In the wake of cloud storage offerings from HTC, Apple, Amazon, Walmart and most recently Google, LG has announced its new LG Cloud, which offers 5GB of free space and syncing between PCs, Smart TVs and Android phones.
It is expected that storage up to 50GB will be offered, although pricing has not been announced.
“To send a file to the LG Cloud you can use the website, a downloadable client for Windows computers, or via a dedicated Android application,” reports Digital Trends. “The app is free to download from the Android Market, but needs either Android 2.2, 2.3 or 4.0 installed. LG adds that an iPhone and iPad app is in the works, too.”
The PC client includes Folder Sync for duplicating files in the cloud to be shared with other devices. Auto syncing is also available with the Android app for use with photos taken by smartphones.
“Videos uploaded to the cloud can be streamed to your TV or phone, including HD, 2D and 3D content, and all files are converted on-the-fly to match your device,” indicates the post.
In one of the nation’s largest tablet deployments, the San Diego Unified School District is purchasing 25,700 iPads for use in 340 5th-8th grade classrooms plus some high school classes.
The district will spend $15 million on iPads and has already spent more than $35 million on netbooks. Administrators requested switching to the iPad because the devices have no boot up time, have a larger screen, longer battery life and can use a large array of educational apps.
Teachers will receive training in the use of the device and educational apps. The iPads will have access to the district cloud where they can access files from the netbooks and instructors’ tablets.
There are 1.5 million iPads already in use at schools across the country. Experts caution that teachers need to be prepared to incorporate the devices into their curriculum.
Numbers from media researcher IDC indicate that Samsung passed Apple during the first quarter to become the world’s largest smartphone manufacturer. Samsung shipped 42.4 million smartphones while Apple shipped 35.1 million.
However, “Cupertino retains another, far more lucrative title: Smartphone-market revenue leader,” reports AllThingsD. Data from Jupiter Research shows that Apple’s iPhone-based revenue was $22.7 billion, while Samsung’s revenue was $17 billion.
“So while Samsung may be winning on global smartphone shipments, Apple is winning on a more important metric: Smartphone profitability. And for a very simple reason: The company has the highest margins around,” suggests AllThingsD.
During the recent second-quarter earnings reports, Apple announced that its gross margin was 47.4 percent. Samsung’s gross margin was reportedly under 13 percent. “So, while Samsung is dominating smartphone shipments, Apple is dominating the smartphone industry’s pool of profits,” notes the article.
Flickr, Behance, Vimeo and YouTube will start using the Pinterest attribution tool, which Pinterest hopes will eliminate some of the copyright concerns associated with sharing content without proper attribution.
Content on those sites (that has been authorized for sharing by the user) will now have a “Pin it” button nearby. “On Flickr this is in a menu alongside Facebook, Twitter, email, Tumblr and WordPress,” details AllThingsD.
Once the item is pinned, it will automatically display an attribution statement including a permanent link that can’t be edited out as it’s repinned by other users.
“The tool was developed in conjunction with Flickr, which is interesting because the photo-hosting site had previously implemented code provided by Pinterest in order to block pinning of copyrighted images,” reports AllThingsD. “This is a separate project, said a spokeswoman for Pinterest.”
ESPN has incorporated Twitter’s Web Intents into their website offerings. Web Intents provide pop-ups for users to access Tweet, Reply, Retweet, Follow and Favorite functions.
“For each article ESPN shows a visitor, they have implemented a scrolling/following sidebar that contains its Twitter sharing widget,” reports the Twitter Developers site. “As a user scrolls through an article, the container follows the position on the page.”
“At any point, a user can click the Twitter bird logo to invoke a Tweet Intent to enable a customized sharing experience,” adds the site. “A Tweet box with text pre-loaded by the ESPN editorial staff pops up, enabling a user to quickly share the news with their followers.”
ESPN readers are generating some 1,250 Tweets per day amounting to 10 percent of all Tweets containing ESPN links. These Tweets resulted in an average of 15 clicks back to the website.
The sports site has also developed customized MLB and NFL widgets that highlight Twitter conversations from top writers and allow fans to interact with the writers directly on the page.
With only one-third of the world connected online, we are already experiencing a network explosion.
“According to Cisco, global IP traffic increased eightfold over the five years leading up to 2010 and will quadruple by 2015, hitting 966 exabytes (nearly one zettabyte) for the full year,” reports Ars Technica. “That will be the equivalent of all movies ever made crossing IP networks every four minutes.”
