Exclusive: Facebook, Google mull Skype deals

 

NEW YORK  - Facebook and Google Inc are separately considering a tie-up with Skype after the Web video conferencing service delayed its initial public offering, two sources with direct knowledge of the discussions told Reuters .
Facebook Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg has taken part in internal discussions about buying Skype, according to one of the sources. Another source said Facebook had reached out to the Luxembourg-based company about forming a joint venture.

Facebook gets big slice of online display ad pie

 

Facebook served up nearly a third of the 1.11 trillion display ads delivered to US Internet users in the first three months of this year, industry tracker comScore said on Wednesday.
Facebook was the stage for 346 billion "impressions," or views, of display ads in a near doubling of the number seen in the same quarter a year earlier, according to comScore.
"The US online display advertising market maintained its strong momentum from last year with a terrific first quarter," said comScore executive vice president Jeff Hackett.
"We are now seeing more than one trillion display ads delivered every single quarter and nearly 300 individual advertisers spending at least $1 million a quarter on display."
Facebook.com was the top spot for online display ads, with its share growing to 31.2 percent of the market from 16.2 in the same quarter last year, according to comScore.
Yahoo! websites ranked second with 112 billion impressions, followed by Microsoft, AOL, and Google in that order. Google still dominated in the lucrative market for texts ads posted with search results.

Facebook gets big slice of online display ad pie

 

Facebook served up nearly a third of the 1.11 trillion display ads delivered to US Internet users in the first three months of this year, industry tracker comScore said on Wednesday.
Facebook was the stage for 346 billion "impressions," or views, of display ads in a near doubling of the number seen in the same quarter a year earlier, according to comScore.
"The US online display advertising market maintained its strong momentum from last year with a terrific first quarter," said comScore executive vice president Jeff Hackett.
"We are now seeing more than one trillion display ads delivered every single quarter and nearly 300 individual advertisers spending at least $1 million a quarter on display."
Facebook.com was the top spot for online display ads, with its share growing to 31.2 percent of the market from 16.2 in the same quarter last year, according to comScore.
Yahoo! websites ranked second with 112 billion impressions, followed by Microsoft, AOL, and Google in that order. Google still dominated in the lucrative market for texts ads posted with search results.

Facebook sued for children 'liking' products

 

A father is suing Facebook for not getting permission from parents or guardians before letting members of the online social network know when children "Like" brands.
"We believe this suit is completely without merit and we will fight it vigorously," Facebook said in an email response to an AFP inquiry.
Lawyers representing Scott Nastro and his son in a US district court in New York want the case to include all Facebook members in the state younger than 18 years old whose names or likenesses have been used in "Social Ads."

Android app store will beat Apple's by August 2011

According to latest reports, the Android app store will overtake the Apple app store by August 2011, provided the current growth rate is maintained. In April 2011, the Android market place added 28,000 apps to its app store as opposed to Apple's 11,000 apps.

There's no doubt that Google's Android OS is the new popular kid on the block and is the only one giving the iOS a run for its money. Not only has it brought to notice the potential of mobile OS, but has also helped elevate some great mobile handsets made HTC, Samsung, Motorola and Sony Ericsson from their struggle against the iPhone.

Sony's PlayStation Network to resume soon

The nightmare is almost over for Sony. While exact dates have not been released, the PlayStation Network gaming service will resume soon, after it was hacked and important information lost. The company said, in a blog post, "Today our global network and security teams at Sony Network Entertainment and Sony Computer Entertainment began the final stages of internal testing of the new system, an important step towards restoring PlayStation Network and Qriocity services."

In a separate post, Sony Chief Howard Stringer said, "In the coming days, we will restore service to the networks and welcome you back to the fun." Sony took the services offline on April 20th 2011 when they learned that their security had been breached.

Sony shares fall sharply on data breach

Sony shares dived Friday as investors tried to gauge the damage from cyber attacks on the Japanese entertainment and technology giant's online networks that have compromised millions of users.

Chief Executive Howard Stringer apologised in a blog post late Thursday for the massive data breach in his first public remarks on the attack, but uncertainty over the cost of the assault prompted investors to sell.

The electronics giant firm was 2.80 percent down by noon in Tokyo trade Friday, after earlier plunging 4.1 percent as Japanese markets reopened following the Golden Week holiday.
 

Nintendo Wii keeps idle people fit

Nintendo Wii, a popular fitness game console, could get inactive or overweight people back into the exercise regime.

A study on Nintendo Wii Fit found that participants, the majority being women, showed significant reduction in body mass and fat deposition around the abdominal area and improved strength, balance and walking fitness.

Queensland University of Technology (QUT) research associate Harvey May said the group of women felt more motivated to exercise after the two-week fitness regime. They reported feeling better about their body image, despite previously being sedentary for long periods.

Chinese tech giants fight over 4G phones

Two of China's biggest technology companies have launched a court battle in Europe over mobile phone patents in a rare public clash between firms Beijing is promoting as national champions.

The fight between Huawei Technologies Ltd. and ZTE Corp. highlights the challenge for communist leaders who need to manage Chinese corporate ambitions as they try to create global competitors in telecoms, energy and other fields. It is the first case of its kind between major Chinese companies, which usually settle disputes in private.

US database documents Nazi theft of Jewish goods

The US National Archives on Thursday launched an international database of Nazi-era documents that officials said will make it easier to recover plundered Jewish artifacts.

