Microsoft: entertainment overtakes multiplayer gaming on Xbox | The Verge

Along with launching new voice-controlled TV apps for Comcast and HBO Go today, Microsoft has also shared some rather interesting stats for its new entertainment apps on Xbox 360. Xbox Live Gold members in the US are now spending an average of 84 hours per month on Xbox Live, with entertainment app usage more than doubled year on year. Globally, this has led to a 30 percent increase in the total hours spent on Xbox Live around the world.

The result of this increased Xbox Live activity means that for the first time on Xbox, entertainment usage has surpassed multiplayer game usage.

via theverge.com

Again, Sign of the times.

Microsoft and Financial Services Industry Leaders Target Cybercriminal Operations from Zeus Botnets

In our most complex effort to disrupt botnets to date, Microsoft’s Digital Crimes Unit – in collaboration with Financial Services – Information Sharing and Analysis Center (FS-ISAC) and NACHA – The Electronic Payments Association, as well as Kyrus Tech Inc. – has executed a coordinated global action against some of the worst known cybercrime operations fueling online fraud and identity theft today. With this legal and technical action, a number of the most harmful botnets using the Zeus family of malware worldwide have been disrupted in an unprecedented, proactive cross-industry operation against this cybercriminal organization.
via blogs.technet.com

Many of these efforts by Microsoft gets overlooked. For e.g. this news today is way below the news of the Microsoft store - Smoked by Windows Phone controversy which is an individual led issue.

When Sharing became bigger than searching

This week’s most stunning statistic: In February, Facebook drove more traffic to the Guardian web site than Google did. This fact was proffered (I couldn’t bring myself to write shared) at the Changing Medias Summit Conference by Tanya Corduroy, Guardian’s director for digital development (full text of her speech):

Eighteen months ago, search represented 40% of the Guardian’s traffic and social represented just 2%. Six months ago – before the launch of our Facebook app – these figures had barely moved.

A recent Pew report echoed these figures, revealing that just 9% of digital news consumers follow news recommendations from Facebook or from Twitter. That compares with 32% who get news from search.

But last month, we felt a seismic shift in our referral traffic. For the first time in our history, Facebook drove more traffic to guardian.co.uk than Google for a number of days, accounting for more than 30% of our referrer traffic. This is a dramatic result from a standing start five months ago.

via mondaynote.com

Sign of the times..

Retracting "Mr. Daisey and the Apple Factory"

I have difficult news. We've learned that Mike Daisey's story about Apple in China - which we broadcast in January - contained significant fabrications. We're retracting the story because we can’t vouch for its truth. This is not a story we commissioned. It was an excerpt of Mike Daisey's acclaimed one-man show "The Agony and the Ecstasy of Steve Jobs," in which he talks about visiting a factory in China that makes iPhones and other Apple products.

via thisamericanlife.org

What can't go right for Apple these days, not that I wished anything should go wrong.

Posterous acquired by Twitter

The good folks at Posterous are getting what they deserve, its an awesome service and they are joining yet another awesome team. Congratulations Team Posterous.

Posterous is Joining the Flock at Twitter

Big news: Posterous has been acquired by Twitter!

The opportunities in front of Twitter are exciting, and we couldn’t be happier about bringing our team’s expertise to a product that reaches hundreds of millions of users around the globe. Plus, the people at Twitter are genuinely nice folks who share our vision for making sharing simpler.

Nokia ClearBlack display

ClearBlack display uses a sequence of polarising layers to eliminate reflections.

You have probably tried polarising sunglasses before now and so have a rough idea of how that works. If you look at a window or the surface of some water using polarising glasses, then they become more transparent – which is why they’re especially good for fishermen. The polariser cuts out reflected light.

Polariser layers used in display solutions are bit more sophisticated than in sunglasses. Light rays actually gets “processed” many times on its way in and out of your phones´s screen.

There’s both a linear polariser and retardation layers between the surface of your phone and the display. When light hits your screen, this is what happens:

  1. It hits the linear polariser, this vertically polarises the light. (Polarising means – roughly – aligning the wave vibration in a particular direction).
  2. Then it hits the circular polariser retardation layer. This converts the light again, making it right-circularly polarised.
  3. Then it hits the screen and bounces off it, switching the rotation of the light to leftist.
  4. It goes back through the retardation layer. When this happens, the light becomes horizontally polarised.
  5. Finally, it hits the linear polariser, since the light is horizontally polarised at this point it can be blocked entirely by this optical solution.

So why doesn’t the light from your phone’s display get blocked? Because it only goes through the second half of this journey so the light is unpolarised when it hits the final filter and goes through.

via conversations.nokia.com

I like it when small innovations can make large impact. Although I am yet to see it in practice, ClearBlack display makes is one such innovation.

