In the world of competitive search engines, Google continues to reign supreme. However, Microsoft’s Bing search engine continues to make progress. Bing’s market share has nearly doubled to reach 15.4 percent, according to comScore.
Mike Nichols, corporate vice president and chief marketing officer for Bing, spoke with Fortune about what Bing is doing to continue its steady rise and hopefully compete with Google in the future.
Nichols claims that Bing’s searches are now preferable to Google’s by a 2-to-1 margin, according to independent research.
To prove these numbers, Bing is hosting the nationwide “Bing It On” challenge, an ad campaign which asks users to search for something on both Bing and Google and rate which answer is better.
“What we’re trying to do here is [encourage] people to compare Bing and Google head-to-head, and we believe that as people do that increasingly they will see that Bing is worth breaking… that Google habit,” says Nichols, “because of the quality of the search results, because it’s the only search service that includes useful information from your friends and experts from Facebook, Twitter, etc.”
Apple users can now edit Google Docs on the go, following an update to the Google Drive iOS app. The new features finally put the iOS app on par with the Android version.
“Google says that any edits on collaborative docs will appear in ‘seconds,’ and full rich text formatting is included as well,” reports The Verge.
“Even the basic function of creating a new document is no longer out of reach. Presentations have been enhanced, with new animation support as well as speaker notes — two crucial items for those living in the slide deck world.”
“Docs support isn’t the only big change, though — users can now upload photos and videos directly from a device to Drive, and it’s now possible to add folders and move (or delete) files directly from the app,” notes the post.
The Android app also received an update that offers the ability to add comments, reply to comments and view tables within the app.
Engadget reports from IBC in Amsterdam on NHK’s Super Hi-Vision camera that “doubles the capture rate from the standard 60Hz to a much speedier 120Hz, yielding sharper motion.”
“While the difference isn’t noticeable with static or slow-moving scenes, it certainly comes into play when filming rapid-motion sporting events or panning the camera,” notes the post.
“Filming a rotating image that paired ordinary objects and cityscapes with letters and numbers, you could see the difference instantly, with the 120Hz image on the right side yielding far shaper details, while the left side was often a blurry mess,” describes Engadget.
Since the higher frequency comes directly from the source, there is no software smoothing involved and “it appears perfectly natural, and much more pleasant.”
The post includes a series of stills and a video report from the IBC show floor.
Spotify is getting ready to launch a newly redesigned browser-based version of its popular streaming music service, according to multiple sources.
The overhaul is expected to focus on music discovery and will reportedly allow users to follow habits and playlists of influencers and friends.
“One source even said a lower subscription price for its mobile app could be in the works,” reports TechCrunch. “With a healthy user base and the record labels’ support, the browser version could help Spotify continue dominating the streaming music spotlight.”
Spotify launched one year ago and already touts 7.7 million daily users and 22.2 million monthlies, according to AppData.
TechCrunch notes that “4 million of them pay $5 a month for ad-free service or $10 for zero ads and mobile access.”
Magazine-style reader Flipboard has announced its partnership with Levi’s in a move that could be the next step in launching a new mobile shopping platform.
“For years now, reader apps have slugged along with an advertising business model that hasn’t exactly been lucrative,” notes Digital Trends. “With the debut of Flipboard’s new social shopping catalog, however, its e-commerce strategy could break ground for the experimentation of new business models among reader apps.”
The mobile-only app’s new Style category (located in the Content Guide) will include images uploaded from Instagram, articles by Levi’s staffers and a behind-the-scenes feature.
Flipboard is not the first to tackle m-commerce. Marie Claire and ELLE magazines are two examples of magazine apps in the iTunes App Store that integrate shopping within the magazine reading experience.
“This strategy could get the folks at Zite, Pulse, News.me, and other mobile readers thinking about supplementing their revenue with an m-commerce business model, and we couldn’t blame them,” concludes Digital Trends. “M-commerce is one of the fastest growing subsets within e-commerce.”
Online privacy company Abine offers a free service called DNT+ (Do Not Track Plus) that “claims to give control back to the user by providing insight into which social networks, advertising networks, and companies are tracking you,” Business Insider reports.
Unlike Microsoft’s “do not track” feature on Internet Explorer 10, Abine actually allows consumers to stop advertisers from tracking.
“Abine not only allows you to notify advertisers that you do not want to be tracked, but it also lets you both see who is tracking you and then block that advertiser from tracking you,” the article explains.
BI tested out DNT+ on various sites, finding social networks had the most trackers. The New York Times had 11 trackers: one for social networks, three for ad networks and seven for other companies.
By contrast, Facebook reported 154 trackers, all monitoring activity on other sites.
“For most of the networks and companies Abine identifies, the tool recommends that you block them,” the article states. “However, there are a few trackers that they suggest you allow. The reason, according to the company’s website, is that some trackers are identified as core technologies that are critical to how a site runs, such as playing videos or login functionality.”