The International Research Portal for Records Related to Nazi-Era Cultural Property will work with the National Archives of the United Kingdom, the Federal Archives of Germany, the State Archives of Belgium, the Commission for Looted Art in Europe, and various other groups to display millions of pages of detailed images.

Mark Zuckerberg becomes a home owner: report

A local newspaper on Thursday reported that Facebook co-founder Mark Zuckerberg is giving up life as a renter for a posh house a short drive from the social network's new Silicon Valley campus.

The Bay Area News Group reported that Zuckerberg bought a home in Palo Alto, the northern California city he has lived in since dropping out of Harvard University to devote himself to Facebook after it launched in early 2004.

Public records indicate that Zuckerberg, who will be 27 years old on May 14, paid $7 million for a home boasting a saltwater pool, a music alcove, and five bedrooms, according to the newspaper group.

New installment of "Assassin's Creed" on its way

Ubisoft on Thursday revealed that the latest installment of its beloved series of "Assassin's Creed" videogames will be released in November.

The French videogame powerhouse promised a glimpse at "Assassin's Creed Revelations" at a premier Electronic Entertainment Expo in early June in Los Angeles.

"Revelations" will be the fourth videogame in a series that has sold more than 28 million copies overall since the first title was released in 2007.

Anonymous denies involvement in Sony data theft

Internet vigilante group Anonymous denied involvement on Thursday in the theft of personal information from over 100 million Sony PlayStation and Online Entertainment network accounts.

"We are trying to fight criminal activities by corporations and governments, not steal credit cards," Anonymous said in a statement published on a Facebook page used by the loose-knit "hacktivist" group.

"Anonymous has never been known to have engaged in credit card theft," the statement said. "If a legitimate and honest investigation into the credit card theft is conducted, Anonymous will not be found liable."

CCAvenue denies hacking attack

Online commerce service provider, CCAvenue, has denied that its portal has been hacked.

Vishwas Patel, CEO,  CCAvenue told NDTVGadgets, "I confirm that the image posted by a hacker is a spoofed, self-created one and not that of our database and it has been created just to create panic and defame our company. We are in the process of filing a criminal complaint against the unknown hacker for the slander and malicious campaign run against our company."

Earlier today, we reported that a hacker claimed to have broken into CCAvenue by exploiting "SQL injection vulnerability".  The hacker, identifying himself as d3hydr8, submitted what he called a full disclosure of his attack on HackerRegiment.com. The "report" included what the hacker said were all the admin usernames and passwords of the CCAvenue portal.

In what was his first reaction on this,  Vishwas Patel said, "First and most [we] would like to say that this a slanderous campaign that is targeting CCAvenue. Based on our initial investigations by our security officials, we confirm that no hack has happened of our servers at 1515 hours on 04th May 2011 by the following person, as claimed in his article. We also confirm that  that the screenshot is not of our live database as the Apache version on live server is 2.2.17 (Updated more than 5 months ago) and not 2.2.14 (as claimed by the hacker). We also confirm that all the passwords of our merchants and all login credentials in our live database are encrypted and stored in our database and not in text format as claimed by the hacker."

He also assured that, "We don't store credit card details or Netbanking account details on our servers."

HackerRegiment has published the details submitted by the hacker but has maintained discretion by blurring the "passwords". The information published includes a list of databases, some information on tables within the databases, and screenshots of the administrator usernames and passwords.

HackerRegiment.com also claims to have reported the issue to CERT (Computer Emergency Response Team) India to help CCAvenue take corrective action before any information is released through any other media.

Motorola DROID X to get its Gingerbread update on May 13th?

The Motorola DROID X2 is expected to launch May 12th as we reported yesterday. As a result, Verizon reps have been told to push the original Motorola DROID X out the door in order to clear inventory for the sequel. One rumor that might help in this quest is the speculation that the latter device will be receiving an OTA upgrade to Android 2.3.3 on May 13th.

Motorola is said to be waiting for Big Red to sign off on the latest Gingerbread build for the carrier's former flagship model and the final version is said to be more recent than a previously leaked build numbered 4.5.591. It is hoped that Verizon will be signing off on the upgrade today with a release coming next Friday.

Verizon might have to cut the price of the Motorola DROID X before the sequel is launched. If you have been stalking the phone waiting for the best time to buy, you might get an opportunity sometime within the next week.

source: DroidLife

Android app allows Hit and Run victim to capture accident on his phone

DailyRoads Voyager is a free app in the Android Market that turns your phone into a little black box for your car. Strategically placed on the dashboard, your phone will continuously record your journey while you drive. While everything is recorded, you decide which part of your trip is kept on your phone by tapping the screen-even while you drive. Images are also retained when the app feels the sudden shock caused by the impact of an accident.

And that brings us to the victim of a minor hit and run accident. Nic Bender might have been called obsessive for placing his Motorola DROID into a dashboard mounted holder everytime he got into his car. But just the other day, Bender's car was clipped on the passenger side by another vehicle whose driver just kept on going. Thanks to DailyRoads Voyager, Bender was able to pass along a video of the accident to the police who are still looking for the driver of the other car. While the "perp" has yet to be found, the cops are being aided in their investigation by Bender's video.

DailyRoads Voyager will work on Android models running 1.5 or higher which covers just about every unit in use today. And while your phone is recording every second of your trip every time you get in the car, the app also will keep you from texting while driving which alone is worth installing the app for.

source: WBIR via Phandroid