Microsoft’s Justin Rao and Google’s David Reiley worked together to determine the societal cost of spam compared with the benefits spammers receive. Their findings: Spam brings in $200 million and society pays $20 billion.
Even though spammers are earning relatively small amounts compared to the societal cost, it still proliferates because the cost to send spam is so small. Rao and Reiley’s report found that for spam to be worthwhile, it only needs 1 in 25,000 people to buy something through its advertising.
Rao and Reiley also offer a solution: raise the cost of business for spammers.
“We advocate supplementing current technological anti-spam efforts with lower-level economic interventions at key choke points in the spam supply chain, such as legal intervention in payment processing or even spam-the-spammers tactics,” the report states.
“By raising spam merchants’ operating costs,” adds the report, “such countermeasures could cause many campaigns no longer to be profitable at the current marginal price of $20-50 per million emails.”
“Thinking we safeguard our phones by physically keeping close tabs on them is way off, according to researchers, because millions of us already provide mobile data to marketers, business analysts, and law enforcement every day,” reports Mobiledia.
The post provides details regarding five ways smartphones are giving away personal information:
1) Carriers “generate a lot of information from consumers’ cell phone use, and make personal information anonymous, sell it to advertisers or hand it over to FBI and police officers,” notes the post, adding that tracking programs also aggregate other information.
2) Smartphones have big bulls-eyes. The big data trend targets personal data including contact lists and Google search words to provide insight into Internet-user behavior.
3) Law enforcement isn’t required to obtain a warrant to search smartphones and “in some places, if law enforcement officials can guess a password and unlock a confiscated device, they can impersonate the phone’s owner by sending texts,” explains the post.
4) Phones with apps that transmit user’s geolocation can make them vulnerable to robbers or burglars who know they aren’t home.
5) While it is known that posting on social media is public to some extent, “consuming content and ‘just browsing,’ was always assumed to be private, anonymous even, but this is also being threatened,” Mobiledia writes.
Even with millions of global viewers, NASA successfully streamed live footage of the Curiosity rover’s landing on Mars, and not once did their servers fail. By contrast, the team’s attempt to upload a clip of the event to YouTube had less luck.
Within minutes of the “NASA Lands Car-Size Rover Beside Martian Mountain” video being posted, it was blocked by Scripps Local News on copyright grounds, highlighting some innate issues with YouTube’s automated copyright monitor, Content ID.
“The good thing about automation is that you don’t have to involve real people to make decisions. The bad thing about automation is that you don’t have to involve real people to make decisions,” said Bob Jacobs, NASA’s deputy associate administrator for communication, who added that these type of claims happen once a month.
Content ID scans the 72 hours of content uploaded each minute on YouTube, looking for videos that violate terms of service and for content that matches copyrighted material.
YouTube also enables copyright owners to submit requests for pirated video to be censored. Unfortunately, the site favors accusers, making it extremely difficult for the accused to reinstate their videos.
“YouTube’s policy requires the alleged violator to submit a signed counter-claim, under penalty of perjury, then awaits a response from the original supposed owner before possibly restoring the video,” Motherboard explains. “YouTube forwards the claim to the supposed copyright owner and waits ten days for a response. ‘If we do not receive such notification, we may reinstate the material,’ says YouTube.”
Jacobs argues there should be consequences for people who make false copyright claims.
Variety writer David S. Cohen says today’s 3D wave is not the same 18-month fad the industry experienced in the 1950s. Even so, he remains skeptical about its future based on filmmakers’ mindsets.
“Release my movie in 3D if you must — but don’t make me change one single thing I’m used to doing” is the attitude of many in the industry, Cohen writes.
The pricing also plays into 3D’s future. “I think the 3D upcharge is proving both a blessing and a curse,” he notes. “We’re getting movies with enough 3D to collect the upcharge, but not enough to deliver the premium experience the audience is paying for.”
3D has developed a bad reputation, which Cohen attributes to the “cynical content creation on the one hand and poor projection on the other,” both of which reflect a philosophy of collecting the upcharge with minimal effort.
“But if filmmakers don’t embrace 3D and make it a plus in their storytelling, and if exhibs won’t do the extra work and spend the extra money to show 3D beautifully, eventually auds might decide that aside from the work of a few people who have publicly promoted the format, Hollywood’s 3D is just a cynical cash-grab. And the sad part is, they might be right,” Cohen concludes.
Since Facebook has been striving to monetize its mobile efforts, the social giant took some heat earlier this year when big retailers such as Gamestop, Nordstrom and JC Penney shut down their Facebook stores.
