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Third Time is the Charm: Facebook Recruits Apple Employees to Build Phone

By
May 29, 2012
  • “This past week, Google completed its acquisition of the hardware maker Motorola Mobility for $12.5 billion, which could lead to the search giant making its own smartphone,” reports The New York Times. “But another software titan might be getting into the hardware game as well: Facebook.”
  • The article cites anonymous Facebook employees, engineers and individuals briefed on the company’s plans in suggesting that Facebook hopes to launch a phone by next year. This would be Facebook’s third effort to manufacture its own phone.
  • According to NYT: “The company has already hired more than half a dozen former Apple software and hardware engineers who worked on the iPhone, and one who worked on the iPad, the employees and those briefed on the plans said.”
  • The article suggests Facebook is motivated by its recent decision to go public, and that “as a newly public company, it must find new sources of revenue.” However, critics note the difficulty in mixing software and hardware knowledge as one reason Facebook’s phone aspirations may fail.
  • If Facebook’s phone plans fall apart, it could consider using some of the $16 billion it raised during its recent IPO to acquire an established smartphone maker such as Research in Motion or HTC.
  • Facebook’s phone is speculated to challenge Google in the market of lower-priced smartphones rather than taking on Apple. Since both Google and Facebook specialize in acquiring advertising revenue, they can subsidize their phones’ costs by displaying ads on the smartphone screens.

Will Opera Acquisition be Next Step for Facebook Mobile Experience?

By
May 29, 2012
  • Geek.com reports that Facebook may consider using some of its $16 billion IPO earnings to acquire companies, with Opera representing a potential target.
  • Opera is an attractive prospect because it already owns 4th Screen Advertising and Mobile Theory. Facebook could capitalize on these mobile advertising resources, as Mobile Theory brings in billions of ad impressions per month and 4th Screen counts sites including MTV and IMDb as clients.
  • Opera’s Turbo system, which compresses Web pages, could allow Facebook to “serve up a faster, more efficient mobile experience to users,” notes the post.
  • Additionally, Opera could be used by the social network to gather analytics about millions of Web users, even if they do not log on to Facebook.com. This would allow them to better tailor their advertising.
  • “Data and advertising income for Facebook and a potentially massive boost to Opera’s user base. Sounds like a win-win situation, at least from a business standpoint,” comments Geek.com.

Will Instagram Play a Role in Rumored Facebook Smartphone Venture?

By
May 29, 2012
  • According to comScore, Instagram’s traffic increased by an impressive 78 percent between March and April.
  • Digital Trends credits the release of a new Android app and the $1 billion acquisition by Facebook.
  • The question remains: What are Facebook’s plans for Instagram, especially following the announcement of competitor Facebook Camera?
  • “It’s entirely plausible that while Facebook is slowly developing its mobile experience for users with new Facebook branded apps and increasing its brand presence on mobile phones, the company is slowly preparing for its first horizontal integration via the rumored Facebook phone,” notes Digital Trends.
  • “After Facebook has comfortably developed and grown its core suite of Facebook mobile applications, while at the same time maintaining acquisitions including Instagram, we could expect these apps to be ported over to the Facebook phone, and displayed as Facebook’s native applications,” adds the post. “Thanks to Instagram that could mean the potential for 50 million Facebook phone owners.”

Mobile Devices Account for One-Fifth of Web Traffic in North America

By
May 28, 2012
  • A new study from online advertising network Chitika reports that 20 percent of Web traffic in the United States and Canada comes through smartphones and tablets.
  • The study suggests that mobile usage is highest in the evening. “That’s when people leave their computers for a bit and pretend to have a real life, while nonetheless staring at their phones or sitting on the couch watching TV and simultaneously pawing an iPad,” according to Ina Fried of AllThingsD.
  • Apple dominates the tablet market, and the iPad generates 95 percent of tablet traffic. iPhones are also successful, generating 72 percent of smartphone traffic, while 26 percent comes from Android devices.
  • “Windows Phone now accounts for a third as much traffic as BlackBerry devices,” notes the article. “Undoubtedly its market share is far less than that, but its more powerful browser and larger screen likely make it more conducive to Web surfing.”
  • The Chitika numbers also indicate that more than 85 percent of traffic comes from Windows machines, while Macs only account for slightly more than 13 percent.

Steve Ballmer Expects to See Windows 8 on 500 Million Computers

By
May 28, 2012
  • Computers pre-installed with Windows 8 will be available sometime this fall. Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer says that the software will be running on half a billion computers worldwide.
  • “That’s quite a lofty goal. Microsoft sold around 240 million copies of Windows 7 in its first year of availability,” reports Geek.com. “Is doubling up on that number realistic considering that Windows 7 was the fastest-selling OS ever?”
  • Microsoft hopes that its new Windows 8 will flourish on its new tablet devices.
  • “But if Microsoft can convince a decent number of users to upgrade to Windows 8, drive solid 2012 holiday sales, get around 80 percent of new desktops and laptops running it (as they did with Windows 7), and grab a good chunk of the 180-plus million tablets expected to sell in 2013, then 500 million devices might not be as far fetched as it first sounds,” explains the post.

