• Is emailing a thing of the past? Thierry Breton, CEO of the French firm Atos (one of the largest IT companies in the world), believes email is a time-killer and plans to get rid of the practice within his company.
• Breton’s 80,000 employees will be asked to make the transition from email to using social media tools, phone calls and face-to-face communication as alternatives.
• “If people want to talk to me, call or send me a text message,” said Breton. “Emails cannot replace the spoken word.”
• Breton himself has not used email at work for three years, claiming that it’s inefficient and a “burden to the workflow,” according to Engadget.
• Forbes adds that Breton cites specific examples of how email wastes time: 1) “The ‘deluge’ of information that plagues organizations,” 2) “The need to review ‘useless’ emails and the time it takes to get focused again on important tasks,” 3) “The ‘pile’ of email that employees end up sorting through after hours and the associated drain on employees’ personal time.”
• According to The Daily Mail, Breton quotes a recent study by business watchdog ORSE: “Reading useless messages is terrible for concentration, as it takes 64 seconds to get back on the ball after doing so. Poorly controlled, the e-mail can become a devastating tool.”

• YouTube is redesigning its homepage and channel pages to incorporate “better personalized video discovery and viewing, with a notable emphasis on social features,” reports TechCrunch.
• A new default Subscriptions feed on the homepage offers users content based on what videos they watch and which channels they subscribe to (the feed can also be filtered). Users can share videos using Google+ or by opting-in on Facebook, both located on the navigation bar.
• Channel pages have four new templates that come with a Feed tab showing the channel owner’s activity (highlighting features such as commenting on a video and subscribing to a channel).
• “These additions, which are more analogous to template options in Tumblr or MySpace rather than Facebook’s one-size-fits-all style, let producers promote their works in the most natural style for what they offer,” suggests the post.
• The homepage and channel changes are the first significant updates, but TechCrunch adds that YouTube is “also introducing a site-wide design upgrade to all the elements — typography, iconography, etc. It’s separately adding new versions of its Xbox and Google TV applications, that feature magazine-style tile interfaces showing various channels. Finally, the company is touting the success of its advertising platform, saying that it’s seeing strong demand for its new cost-per-click style of video ads.”

• Despite analyst speculation that video game consoles may be in jeopardy due to the increased capabilities and growing popularity of smartphones and tablets, “Microsoft’s Xbox and Nintendo’s Wii sold in record numbers last week as Americans kicked off their holiday shopping,” reports AllThingsD.
• Some 960,000 Xbox 360s were sold last week and 500,000 Wiis were sold the day after Thanksgiving. Game consoles are still experiencing strong sales five and six years after they were introduced.
• “It’s difficult to imagine any other consumer hardware that could attract that kind of demand after such a long period of time,” suggests the article.
• Blockbuster game titles like Activision’s “Call of Duty” game, which grossed $775 million in its first five days, continue to juice the market.
• Motion-controls such as Wii and Microsoft’s Kinect open up the market beyond gamers to a family market.
• And, as previously reported on ETCentric, game consoles are becoming entertainment centers for streaming video, music and other media content through partnerships with providers such as Netflix, Hulu, ESPN, HBO GO and others.

• Wedbush analyst Michael Pachter believes Netflix cannot repair itself from the damage inflicted earlier this year after the streaming company raised prices on subscribers.
• CNET reports that, “according to Pachter, by year’s end, Netflix will show a loss of 11 million ‘hybrid’ customers that previously rented DVDs and streamed video content. He said he believes that 7 million of those customers will have traded down to the streaming-only option, while another 4 million will have ‘quit the Netflix service altogether.’”
• Shareholders also seem uncertain if Netflix can bounce back. “Over the past six months, the company’s stock is down 75 percent,” indicates the article.
• Netflix has not given up, and believes things can be turned around. However, the company offered this honest evaluation: “If we are unable to repair the damage to our brand and reverse negative subscriber growth, our business, results of operations, including cash flows, and financial condition will continue to be adversely affected.”
• In the wake of a devastating couple of months, the company is looking to rebound “brick by brick” with a strong rebranding, suggests a related Home Media Magazine article.
• In addition to ongoing damage control, Netflix is working to increase its content selection, update its interface and improve user algorithms. These changes, the company hopes, will restore credibility after its recent 60 percent price increase led 800,000 people to unsubscribe.