Working with Ecwid, the second largest store-building application on Facebook, VentureBeat finds that Facebook store commerce is in fact working, but mostly for small- to medium-sized businesses.
“We started pulling data from the over 40,000 Ecwid accounts globally that have active stores on both a website and on Facebook,” the post explains. “For the second quarter of this year, we found that 22.1 percent of those orders came from the Facebook store. That’s up from 17.3 percent in Q1. These are impressive figures, especially when you consider they’ve grown from 15 percent in 2011 when we first started tracking this.”
Smaller businesses seem to have a better understanding of how social networks work, according to the analysis. These companies can convey a more personal tone in social conversations, be more flexible to incorporate new store-building technologies and build up their community — rather than just “product hawking.”
“[Small- to medium- businesses] more effectively integrate their stores into the flow of the conversation,” the post adds. “Dropping a store into a social news stream has to be done carefully. The purpose of social networks is to connect people, so an ill-timed sales offer can be a turnoff.”
The bigger companies could learn a thing or two from the smaller businesses. “Since the rules of this game are still being written, it’s important to pay attention to who’s figuring it out first,” suggests VentureBeat.
Removing the built-in entertainment systems common on airplanes today could save some airlines around 14 gallons of jet fuel per hour by taking tons off the plane’s weight. And on those long flights, this change can equate to hundreds of dollars saved per flight.
On average, in-flight entertainment systems weigh in around 13 pounds per seat. Offering iPads instead could drastically cut down this weight and even reduce costs of replacing or maintaining IFE systems.
“In addition, airlines have to provide tablets only to actual passengers who didn’t already bring their own, and some passengers might not want to watch movies and so would decline the device. Empty seats don’t get them, either, saving even more weight and expense,” notes ReadWriteWeb. “In classic airline fashion, they’ll likely yield management analysis to precisely calculate how many tablets they’ll need for each flight.”
Those opposed to the change claim tablets take up space on trays and are inconvenient for lie-flat seats. However, new IFE platforms could let passengers “connect their own devices to the on-board entertainment or connect their tablet’s content to the seat-back screen,” the post states.
“Eventually, with the increase of broadband availability on flights, airlines may not even bother to provide proprietary content at all: passengers will bring their own, or surf online to find their own entertainment,” the article continues. “And as tablet penetration continues to increase, more and more passengers will likely tote their own tablets onto the plane.”
Customers will ultimately have the last say as they choose with their wallets, ReadWriteWeb suggests.
The Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) is getting an update in light of the expanding social media scene, extensive ad networks and new tracking technology.
The rules apply to third party advertising networks and developers of apps or plug-ins when dealing with a child-oriented website or service. If a site and/or service directly targets children under 13 as their main audience, it is required to treat all visitors as underaged. The rules do not, however, affect information collection required for maintaining a network or offering a service.
The new rules allow sites/services to “age-screen all visitors in order to provide COPPA’s protections only to users under age 13,” the FTC states.
According to the FTC, “an operator of a child-directed site or service that chooses to integrate the services of others that collect personal information from its visitors should itself be considered a covered ‘operator’ under the Rule.”
The update also expands the meaning of personal information to include geolocation data and “‘persistent identifiers’ that recognize a user over a period of time which are used for purposes other than ‘support for internal operations,'” according to the FTC.
“This rule is aimed squarely at tracking cookies that are capable of not only delivering advertising within a site but can also be used to track people across sites to deliver targeted information,” notes SafeKids.com.
Despite good intentions, the COPPA revision still has some setbacks like its potential impact on small businesses. Also, “…it discourages companies from offering services to people under 13 or even allowing pre-teens to use services that could benefit them,” SafeKids.com writes. “Because COPPA doesn’t apply to people 13 and over, there are a lot of great services aimed at teens and adults but since kids do want to use many of these services, they wind up lying about their age, often with parental consent or involvement.”
Despite the cries against an Internet crackdown, the MPAA says it is not trying to control the Web in its case against Richard O’Dwyer.
UK resident O’Dwyer could be extradited to the United States for copyright infringement regarding his site TVShack.net, which provided links to possibly illegal content. O’Dwyer may not have violated UK laws and he is in the process of appealing the decision.
According to a supposed leaked MPAA memo: “Being 24, posing for newspaper photo shoots in a cartoon sweatshirt, and having your mother and Jimmy Wales speak for you, does not mean you are incapable for [sic] breaking the law.”
Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales sees O’Dwyer’s prosecution as an affront to Internet freedom. He has initiated a petition that has since gotten a quarter million signatures.
The MPAA is trying to curb these concerns. “This case isn’t about Internet freedom,” the association states. “It’s about a man profiting from theft. However, we do welcome a larger discussion about how best to protect intellectual property online while ensuring an Internet that works for everyone.”
Square has already gained popularity and success with its small credit card reader that plugs into smartphone audio jacks. The company wants to take the service one step further: remove the device altogether and enable payments without even digging out your wallet or phone.
Pay With Square keeps users credit card information to enable charges online. While it may be “unsettling” for first time users who don’t know whether to trust the app, the company hopes it will improve the payment experience and even help customer service.
“When you open a tab on Pay With Square at a store, café, restaurant or food cart, the merchant sees your name and face appear on Register. When you check out, you give your name, so the merchant knows on whose tab to put your order. When the payment goes through, your phone buzzes, and the merchant says you’re all set,” ReadWriteWeb explains.
The “Auto-Open Tab When Near” option will open and close your tab based on location so you don’t even have to use your phone at all.
“Likewise, on the merchant’s side, Register keeps track of when customers are nearby and ready to pay. Since it shows their names and faces and keeps track of their visits, the merchant has a powerful customer service advantage: ‘Hi, Anna. How are you? Would you like the usual?'” the article says.
“Higher technology made payments more complicated,” suggests the post. “As our economies gained complexity, so did our media of exchange. But now we’re over the hump, and mobile networking can make things simpler again.”
As mobile usage increases, non-profits like the Wi-Fi Alliance continue to work with manufacturers, creating standards to make the wireless experience seamless and faster for all users.
One example is the new 802.11ac wireless standard, which enables high-speed connectivity, backup and sync for wireless devices.
“802.11ac significantly increases available Wi-Fi bandwidth, improving wireless performance for reliable high-definition (HD) video streaming, alleviating nuisances such as slow loading times and videos pausing in the middle of a scene,” Forbes explains. “802.11ac also allows consumers to transmit multiple HD videos simultaneously without losing the connection.”
NFC is also going to be important to digital households, allowing “two devices to securely communicate wirelessly without the hassle of passwords,” the article states.
Besides enabling mobile devices to connect to Wi-Fi automatically when close, near field communication also “simplifies the pairing of Bluetooth devices such as remote controls, 3D glasses and an array of mobile and audio streaming products,” reports Forbes.
The article also details the new technology, Wi-Fi CERTIFIED Miramast, which, “uses a peer-to-peer Wi-Fi connection to deliver audio and video content from one device to another without cables or a connection to an existing network,” so users can easily stream mobile content onto their big screen TVs.
“In the coming years,” Forbes concludes, “the latest and greatest consumer devices will only be as good as the wireless technologies they’re built on and the standards that they support.”
Top pay TV providers are facing fierce competition from evolving Internet services. In addition, the companies are dealing with harsh realities of a weak U.S. economy as well as battles with program makers, all contributing to over 400,000 American homes canceling their pay TV service since January.
While the second quarter is generally weak for the business — with college students moving out and people changing houses before summer — top providers are reporting some noteworthy drops in subscriptions.
DirecTV had 52,000 homes cancel their services, Time Warner Cable saw 169,000 customers cord-cut, Comcast lost 176,000 subscriptions, and Dish Network saw 10,000 customers leave. For Dish and Comcast, the rate of losses were actually less than previous quarters, but the losses were a first ever for DirecTV.
The declining numbers are “ominous” for pay TV services, suggest Reuters. Competing with new services has led pay TV distributors to try new measures.
“The maturity of the nearly fifty-year-old cable TV market has raised the stakes leading to more bitter and prolonged battles between distributors and their program maker partners,” notes Reuters. “These disputes now typically end up with customers losing some of their favorite programming for days on end and adds to customer weariness with pay TV.”
“The idea of cord-cutting has gathered steam as several major technology companies [Google, Intel, Amazon and others] have held talks with program makers about putting together TV packages that will be delivered via the Internet,” the article states.
But some don’t think cord-cutting is the primary issue. “We actually think a bigger issue in the market is that there is a group of customers that are in really serious financial shape, they have been out of work for a long time,” said TWC CEO Glenn Britt.
Free-to-play gaming provides consumers with more choice and possibly even more content as developers update to attract more people or bring previous users back.