Last week, we reported on ETCentric that the new lineup of Amazon Kindles would include advertisements that did not provide an opt out option for users.
Now the company has announced it will provide Kindle Fire HD customers with an option to purchase their way out of the ads for $15.
However, Business Insider suggests users may opt not to avoid the ads because they “won’t realize that they can turn off the ads, will be too lazy to turn off the ads, or, most likely, won’t want to turn off the ads.”
According to the post, “the ads look cool” and customers will most likely get used to them quickly and possibly find them helpful.
“But having the option to turn off the ads will silence everyone appalled by the idea that Amazon will shove ads down people’s throats while perfect Apple and Google won’t,” says Business Insider. “So it’s very much the right move.”
In an interview with AllThingsD, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos discusses the company’s eclectic business strategy that ranges from offering Web services to selling apparel.
“Our approach is, if we have a good idea, and if it’s something we think customers would care about, like AWS or Kindle Fire, then we don’t ask why do this, we ask why not do this?” says Bezos. “We have a high bar for doing those things. We don’t want to do me-too things. The people we’ve attracted over time to Amazon want to be pioneers. They want to be inventors. They want to do new things.”
Amazon has created its own approach to making a profit while offering cheap services and devices — an approach that Bezos admits doesn’t work for every company.
“In my view, you set up the business in a way that is aligned with the customer, or you can set it up in odds with the customer. When you have the option, you should figure out a way to be in alignment,” he explains, adding the make-money-up-front or make-it-up-on-the-backend approaches may work best for others.
Amazon has taken on expensive endeavors, like its Amazon Prime service and Kindle Owner’s Lending Library, both of which the company has spent millions to license while offering customers a low price.
“Despite what some have said from time to time, Amazon is a for-profit business,” says Bezos. “So, we looked at some numbers, and we believed that this would be a good program for customers and for Amazon — that’s the alignment I’m talking about.”
“These devices are not very useful unless they are connected to the Internet,” he notes, regarding wireless. “The whole point is to connect to the Internet, and that means Wi-Fi. Even for 4G, you want Wi-Fi.”
“This year, we wanted to build the best tablet at any price,” Bezos concludes. “Take away the price and it’s still the best tablet. It also happens to be only $499.”
New data from IHS iSuppli shows that cloud-based storage subscriptions are expected to pass the half billion mark this year, a sizable increase from the 300 million in 2011.
Next year, the growth is expected to remain high at 25 percent for a total of 625 million subscriptions. By 2017, IHS iSuppli expects 1.3 billion cloud-storage subscriptions.
Independent providers such as Dropbox have been strong players in the early cloud market, but powerful consumer technology and IT companies are now crowding in with new cloud services — Apple’s iCloud, Amazon’s CloudDrive, GoogleDrive and Microsoft SkyDrive, for example.
“The big question is how many of these consumers are using the freemium, as opposed to the paid, versions of these products,” notes GigaOM.
“Profitability is the tricky part. Ragdish Rebello, Ph.D., IHS’ director for consumer and communications, said these companies should realize — if they don’t already — that cloud services in and of themselves are not profitable so these vendors better be prepared to identify and provide value-added services that actually make money.”
LinkedIn announced it is adding Company Pages and a Facebook-style notification stream in its effort to increase user engagement.
“Launching today is our new notifications feature, which will keep you notified in real-time when someone likes what you’ve shared on LinkedIn, views your profile, accepts your invitation, and much more,” explains a September 5th blog post from Angela Yang, associate product manager at LinkedIn.
CNET reports that the notifications feature will take several weeks to go live to all members, “and push notifications for Android and iOS devices are also in the works.”
“LinkedIn is trying to graduate from a simple resumé-and-headhunting site into something big — Facebook big — in a sector where increased communication pays real dividends,” Ryan Tate writes in a related Wired article.
“LinkedIn’s ambitions are no doubt stoked by enthusiasm from Wall Street, which has bid up LinkedIn stock 36 percent since the company’s May 2011 IPO,” notes Tate. “Since Facebook went public in mid May, LinkedIn stock has climbed 14 percent, compared to a decline of 51 percent for Facebook shares.”
Facebook recently increased its automated efforts to remove “likes” that were generated from fraudulent accounts, according to a post on the company’s security blog.
Since Facebook often bills advertisers on a per click basis, Facebook’s own admission of fake likes will possibly cause an uproar in the advertising world.
“Facebook’s advertising system is built on the idea that consumers will be willing to build closer relationships with advertisers, ‘liking’ the advertiser’s pages, reading the advertiser’s status updates, and circulating content about the advertiser to friends,” explains Wired.
“If an advertiser’s popularity is exaggerated by fake ‘likes,’ it makes the business less trustworthy and less likely to be engaged by real consumers,” contends the article.
Facebook’s blog post references “vendors” of fake likes and the illegal practices of purchasing or selling Facebook likes. Facebook says businesses will only lose about 1 percent of their likes, but this could represent a huge loss for some of the most popular businesses on Facebook.
