPhone and Android interfaces, users are just not willing to put up with cumbersome old interfaces."

Dalgaard has created an unconventional, fast-paced work environment business culture at his Silicon Valley company, where he has advised employees to take calculated risks, make mistakes and learn from them.

The company's value statement promotes respect for individuals ("No jerks") and tells employees to enjoy their work ("Get a rush from what we do"). Yet it is focused on the bottom line, telling workers that they should produce measurable results and "Get it done. Do whatever it (legally) takes."

Analysts said they are looking to see just how Dalgaard fits in at SAP.

"Lars is the type of guy who when he sees a problem, he has to fix it immediately," Nemeroff said. "Maybe this is McDermott's way of saying 'We have to move faster.'"

(Reporting by Jim Finkle and Georgina Prodhan. Additional reporting by Nicola Leske. Editing by Tiffany Wu, Bernard Orr)

Stop being your own worst enemy (InfoWorld)

Posted: 05 Dec 2011 03:00 AM PST

– Mon Dec 5, 6:00 am ET

San Francisco – I've spent a great deal of the past 15 years doing two things: building new server, storage, and network infrastructures -- and fixing them when they fall flat on their face for one reason or another. Over that time, I've seen one common theme emerge: There are very easy, seemingly unimportant things you can do when you build and maintain infrastructure that will save your bacon later when things go pear shaped.

Most of them involve writing stuff down -- you know, documentation.

I realize if there's one word that can cause a room full of IT folks to roll their eyes, it's "documentation." Usually, when you tell IT pros they need to document what they're doing, the thought of writing a book-length, screenshot-laden tome that would allow a monkey to manage a complex system comes to mind. Nothing could be more horrifying.

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at 9:29 PM

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