“The concept of paying a regular, flat fee for access to game time has had a good run since apparently getting its start in the mid-’80s, and the business model will no doubt continue to limp along for a while in some corners of the industry,” writes Ars Technica. “But it seems obvious now that offering online games for free, and monetizing players once they’re hooked, has fully replaced this outdated business model.”
Already, game makers are seeing a switch in consumer behavior. “‘Lord of the Rings Online’ saw its monthly revenue double after it stopped requiring subscriptions in 2010. ‘DC Universe Online’ saw a seven-fold revenue increase when it did the same late last year. Even the venerable ‘Team Fortress 2’ started bringing in 12 times as much money when it switched to a primarily hat-based business model,” notes the article.
While this trend hasn’t held out for all games — like “World of Warcraft,” which continues to benefit from monthly subscriptions — Ars Technica criticizes the model’s non-negotiable rates compared with the more a la carte approach of level-limited free-to-play options that offer microtransactions.
“It’s that kind of inflexibility that has proven to be the online gaming subscription model’s ultimate downfall,” suggests the article.
Do you prefer writing over typing? For those of you who answered yes, Google has just released a new handwriting recognition feature that will translate your scrawls into searches (with support for 27 languages).
“Google Handwrite works in the background while you scribble your search so you don’t have to look back and forth from the keyboard to the search box,” Mashable explains. “Google says the feature isn’t designed to replace keyboard search but instead supplement it.”
Available on Android phones and tablets as well as iOS devices running iOS 5, Google Handwrite is still experimental so users have to opt-in to use it.
“On your mobile device, login at google.com, tap on ‘Settings’ at the bottom of the screen and enable the ‘Handwrite’ feature. Then save your changes and refresh the homepage to get started,” the post states. “To enable Handwrite, tap the icon on the bottom right corner of your screen. You can scribble on any part of the screen, not just the search box. After writing a few letters, autocomplete options will appear below the search box.”
Third-party developers are concerned after Michael Sippey, Twitter VP of product, posted a brief company blog entry that offered general insight into Twitter’s new direction and noted stricter guidelines that may impact how outside developers will be allowed to use the popular data stream.
As outsiders worry what limitations will be established, “…nearly all have overlooked the section of Sippey’s post which holds the key to Twitter’s future: Cards,” reports AllThingsD. “Twitter’s new Cards technology allows third-party developers to create richer, more compelling — and, above all, visually consistent — content inside of Twitter itself.”
“With the addition of a few lines of code, publishers, brands and developers can create better tweets showcasing their content inside of the Twitter stream,” explains the article, suggesting improvements will attract more eyes to brands and traffic to publishers.
Sippey’s blog post also highlighted consistency as a major concern for the microblogging site. Unfortunately, Cards may have issues with standardization.
Developers are expected to make the media-rich tweets look the same across all official Twitter clients (Web, mobile and apps). Adding to that, the new technology won’t appear the same for non-official third-party clients, spelling danger for those services.
Only major publishers, brands and media apps will have access to Cards at the start, but any developer can apply for use. Twitter’s distancing of third-party developers could end up being bad for Twitter, according to the article.
“Twitter cards are an important step toward where we are heading with our platform, which involves creating new opportunities to build engaging experiences into Twitter. That is, we want developers to be able to build applications that run within Tweets,” wrote Sippey.
According to Forrester analyst Sucharita Mulpuru, Amazon could be converting on-site recommendations into sales at a rate as high as 60 percent in some cases.
Fortune suggests the recommendation system likely played a significant part in Amazon’s 29 percent sales increase for the second fiscal quarter this year.
“At root, the retail giant’s recommendation system is based on a number of simple elements: what a user has bought in the past, which items they have in their virtual shopping cart, items they’ve rated and liked, and what other customers have viewed and purchased,” the article explains.
In addition to featuring recommendation panes throughout the purchasing process (from search to checkout), Amazon sends users recommendations via email. To keep the volume of Amazon emails down, the company only sends out emails from product lines that have the highest average revenue-per-mail-sent. Simple, but when the customer qualifies for mail across multiple product lines (books, video games, etc.), it makes a difference and it also maximizes the purchase opportunity.
But there are still areas where Amazon could expand its system. “Already, the company has begun selling items previously sold in bulk that were too cost-prohibitive to ship individually like say, a deck of cards or a jar of cinnamon,” notes Fortune.
“Customers may buy them, but only if they have an order totaling $25 or over. But the company could actively recommend these add-on products during check-out when an order crosses that pricing threshold, much like traditional supermarkets have impulse-purchase items like gum and candy bars at the register.”