• Walt Mossberg favorably reviews Apple’s iTunes Match service. For $25/year, you can create a music locker in the Cloud that allows you to play your music collection on up to 10 devices.
• In contrast to similar locker services from Google and Amazon, you do not have to upload your entire collection — iTunes Match scans your iTunes library and matches it with its 20 million song library.
• The service only works for digital music currently, and not for movies, TV shows or audiobooks.
• Your locker can include up to 25,000 songs. It’s worth noting that, “Match is an optional addition to an existing free service called iTunes in the Cloud, which covers only songs you bought from Apple’s iTunes store.”
• “In all, I like iTunes Match, and can recommend it to digital music lovers who want all their tunes on all their devices,” writes Mossberg. “It’s another nice feature of iCloud, priced reasonably.”

• Verizon has announced a new feature and related promotion that suggests it is “taking a much more active interest in video games for both distribution and new customers,” reports Mashable.
• “FiOS customers who subscribe to both FiOS TV and FiOS Internet and are Xbox LIVE Gold members can use their Xbox consoles to watch select live FiOS TV channels. No extra hardware,” explains a post in the Verizon Forum. “Plus, for the first time, Kinect for Xbox 360 will be integrated into the TV experience, allowing customers to use voice and gesture commands to control their TV viewing.”
• Initially, only 26 channels will be available starting in December.
• For $89.99, you can get triple-play service, a limited Xbox LIVE Gold membership and a sponsor spot for Machinima’s Gamers’ Choice Award.

• As an Android, Blackberry or Nokia user, you may not know that an app called Carrier IQ is logging literally everything you are doing on your smartphone including keystrokes, SMS messages and HTTPS sessions. Other articles on Carrier IQ report that this information is being sent to the carriers.
• Apparently, there is no way for a user to turn Carrier IQ off without replacing the operating system.
• A former Justice Department prosecutor has told Forbes that this is “likely grounds for a class action lawsuit” as it violates federal wiretapping law. This story is beginning to get a significant amount of attention online.
• To see Carrier IQ in action, watch the 17-minute video posted to the PC World article.

• According to an editorial in The New York Times, the House’s proposed Stop Online Piracy Act is too broad as it has provisions to cut off payments from providers such as Visa and ad networks like Google simply by filing a notice of infringement.
• While the legislation is aimed at foreign websites like Pirate Bay, it could also be used against domestic websites covered by the Digital Milennium Copyright Act that has safe harbor provisions.
• The editorial asserts that safe harbor provisions should be made available to foreign websites that abide by the DMCA. And a court order should be required before action is taken.
• A related Los Angeles Times editorial suggests that the Stop Online Piracy Act and the PROTECT IP Act both go to extremes in an effort to protect intellectual property.
• The legislation could force companies to monitor their users’ behavior “turning them into a private security force for copyright and trademark owners.”
• Infringement on popular sites like Facebook, Dropbox and YouTube are certainly opening them up to action in spite of safe harbor provisions now in force. The result would be less innovation to create the next YouTube and would have a potentially chilling effect on free speech.

• Chairseven and App Creation Network recently announced the beta availability of Cinefy, “a mobile video editing and effects platform for iPhone where users create and share videos mixed with high quality visual effects,” according to the press release. “Cinefy empowers users with no editing skills to quickly insert footage, add music and apply visually stunning effects with its intuitive and simple interface.”
• The app offers branded effects packs which opens a marketing opportunity for TV and game studios to promote in an engaging way and possibly draw “massive viral exposure.”
• Users can export their videos to their device’s camera roll in addition to Facebook, YouTube and Vimeo. Cinefy will eventually be available for iPads and Android devices.
• To help create soundtracks, Friendly Music has teamed up to provide a catalog of songs, “offering 100 percent legal and all rights-cleared music for personal and custom online media creations.”