Video will account for more than 50 percent of consumer Internet traffic this year. By 2015, on-demand video traffic will be the equivalent of three billion DVDs per month, and one million minutes worth of video will cross global IP networks every second.
In business traffic, videoconferencing is growing faster than any other application.
Advances in network infrastructure including the upgrading of undersea cables, OpenFlow, dark fiber, and 400 Gigabit Ethernet all promise to accommodate growth over the next ten years.
According to The New York Times, Facebook is still on track for its expected mid-May I.P.O.
“Despite whispers of delays, the world’s largest social network is in the process of finalizing its prospectus with regulators and may begin its roadshow as soon as early next week,” reports the Times.
The “roadshow,” or presentation to investors, will likely span to New York, Boston, San Francisco, Chicago, Baltimore and possibly Los Angeles and will allow for Facebook’s chief financial officer David Ebersman to convince investors and analysts of Facebook’s worthiness. It’s unclear which meetings CEO Mark Zuckerberg will attend.
The initial public offering has the potential “to be the largest Internet I.P.O. on record, dwarfing the recent offerings of Zynga and Groupon, as well as Google’s debut in 2004.”
“While interest runs high, Facebook’s executives will have to outline a compelling picture for investors in the coming weeks, to justify a valuation of $100 billion or more and to offset lackluster first quarter earnings,” suggests the article. “In the first quarter, Facebook’s profits fell 12 percent to $205 million, amid mounting expenses.”
Netflix has been putting pressure on traditional pay TV, but networks like CBS, ABC and NBC haven’t been hit nearly as hard as kids’ TV networks.
“Bernstein Research used data from TiVo boxes to find out that, among households that use Netflix regularly, kids’ TV networks are losing out — Nickelodeon’s ratings declined 6 percent in streaming households despite seeing 2 percent growth elsewhere, and Teen Nick saw an even bigger 11 percent drop for Netflix users while increasing viewership 26 percent in non-streaming households,” The Verge reports.
One reason for this might be that adults are more likely to tune in for TV show premieres as they follow linear shows. Streaming services are more ideal for catching up on past seasons. For children, Netflix provides a more convenient means of accessing the content they like, when they want it.
“However, Bernstein also discovered that Netflix viewing made consumers much less likely to watch repeats of shows in off-net syndication, with the streaming group declining in off-net viewing by about 19 percent compared to 9.7 percent for non-streamers,” notes paidContent in a related article.
The Android OS is slowly encroaching on Apple’s tablet market share, which fell 6.8 percent in 2011.
One tablet has had much more success than others and accounts for much of Android’s growth. Amazon’s Kindle Fire now takes up more than half of the Android tablet market at 54.4 percent, followed by the Samsung Galaxy Tab and Motorola Zoom.
According to a new study from comScore, the Galaxy Tab saw a drop from 23.8 percent share in December to 15.4 percent today. The Zoom fell to 7 percent from 11.8 percent last year. The study did not include Barnes & Noble’s Nook, since comScore categorizes it as an e-reader, not a tablet.
Another study conducted by IDC found that Amazon likely sold 4.7 million Fires in Q4 — and the tablet remains the top-selling item on Amazon’s site — but is still dwarfed by the 15.4 million iPads that Apple sold in the same period.
Microsoft and Barnes & Noble announced they are creating a strategic partnership to compete with the likes of Amazon and Apple.
According to Engadget, the partnership “would come in the form of a new Barnes & Noble subsidiary that deals with all things Nook, in addition to its education business.”
“The partnership will accelerate the transition to e-reading, which is revolutionizing the way people consume, create, share and enjoy digital content,” suggests the press release.
Barnes & Noble will will hold on to 82.4 percent of the company while Microsoft will take hold of 17.6 percent.
The first item on the list is a Nook app for Microsoft’s Windows 8 phone. “Barnes & Noble’s Nook Study software would also benefit from a friendly boost on all that Windows hardware,” according to Engadget.
The New York Post reports that in order to access Hulu’s online content, the streaming service is planning to start requiring proof of a pay TV subscription.
As a part of the industry-wide “TV Everywhere” initiative, consumers will be able to access Pay TV content online, but they must first prove that they are paying subscribers of a cable or satellite TV operator.
“The Post suggested that Hulu’s Web traffic could be dragged down by the move towards authentication. It had 31 million unique users in March,” according to The Hollywood Reporter.
