February 23, 2012

Posts Comments

You are here: Home / Technology

Facebook unveils $5bn stock market flotation plans

February 2, 2012 By Leave a Comment
a2f186c536006b7e6d5f5a0fda9eda92

(Phatfrums News / BBC News) --- The world's largest social networking site, Facebook, has announced plans for a stock market flotation. Facebook said it would seek to raise $5bn (£3.16bn, 3.8bn euros), about half the amount many analysts expected. But the initial public offering (IPO) is still expected to be the biggest sale of shares by an internet company. Facebook, just eight years old and started by Harvard University students, now has 845 million users and made a profit of $1bn last year. Facebook filed its intention to float with the Securities and Exchange Commission after the US stock markets closed. “Start Quote For Facebook the issue is whether its turnover will continue to rise at an exponentially fast rate - basically whether it can generate ever growing revenues from its 845m monthly active users.” Robert Peston Business editor, BBC News Facebook and Glenstrata: Which is bubblier? The documents revealed for the first time information about the company that had previously been the subject of speculation. This included news that Facebook's net income in 2011 rose 65% to $1bn, off revenues of $3.71bn. It was disclosed that founder Mark Zuckerberg owns 28.4% of Facebook and has more than 50% of voting rights. It also revealed that the network now has 845 million monthly users of which 443 million are daily users. A letter from Mr Zuckerberg said: "Facebook was not originally created to be a company. It was built to accomplish a social mission - to make the world more open and connected. "We think it's important that everyone who invests in Facebook understands what this mission means to us, how we make decisions and why we do the things we do." Mega flotations Google: raises $1.67bn for 7% of the company in 2004 Rosneft: raises $10.4bn for 15% of the company in 2006 Visa: raises $19.1bn for 50% of the company in 2008 Agricultural Bank of China: raises $22.1bn in 2010 making it the world's largest IPO to date The $5bn being raised would be the most for an internet initial public offering since Google and its early backers raised $1.67bn in 2004. "The company is a lot more profitable than we thought," said Kathleen Smith, principal of IPO investment advisory firm Renaissance Capital. She said Facebook's numbers were "very impressive," but she added that Facebook needed to talk more about where it saw its growth coming from. "What new areas of business is it expecting to pursue beyond display ads?" she said. The final amount Facebook will raise is likely to change as Facebook's bankers gauge the investor demand for the shares over the coming months. The story of the company was made the subject of a 2010 Hollywood film, The Social Network, and the firm has made the verb "to friend" a part of everyday language. Valuation justified Reports have suggested the company could be worth $100bn, roughly the same as US giants Amazon and McDonald's. Facebook … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Business, Technology Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Wikipedia, Reddit plan blackout in SOPA protest

January 17, 2012 By Leave a Comment
94601a4ade02241aaf05ece911e17a2f

NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- A handful of large websites will go dark on Wednesday to protest an anti-piracy bill that critics say will wreck the Internet as we know it. Wikipedia, user-submitted news site Reddit, the blog Boing Boing and the Cheezburger network of comedy sites all plan to participate in the blackout. The protest is their response to the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) bill, a piece of proposed legislation that is working its way through Congress. Introduced in the House of Representatives in late October, the bill aims to crack down on copyright infringement by restricting access to sites that fuel it. Its targets include "rogue" overseas sites like torrent hub The Pirate Bay, which essentially operates as a trading ground for illegal downloads of movies and other digital content. A similar bill called the Protect IP Act was approved by a Senate committee in May and is now pending before the full Senate. The controversial legislation has turned into an all-out war between Hollywood and Silicon Valley. Media companies have united in favor of it, while tech's power players are throwing their might into opposing it. If SOPA passes, copyright holders would be able to complain to law enforcement officials and get websites shut down. Search engines and other providers would have to block rogue sites when ordered to do so by a judge. Sites could be punished for hosting pirated content in the first place -- and Internet companies are worried that they could be held liable for users' actions. As BoingBoing wrote: "Making one link would require checking millions (even tens of millions) of pages, just to be sure that we weren't in some way impinging on the ability of five Hollywood studios, four multinational record labels, and six global publishers to maximize their profits." White House jumps in: The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform was supposed to hold a hearing with industry experts on Wednesday, which is why sites targeted that day for a blackout. But Rep. Darrell Issa, a Republican from California who opposes SOPA, postponed the hearing on Friday after House Majority Leader Eric Cantor said the bill won't move in its current form. Cantor's comments sparked some news reports claiming that SOPA is dead, but an aide in Issa's office said "that's probably a little premature." Reddit founder Alexis Ohanian was slated to testify in Washington, but he said he will now instead attend a protest rally in New York City organized by the group NY Tech Meetup. They plan to assemble outside the offices of New York senators Chuck Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand. The White House released its first statement about the bill on Saturday. The Obama administration wrote that it would not support legislation that mandates "tamper[ing] with the technical architecture of the Internet through manipulation of the Domain Name System (DNS)." As originally written, SOPA would have required Internet access providers and … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Featured, Technology Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Google looks ahead as it buys up more IBM patents