Is a Generational Shift to Social Video Poised to Take On YouTube?

By
May 28, 2012
  • People spent 10 percent less time watching YouTube videos last quarter while spending 52 percent more time watching videos from mobile video apps, according to mobile advertising and analytics platform provider Flurry.
  • These numbers demonstrate people are spending less time watching online video and more time creating and sharing their own content. Social video apps such as Viddy and SocialCam make it easy to capture and upload video to share with friends and the world.
  • This represents a generational shift away from websites and PCs towards mobile devices that may eventually lead to “the downfall of companies as powerful as Google and Facebook,” suggests Eric Jackson, founder and managing member of Ironfire Capital.
  • “While older companies struggle to reinvent their legacies, Viddy, SocialCam and other startups remain focused on the technology people are quickly moving to today — in this case, mobile devices,” reports ReadWriteWeb. “This razor-sharp focus has led to Viddy and SocialCam amassing more than 60 million users. Meanwhile, the previous generation is reaching for the oxygen mask to try to keep up.”

Social TV: Will Hate Watching Prove that All Publicity is Good Publicity?

By
May 28, 2012
  • “Watching spectacularly bad TV shows for the sheer pleasure of mocking them with your friends is not new — remember ‘Mystery Science Theater 3000’ mocking bad movies? — but the advent of social media may have turned it into a sport for a small group of TV viewers,” reports Lost Remote.
  • “Now there’s a term for it, ‘hate watching’ and the occasional #hatewatching hashtag, to boot,” notes the post.
  • The term was popularized in a New Yorker column by Emily Nussbaum, titled “Hate-watching Smash.”
  • While “hate watching” is easier than ever because of social media, it’s certainly not new. For example, weekly emails dating back to the early 1990s dissected shows such as “Melrose Place.”
  • “Negative social buzz may not be a good thing, but ‘hate watching’ is an entertaining activity — driven by short Twitter wit — and by extension it could drive a little viewership on its own under the umbrella, ‘all publicity is good publicity,'” suggests the post.

Union Square Partner Urges Content Owners Not to Fear the Future

By
May 28, 2012
  • Speaking at the paidContent 2012 conference in New York last week, Fred Wilson of Union Square Ventures said the battle between content owners and tech firms could be avoided if media companies would adapt to digital distribution in order to keep the revenue flowing.
  • “I think those (traditional media) industries will survive and thrive, they just need to move from a fairly monopolistic distribution system to a wide open distribution system,” he said.
  • Wilson cited innovations such as radio, the VCR, and iTunes as historical examples of technologies that provided new revenue, while he suggests that music subscription services will also be successful.
  • “In a perfect world, Wilson said he’d like to see a system similar to a DNS registry in which content owners would register their content and make it available with rules in exchange for copyright enforcement,” reports paidContent. “That’s the fair compensation for society already enforcing the rights of copyright holders, he said.”
  • Has Wilson invested in companies that would make content registries a viable business approach?

Detailing the Key Takeaways from the paidContent 2012 Conference

By
May 28, 2012
  • Industry leaders gathered in New York City last week to discuss opportunities and strategies involving digital media at the paidContent 2012 conference.
  • According to paidContent, the following are the five key takeaways from the day:
  • 1) “Data helps destroy containers, and that’s a good thing. Data creates new content and information experiences and helps bring an end to the notion of content silos.”
  • 2) “Digital storytelling is a native art. Stories on the Internet are not a new form of magazine or newspaper stories, but a medium in their own right — just like radio or TV. Publishers should develop their platforms accordingly rather than just repurposing other print vehicles.”
  • 3) “Not all ‘media’ are created equal. Union Square’s Fred Wilson and Betaworks’ John Borthwick gave a rude awakening to Big Media executives, urging them to give up control of their content — and even to stop calling it ‘content.'”
  • 4) “Publishers have to sell their brands directly to consumers.”
  • 5) “It’s time to toss CPM as a yardstick for online advertising success… it’s time for advertisers to adapt their ads to the evolving nature of the Internet itself. That means forgetting about CPMs and focusing on data and social dynamics. On a broader level, it means re-imagining basic precepts of advertising and product discovery in a world where Web pages are being eclipsed by new types of online discovery and interaction.”
  • It’s worth noting that proposed projects being developed by the ETC will address the first 3 of these 5 bullets.

BitTorrent Traffic Surges in Asia and Europe, Sharply Declines in U.S.