NBCUniversal is one of the Hulu owners. NBC Sports will require pay TV subscriptions in order to watch most of its upcoming online London Olympics coverage. NBC says it will offer 3,500 hours of streaming coverage.
In response to consumers who have been quick to embrace the tablet PC, there is a push to make the television experience more like the tablet experience. We’re seeing rapid development of apps from video providers, cable channels and broadcast networks.
“While still in its early stages, the idea has taken off among tech-loving consumers, and companies are trying to satisfy them,” reports The New York Times.
“Already, apps for Hulu Plus, Netflix and Wal-Mart’s Vudu streaming service, among others, are built into Internet-enabled televisions,” explains the article. “Devices like Microsoft’s Xbox 360 and the streaming video player Roku let viewers watch apps that mimic channels. New sets by Samsung and others come with built-in apps loaded with television shows, movies and sports.”
However, how these apps will impact the TV experience is not yet known.
“The question that hasn’t yet been answered is whether television viewing will consist of a single app that mimics the pay TV bundle or a series of different apps that together form a content experience,” suggests Jon Miller, chief digital officer at News Corp.
“A model built around TV apps, however, could let viewers use favorite apps on the screen on an á la carte basis, thus bypassing cable subscriptions and all the extraneous channels they don’t watch,” adds the article. “And therein lies the tension that has the television industry delicately assessing how to balance the current system with an Internet-based future that some feel is inevitable.”
Regardless, development of TV apps is expected to increase. “I’ve told my bosses, ‘This is beachfront real estate. Buy in now,’” says Lisa Hsia, executive VP of digital media at NBCUniversal’s Bravo channel.
The mobile industry is set to take in more than $1.5 trillion in revenues in 2012, according to research from analyst Chetan Sharma. Of that $1.5 trillion, 28 percent will be attributable to mobile data, the study indicates.
“He notes that within the revenues expected for mobile data, non-messaging revenues led by apps, mobile Web browsing and streaming media have finally overtaken those of traditional messaging like SMS as smartphone usage continues to grow,” according to TechCrunch.
He says that “non-messaging” will account for 53 percent of the total, meaning about $212 billion of that total revenue will come from apps, music and video streaming, games and mobile Web browsing.
The report also details that the U.S. now accounts for 69 percent of all smartphone sales, “the highest rate with the global average at about half that, 32 percent,” details the post.
TechCrunch also notes that “the total worldwide base of mobile subscribers now stands at 6 billion, and while it took 20 years to reach the first billion, the speed at which this has accelerated is pretty remarkable: Sharma notes that it took only 15 months for that number to go from 5 billion to 6 billion.”
Hollywood studios are reportedly concerned that Google’s development of a super-high-speed Internet service in Kansas City may encourage users to illegally download content.
Google has strung more than 100 miles of cable in Kansas and Missouri with plans to connect homes in the next few months. Meanwhile, its test network in Palo Alto has been providing download speeds of 922Mbps and upload speeds of 883Mbps.
“The search giant has said it hopes to spur innovation among cable companies and Internet service providers by demonstrating what’s possible with Internet speeds 100 times faster than the U.S. average,” reports Businessweek. “The project could also foreshadow dramatic changes for Hollywood, both because of the specter of piracy and Google’s possible experiments with new ways to distribute content legally.”
“Google Fiber will definitely be a disruptive force. The studios know that if we stick our heads in the sand, we will fail, pure and simple,” said Mitch Singer, chief digital strategy officer for Sony Pictures Entertainment.
Consumers are increasingly turning to mobile devices to watch video, which is creating opportunities for content providers.
However, fear of forfeiting retransmission fees or running into copyright problems has prevented most local TV stations from leveraging the technology.
As a result, companies such as FilmOn, Ivi and Aereo have emerged, causing TV networks to seek legal action.
“That doesn’t mean broadcasters are ignoring the demand for their content on mobile; they’re just taking another route,” reports Variety. “The solution is much more of a technical feat: Delivery of dedicated mobile TV signals to portable devices specially equipped with receivers. That includes news, sports, traffic, weather and emergency alerts. Some 120 stations are transmitting mobile digital TV signals, according to the Open Mobile Video Coalition.”
Aereo believes its streaming of New York stations via thumbnail-sized antennas for capturing broadcast signals is a legal option, but the issue of violating copyright law has been raised. In Portland, Skitter is streaming channels to Roku boxes, “with an eye to offering them via mobile apps,” indicates the article. “Skitter is believed to be on more solid footing because it has obtained retrans licenses from broadcasters to stream their signals.”