January 4, 2012 By Leave a Comment
2f4ae486b759e3a8eede03eda0d91ce3

(Phatforums News / BBC Business) --- Google has gained hundreds of patents from IBM as it continues its intellectual property spending spree. It has acquired 187 patents and 36 applications, adding to the 1,000 it purchased from IBM last summer. The latest patents include a system for "using semantic networks to develop a social network". Google has spent billions building its technology rights portfolio, including a $12.5bn (£7.7bn) deal for Motorola Mobility. The California-based company has been actively bolstering its patent catalog in the face of lawsuits from key competitors such as Apple and Microsoft. Among the patents acquired in this latest deal is US Patent 7,865,592 which relates specifically to social networking sites, allowing "identifying common interests between users of a communication network". Vicki Salmon, the chair of the litigation committee of the UK Chartered Institute of Patent Attorneys, believed this might be a nod that Google was moving from protecting existing technology and beginning to plan for the future. "When you start you have to play catch-up," she told the BBC. "When you've finished playing catch-up and you've got yourself in a stronger position, you then can begin to look forward." Other patents included a method for using web-based applications across additional devices, and an intriguingly titled computer phone. Neither Google nor IBM would comment on the deal when approached by the BBC. 'Get real' Last year, Google accused its competitors of buying up what it called "bogus patents" in order to slow the development of its Android operating system. However, the company now appears to have succumbed to the same approach as it adds the IBM patents to a portfolio that also includes technology for driverless cars. “Start Quote I think they've realized that they just had to get real, and understand that you can't just ignore the system” Piers Strickland Patent lawyer "Although you can object to a lot of cost of inconvenience by virtue of people enforcing their patents, the patent system still exists," Piers Strickland, a lawyer specializing in mobile telephone patent litigation, told the BBC "In order to engage with that you've either got to take licenses from from people's patents, and/or aggressively increase your bartering position by buying patents. "I think they've realized that they just had to get real, and understand that you can't just ignore the system." Google's agreement to buy Motorola Mobility, announced in August last year, includes 24,500 patents, many of which could be used to defend the use of features on its Android mobile operating system. The purchase is currently being reviewed by competition regulators. 'Turf war' Google's Motorola move came off the back of losing out on buying the 6,000-strong patent portfolio of bankrupt telecoms firm Nortel. It was outbid by a consortium of companies including Apple, Microsoft … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Business, Technology Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Man sued for keeping company Twitter followers

December 27, 2011 By Leave a Comment
d5a6f413baa3fb1f076e9d7735e7cb42

(Phatforums News / BBC News) --- A man is being sued for keeping Twitter followers that he attracted while working for a US mobile news website. Noah Kravitz tweeted for Phonedog as @Phonedog_Noah, but later changed his username when he left the company - taking 17,000 followers with him. The company is now seeking damages of $2.50 (£1.60) per user, per month - a total of $370,000. Mr Kravitz said his former employer had given him permission to continue using the account after he left. He told the New York Times that Phonedog had allowed him to make the account personal as long as he agreed to "tweet on their behalf from time to time". The 17,000 followers, which have since risen to 22,000, had been built up by Mr Kravitz during his four years at the company where he worked as a blogger. However, eight months later the company filed a lawsuit claiming that the account's followers were a customer list, and that it had invested "substantial" resources into building it. In a written statement, it said: "The costs and resources invested by Phonedog Media into growing its followers, fans and general brand awareness through social media are substantial and are considered property of Phonedog Media. "We intend to aggressively protect our customer lists and confidential information, intellectual property, trademark and brands." “Start Quote Companies will now be developing careful ways of deciding if they want to tweet with a conjoined account” Barbara Cookson Intellectual property lawyer Strong personality Corporate control of Twitter accounts has been a highly debated subject. Legal experts believe this latest case could set a precedent for future ownership tussles. "Companies will now be developing careful ways of deciding if they want to tweet with a conjoined account," said Barbara Cookson, an intellectual property lawyer in the UK. "For ordinary businesses it's quite difficult to gain a following without a strong personality. You have to have a very strong brand for it to work." Ms Cookson argued it is hard to pinpoint a financial value to Twitter followers as it is unclear why they follow a particular account. It's arguable as to whether a Twitter follower list is comparable to a mailing list. "If Phonedog has been using it to run offers, it perhaps is a mailing list that has value." … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Featured, Technology Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Twitter gets $300m Saudi cash injection