By
May 28, 2012
  • BitTorrent’s share of U.S. Internet traffic has declined significantly, especially compared to Europe and Asia. A recent report attributes the difference to the availability of legal alternatives.
  • In the U.S. BitTorrent now accounts for only 11.3 percent of peak Internet traffic. Last year, it represented 17.3 percent.
  • By comparison, in Europe BitTorrent and eDonkey make up almost 30 percent of traffic. In Asia, it accounts for 27 percent and other P2P services add 11 percent more.
  • “The MPAA is slowly starting to realize that consumers are not all out to steal content, they simply want to consume,” reports TorrentFreak.
  • “I believe it’s critical to find solutions to the challenges facing both these consumers and the people who create the content. Because at the end of the day, this discussion is about consumers and by consumers who love TV shows and movies. They want to be able to access them quickly and safely online,” wrote Marc Miller on the MPAA blog.
  • “The challenge for the entertainment industry in the years to come is not to invent ways to stop piracy but to make it less attractive, by ensuring that consumers get timely access to the content they want independent of their location, and on demand,” suggests TorrentFreak.

Microsoft Leads the Pack in Requests to Remove URLs from Google

By
May 28, 2012
  • Google reports that it received 1.13 million requests in the past month to remove URLs for allegedly infringing copyrights.
  • “Who complains loudest about Google linking to infringing content in its search results?” asks Ars Technica. “The movie and music industries, of course, who absolutely delight in taking whacks at the search engine. But thanks to a huge new trove of data released today by Google, we know that the worldwide top takedown requestor — by far — is actually Microsoft.”
  • Top copyright owners making requests include Microsoft, NBCUniversal and RIAA member labels. Top targeted domains included filestube.com, torrentz.eu and 4shared.com.
  • Google says it removes 97 percent of requested links.
  • “We recently rejected two requests from an organization representing a major entertainment company, asking us to remove a search result that linked to a major newspaper’s review of a TV show. The requests mistakenly claimed copyright violations of the show, even though there was no infringing content,” explains Fred von Lohmann, Google’s senior copyright counsel.

Google Set to Take On Amazon and Samsung with 7-inch Tablet

By
May 25, 2012
  • Google is expected to release its long-awaited Asus manufactured 7-inch tablet in June, with the initial 600,000 units hitting shelves by July.
  • Although details have yet to be officially released, speculation suggests the device will run on Android 4.0 with a quad-core chip, reports CNET.
  • According to a report from DigiTimes, it’s predicted that around two million units will be produced in 2012.
  • “If Google’s 7-inch tablet materializes and a rumored tablet 7.85-inch ‘iPad Mini’ from Apple also surfaces, that would add to a growing collection of smaller tablets from first-tier suppliers,” notes CNET.
  • Google and Apple could both be headed into the small tablet market currently dominated by Amazon and Samsung with the Kindle Fire and the Galaxy Tab 2.

Amazon Expands Video Library with Never Before on DVD Store

By
May 25, 2012
  • Amazon announced this week that it will expand its video offerings with the new “Never Before on DVD” store that features on-demand content.
  • “Amazon says that 2,000 titles are available, and some of that same content should also be available to stream on Amazon’s Instant Video service,” reports The Verge. “Most of the content appears to be not-so-popular TV series and some classic movies, but we’re sure that you could find some gems hidden in there.”
  • Amazon has also struck a deal with Paramount Pictures to offer hundreds of movies on its Prime Instant Video service (which costs $79 a year).
  • “The agreement is good for the next three years, though the window for when new movies will become available on the service looks like it will be fairly long, if the titles Amazon has namechecked are any indication,” notes the post.
  • Amazon says it now has an estimated 17,000 titles available for its customers.

Personalized Video News: NewsLook Announces Free iPad App

By
May 25, 2012
  • Streaming video news service NewsLook has launched a free iPad app that allows users to create personalized video channels that feature curated news content from more than 50 worldwide sources.
  • “Our NewsLook iPad app offers unprecedented personalization and engages users by greatly streamlining video search and discovery, enabling them to weed out unrelated content and get just what they want, from trustworthy sources,” said Fred Silverman, former CBS producer and current CEO of NewsLook.
  • According to the press release, sources include the Associated Press, Bloomberg, and Reuters — and users can customize channels based on interests such as “sports, politics, lifestyle, fashion, art, and entertainment.”
  • “NewsLook curates and publishes 150 videos daily in real-time and maintains a vast archive of over forty thousand videos,” notes the release. “This content is also available across a variety of platforms like Sony BIV and Google TV as well as via seamless syndication.”

Intel Launches Research to Offer Smart Devices that Mimic Your Brain

By
May 25, 2012
  • The Intel Collaborative Research Institute for Computational Intelligence has begun research intended to develop technology that will not only mimic the human brain, but will be able to use information to learn about its user.
  • “Machine learning is such a huge opportunity,” says Justin Rattner, Intel’s chief technology officer. “Despite their name, smartphones are rather dumb devices. My smartphone doesn’t know anything more about me than when I got it.”
  • Rattner leads the Intel research in conjunction with the Technion in Haifa and the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, “aimed at enabling new applications, such as small, wearable computers that can enhance daily life,” reports Reuters.
  • “All of these devices will come to know us as individuals, will very much tailor themselves to us,” says Rattner, who suggests that the devices, which continually record actions of the user, are expected to be available by 2014 or 2015.
  • “Within five years all of the human senses will be in computers and in 10 years we will have more transistors in one chip than neurons in the human brain,” adds Moody Eden, president of Intel Israel.

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