• Microsoft lost trust from its hardware partners with the Zune MP3 player which ultimately caused the product to fail. The new Facebook phone could be equally disastrous by pinning HTC against its current software partners.
• HTC has strong relationships with Google for Android OS and Microsoft for Windows Phone 7, relationships that could be jeopardized in moving forward with a Facebook phone.
• “One of the key standout features for Windows Phone 7 is social networking and in particular, Facebook integration (Facebook and Microsoft are partnered),” reports Digital Trends. “Google, on the other hand, is at war with Facebook with Google+, and monetizes Android after-the-fact with services like Google+.”
• “Right now Apple, Microsoft and others spend lots of time on Facebook, but they aren’t likely to continue if they view Facebook as a potential competitor,” suggests the post. “Facebook should be focused on building the best Facebook app for every major platform.”
• In a related survey conducted by AllThingsD, results suggest an overwhelming number of readers had little to no desire for a Facebook phone (81 percent indicated no interest and 12 percent said they would consider it).

• According to the DisplaySearch unit of The NPD Group, 6.6 million 3D TV sets were shipped in the third quarter of 2011, up 27 percent from the previous quarter.
• The research firm expects shipments to increase 30 percent this quarter, for a total of 21.5 million units in 2011.
• However, DisplaySearch suggests a “lack of 3D content and services” means buyers are mostly watching 2D video.
• Additionally, Nielsen released a study last year suggesting consumers were reluctant to wear 3D glasses and nearly 90 percent said that viewing 3D TV would get in the way of checking e-mail or Web surfing while watching television.
• The article suggests that marketing and aggressive pricing has made the difference. “Television vendors have been pushing 3D sets on customers all year,” reports CNET. “In fact, companies such as Samsung, Vizio, and Panasonic, among others, have made 3D a key component in a large number of their televisions, making it harder and harder to find sets that don’t come with 3D support.”

• Founded by a team of execs and engineers from Intel’s Wi-Fi Centrino group in 2007, Wilocity is developing next-gen 60GHz multi-gigabit wireless chipsets for mobile and peripheral markets.
• According to the company’s website: “Wilocity’s Wireless PCI Express technology will enable truly multi-gigabit wireless for a wide range of applications from I/O to networking to video.”
• “Wilocity, which is leading the charge for next-generation technology called 802.11ad designed to reach 7 gigabits per second over short distances, plans to show off a variety of devices using its technology at the mammoth CES trade show,” reports CNET.
• “In Wilocity’s dream, the company will excite people about the possibilities of wireless networking that’s faster than what typical computers today can do with a wired connection,” explains the post. “For example, a smartphone carried into the office could connect to a keyboard, mouse, and large display. A tablet carried into the den could become a controller for a game shown on the big-screen TV.”

• The ever-evolving Viera Connect IPTV system is now available on many of the company’s plasma TVs, LCD TVs and BD players. At a recent press event, the company provided details including updates to the number of available apps.
• The Viera Connect Market of interactive apps includes 120 offerings with expectations of growing two to three times that amount by the end of next year, explained Merwan Mereby, Panasonic interactive content and services VP. According to TWICE: “The connected TV trend is on an explosive course, with estimates for worldwide connected TV shipments expected to surpass those of PCs by the end of 2013, he offered.”
• The article cites recent additions including a Social TV app, an AccuWeather tracking app and a new 3D car racing game from GameLoft.
• “To keep up with the challenge, Panasonic has been actively recruiting app development, and is offering a JavaScript app to help third-party developers create programs for the Viera Connect platform,” indicates the article.

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• Time Warner Cable is expected to add local broadcasting to its iPad streaming app in the New York City market. The app allows its customers to view broadcast programs on the tablet anywhere in their homes.
• It will expand the local offering soon and extend it elsewhere by early next year, according to Rob Marcus, TWC’s chief operating officer.
• The service will also include access to local newscasts and syndicated programming. “We’re moving towards delivering local programming, which is a little more difficult to do technologically,” Marcus explained to investors.
• “Marcus reiterated that TWC believes it has rights to offer Viacom-owned networks on its app. The two companies are suing each other over the matter,” reports Media Daily News. “Cablevision has reached an agreement with Viacom, and offers its channels among the 300-plus it provides.”
• “Marcus went on to say there is some impetus to move ahead with TV Everywhere-type opportunity extending outside the home, where it has a deal with ESPN and some others, but ‘the process has taken a lot longer than we would have anticipated at the outset,’” suggests the article.