Facebook has almost seven times Twitter’s number of monthly users, sitting at one billion compared with Twitter’s 150 million. But Forbes contributor Eric Jackson argues that Twitter is now in fact a bigger company than Facebook because of mobile ads.
According to eMarketer figures, Twitter’s 2012 mobile ad revenue is $129.7 million, compared to Facebook’s $72.7 million. In the world of social media, mobile ad dollars mean everything.
“The stock market is obsessed with who will make money in the mobile space because the stock market — correctly — believes that all of us (or 90+ percent of us) will only access these services from mobile devices in a very short period,” writes Jackson.
Facebook is “really only a PC-based ad company,” he suggests, adding that Facebook’s Payments business has also struggled due to the rapid shift in mobile.
Admittedly, Facebook only began selling mobile ads in the second half of 2012 but Jackson counters, saying “Twitter’s mobile ad sales were likely also light in the first half of the year.”
“Maybe Facebook is going to ramp things up in the future,” concludes Jackson. “But given that they’re 7x as big as Twitter and to have their heads handed to them like this from the quirky little San Francisco company, it’s embarrassing.”
“Never mind the fact that nearly 40 percent of mobile ad clicks are either accidental or fraudulent — the folks from eMarketer say that mobile ad revenues in the U.S. will grow from $1.45 billion in 2011 to $6.62 billion in 2014,” reports GigaOM. “The New York-based research group projects that by 2016, the U.S. mobile advertising market will be close to $12 billion.”
The posts notes that Google (Android OS) dominates the mobile ad industry, while Pandora and Twitter also stand out.
“On a net basis, Pandora Media has emerged as one of the strongest U.S. mobile display-ad sellers, and its share of the total U.S. mobile display market is expected to reach 20.5 percent in 2012,” according to the eMarketer press release.
However, Om Malik argues that mobile ads in heavy rotation could eventually have a negative impact on the Pandora audience.
“While Twitter is beating Facebook as of now, it won’t be long before Facebook makes a comeback,” notes GigaOM. “Apple’s iAd continues to struggle” and is expected to steadily decline, according to eMarketer.
Projections from eMarketer suggest that by 2014, U.S. net mobile display ad revenue share will be comprised of: Facebook (20.5 percent), Google (17.6 percent), Pandora (16.3 percent), Twitter (14.5 percent), Millennial Media (5.3 percent), Apple iAd (4.8 percent) and Other (21.1 percent).
A recent Nielsen consumer survey found more adults reported using radio streaming service Pandora to listen to music than Apple’s iTunes.
“Apple has dominated the sale of song downloads since 2003 when it launched what was then the iTunes Music Store. It has since become the largest music retailer, physical or digital, in the world,” reports the Wall Street Journal. “But if services like Pandora and Spotify gain popularity, Apple could lose its edge.”
Apple is reportedly working on creating a custom-radio service, according to people familiar with the matter. The service would be available across all Apple products and possibly on Windows computers. It would not, however, work with devices using Google’s Android operating system.
“Apple is negotiating for its own licensing deals with record companies, these people said, because it wants to offer users a greater degree of interactivity than allowed by so-called compulsory licenses used by Pandora and other webcasters,” notes WSJ.
Pandora’s free, ad-supported service has yet to be profitable due to high royalty payments. Research firm eMarketer expects the company to earn $226.4 million in mobile ad revenue this year, but Pandora’s “content-acquisition costs for [Q2] increased 79 percent compared with the same quarter in 2011, far outstripping its revenue growth of 51 percent,” explains the article.
Apple’s service would also take the ad-supported approach with its iAd platform, a move that could make achieving profitability difficult. Competing music service Spotify instead relies on subscription fees for ad-free versions, and has noted that less than 15 percent of its revenue comes from ad sales.
Business Insider discusses the evolution of online video and its potential future impact on content creation and distribution. It cites video streaming providers like Netflix and Hulu, the emerging success of YouTube’s original channels and the influence of social media and crowd-funding site Kickstarter.
“So what’s this mean for online video?” asks the article. “Web series and their increasing popularity are extremely revealing when it comes to foreseeing the future of online video.”
“The emerging popularity of online video can most definitely be accredited to the obsession and dependence on social media present in our world today. Online videos are going ‘viral’ because of the accessibility of a simple click of a button to share with our ever-connecting networks.”
Cisco predicts that the number of people accessing video via the Web will nearly double over the next four years. However, advances in Internet TV and a surge in mobile subscribers will lead to fewer viewers using PCs to view content.
By 2016, Cisco expects mobile devices to generate dramatic growth in video traffic, while HD video streamed to Internet TVs will grow sixfold, and comprise 6 percent of all worldwide consumer Web traffic.
“Our smartphones and tablets are predicted to be responsible for an 18-fold growth in mobile video traffic between 2011 and 2016,” notes Business Insider. “Not to mention, the number of worldwide mobile users will reach 1.6 billion, sooner rather than later.”