December 19, 2011 By Leave a Comment
a7106a558fe25d27cb4e816b8f6cc0b3

(Phatforums News / BBC News) --- Saudi billionaire Prince Alwaleed bin Talal's Kingdom Holding Company has announced a $300m (£194m) investment in social media site Twitter. The investment follows "several months of negotiations", a company statement to the Saudi stock exchange said. The prince, who is one of the world's richest men, owns stakes in many well-known companies, including News Corporation. He also has investments in a number of media groups in the Arab world. "Our investment in Twitter reaffirms our ability in identifying suitable opportunities to invest in promising, high-growth businesses with a global impact," Prince Alwaleed said. Twitter redesign offer big name brands more prominence Twitter has redesigned its micro-blogging service giving companies a greater presence on its network. The company said the enhancements would make Twitter a more "compelling destination" for brands. The firm depends on its relationship with advertisers. At present its main source of revenue is "promoted" tweets, accounts and trends sold for cash. Experts have warned that the company must be careful not to "compromise users' experience". "It may make Twitter's members feel that its commercial interests are being put ahead of their own," said UK-based digital consultant Philip Buxton. He warned that the business needed to be aware of the mistakes other social media organisations had made after increasing the amount of marketing on their services. "Twitter realises looking after its users is essential to its success, but it knows it also needs commercial success to sustain the service," Mr Buxton added. However, a spokeswoman for Twitter said the main goal of the revamp was to make the service more simple and easy to use, rather than to focus on brands. "If users don't want to see a brand's page, then they can just not visit it," said Rachel Bremer. 'Simplified' The so-called "brand pages" will bring Twitter in line with similar features offered by Facebook and Google+. A new "discover" feature highlights content from Twitter based on a user's interests and location, an enhancement of the site's existing hashtag system. "We've simplified the design to make it easier than ever to follow what you care about, connect with others and discover something new," the company said in a blog post. "You'll see this new design both on Twitter.com and mobile phones, so that you'll have a familiar experience any time, anywhere." The company said an update to its standalone app Tweetdeck would also be made available. Twitter bought the UK-developed tweeting software for £25m in May. Twitter said that the upgrade would be rolled out to all users "in the next few weeks". The new features can be accessed earlier by downloading the firm's updated mobile app. However, UK brands will not have an opportunity to take advantage of the new profile pages until 2012. Bigger presence Several brands have partnered … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Featured, Technology Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Facebook ‘virus’ shows hardcore porn and violent images

November 15, 2011 By Leave a Comment
b855b1eec35ba986c756cfd6e5c24c3c

(Phatforums News / BBC News) --- Facebook says it is looking into reports that pornographic and violent images have been posted to its website. The pictures are reported to have shown up in users' news feeds. According to the technology site, ZDnet, the material is being spread via a "linkspam virus" which tempts members to click on a seemingly innocuous story link. A spokeswoman for Facebook said: "[We are] aware of these reports and we are investigating the issue". Thousands of the site's members have posted comments about the breach on Twitter. "Discovered a new porn site, it's called Facebook," wrote one user. "Facebook should do something about the photoshopped porn images, it's offensive," wrote another. Other users complained they had seen pictures of mutilated animals and people, in some cases adding that they had deactivated their accounts as a consequence. Several people are linking the attack to the Anonymous hacktivist group after a video appeared on YouTube threatening to "kill" the social network. However, experts have questioned whether the video was authentic. Response Internet security firm Sophos said the images had "flooded" the social network over the past 24 hours or more. The company's senior technology consultant, Graham Cluely, said it was not clear how the offending content was being spread, but added that the website could face long term consequences. "It's precisely this kind of problem which is likely to drive people away from the site," he wrote in a company blog. "Facebook needs to get a handle on this problem quickly, and prevent it from happening on such a scale again." The social network requires its members to be at least 13 years old to sign onto the service. Experts say the firm may need to issue warnings if the pictures have been seen by its youngest users. "Facebook management may have a duty of care to encourage anyone who is underage and has viewed this to discuss it with their family or a school counsellor," said Sally Leivesley, managing director of NewRisk, a crisis management consultancy. … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Featured, Technology Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

‘No evidence’ for extraterrestrials, says White House

November 8, 2011 By Leave a Comment
bce9000218f40b70a20785d5e13cf7e6

(Phatforums News / BBC News) --- The US government has formally denied that it has any knowledge of contact with extraterrestrial life. The announcement came as a response to submissions to the We The People website, which promises to address any petition that gains 5,000 signatories. Two petitions called for disclosure of government information on ETs and an acknowledgement of any contact. The White House responded that there was "no evidence that any life exists outside our planet". More than 17,000 citizens joined the two petitions, and the White House has since amended the requirements for response to a minimum of 25,000 signatories. "The US government has no evidence that any life exists outside our planet, or that an extraterrestrial presence has contacted or engaged any member of the human race," wrote space policy expert Phil Larson of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. "In addition, there is no credible information to suggest that any evidence is being hidden from the public's eye." The post went on to outline the efforts that are underway that may add evidence to the debate, namely the space missions Kepler and the Mars Science Laboratory. Kepler is searching for Earth-like planets around far-flung stars, and the Mars Science Laboratory will sample the Red Planet's geology looking for the building blocks of life - though it will not explicitly look for life itself. Perhaps the most famous effort in the hunt for alien life is the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (Seti), once funded in part by US space agency NASA, which continues to listen to and look around the cosmos for signs of intelligent civilizations elsewhere. Mr Larson summarized the numbers game that a hunt for ETs necessarily entails. "Many scientists and mathematicians have looked... at the question of whether life likely exists beyond Earth, and have come to the conclusion that the odds are pretty high that somewhere among the trillions and trillions of stars in the Universe there is a planet other than ours that is home to life," he wrote. "Many have also noted, however, that the odds of us making contact with any of them - especially any intelligent ones - are extremely small, given the distances involved." … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Featured, Technology Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Apple’s iOS Dominates Mobile Traffic, Report Says

November 7, 2011 By Leave a Comment
c3e7b0df949426df9accbdcbbecb3a25

CUPERTINO, Calif. — Apple’s iOS operating system for iPhones, iPads and iPod Touches, grabbed more than 60 percent of the mobile/tablet traffic in October. According to findings by Net Applications, iOS accounted for 61.64 percent of mobile web traffic last month, which was up from nearly 55 percent in September and 44 percent in October of 2010. Android came in second place with almost 19 percent of mobile web traffic, most of which came from smartphones rather than tablets. The release of iOS 5 and the iPhone 4S in October were two events that caused a spike of Internet traffic in several countries. … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Technology Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Report: Smartphone Use Boosts E.U. Internet Traffic

October 28, 2011 By Leave a Comment
8d8d7504c0e5f94be04f0f7ca1cae9e0

(Phatforums News / XBiz) --- RESTON, Va — Smartphone use generated 4.6 percent of all major European Internet traffic in the 3rd quarter of 2011, according to a ComScore MobiLens report. The study canvassed adults from five of the largest European markets — the U.K., Italy, Denmark, France and Spain — and revealed that 94.1 million people used smartphones in the three-month period that ended Aug. 31, resulting in a 46 percent increase on the year. ComScore also said that although the Symbian platform is the most widely used in Europe with a 28.7 percent share, Apple’s iPad and iPod have helped iOS grab the overall mobile Internet audience lead with a 30.5 percent share for the period. “While we have seen the increasing adoption of smartphones in the EU5 contribute to the rapid growth of mobile media consumption, we are also beginning to see tablets and other connected devices play an increasing role,” said Jeremy Copp, ComScore’s vice president for mobile in Europe. In the U.K., mobile browser usage is still higher than mobile app usage with 45.9 percent of respondents having used their mobile browser compared to 43.7 who have used mobile apps. More than one third of users have used their mobile devices to access their social networking profiles, according to the study. … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Technology Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
« Older Posts