How rebounding economy impacts Facebook

About the only bad news in the employment report was for Facebook. It can't be a coincidence that its roster of users swelled to over 800 million worldwide during the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression, as joblessness swelled and with it, free time to spend on Facebook. And in the U.S., jobs are growing in manufacturing and construction, where few people sit in front of PCs, while shrinking in information, finance and government, where most everybody does.

So, as Facebook users go back to work, they will have less time to update their pages and peer at those of others. And fewer office jobs also means less time goofing off at work looking at Facebook (which is broken up by watching videos on You Tube.) And folks who are employed and have a few bucks in their pockets might actually get out and have what used to be called a social life, as opposed to social networking. "Friend" might once again be a noun rather than a verb. It could happen.

via online.barrons.com

As Facebook users go back to work, they'll have less time to update their pages and peer at those of others.

Google's biggest challenge right now is Staying Relevant

Out of 20,000 potential matches on YouTube, out of 21 million potential video matches across the web, what does Google’s supposedly sophisticated Universal Search algorithm pick out to display as the top video content to be shown within the top search results?

A cartoon created by a company pitching its SEO software on YouTube as a way for Santorum to solve his Google problem. Wow.

via searchengineland.com

Relevancy took Google to the top, Relevancy (or the lack of it) will take it down.

Apple's Tim Cook expresses 'outrage' over NYT report on worker safety

Now, an internal email from Apple CEO Tim Cook has leaked to 9to5 Mac, partially disputing the NYT report.

As a company and as individuals, we are defined by our values. Unfortunately some people are questioning Apple’s values today, and I’d like to address this with you directly. We care about every worker in our worldwide supply chain. Any accident is deeply troubling, and any issue with working conditions is cause for concern. Any suggestion that we don’t care is patently false and offensive to us. As you know better than anyone, accusations like these are contrary to our values. It’s not who we are. For the many hundreds of you who are based at our suppliers’ manufacturing sites around the world, or spend long stretches working there away from your families, I know you are as outraged by this as I am. For the people who aren’t as close to the supply chain, you have a right to know the facts.

via theverge.com

Wonder how an internal mail from Secretive Apple leaks to clear up the image but such emails never leak detailing product releases.

Sometimes you need a voice from outside to know what's missing within

“We knew there was an incident in 2006,” he told Threat Level. “But it was inconclusive at the time as to whether or not actual code was taken or that someone had actual code in their hands.”

Following the public claim of hackers earlier this month that they had source code for pcAnywhere, Norton Utilities and other products, Paden said the company went back through its logs and records and “put 2 and 2 together that there was a source code theft.”

via wired.com

Symantec waited for 7 long years and hackers to trash them publicly before investigating and putting "2 and 2" together and we all trusted them for securing us.

Con Artist Starred in Sting That Cost Google Millions

The government built its criminal case against Google using money, aliases and fake companies—tactics often used against drug cartels and other crime syndicates, according to interviews and court documents. Google agreed to pay a $500 million forfeiture last summer in a settlement to avoid prosecution for aiding illegal online pharmaceutical sales.

Google acknowledged in the settlement that it had improperly and knowingly assisted online pharmacy advertisers allegedly based in Canada to run advertisements for illicit pharmacy sales targeting U.S. customers.

via online.wsj.com

And all this under Google management eyes and supposedly with their support. That's evil.

JC Penney Reinvents Department-Store Retailing

Over the course of a two-hour presentation on Manhattan's West Side today, JC Penney CEO Ron Johnson and President Michael Francis outlined a series of major changes across all aspects of the department store's pricing, promotion, presentation and products. Changes will be unveiled to consumers on Feb. 1.
via adage.com

That's a lot of "talk" without actual "walk" for an ex-Apple executive. So as soon as you leave Apple, you forget the Apple way of doing things.

Tim Cook: Phone market isn't a two-horse race, 'there's a horse in Redmond that always runs' | The Verge

asked if the phone market was now a two-horse race between iOS and Android, Cook said that "There's a horse in Redmond that always suits up and always runs, and will keep running.
via theverge.com

Indeed there is a very fast, very pretty horse suited up and running in Redmond but the challenge is that this horse joined the mile rong race almost many lengths behind. So it won't win the shorter races, but will definitely show up in the podium in the long run. Just keep running and you will find this Redmond horse in the corner of your eye, keeping you honest and pushing you to give the best.

Apple - Record quarterly revenues of $46.33 Billion

Apple® today announced financial results for its fiscal 2012 first quarter which spanned 14 weeks and ended December 31, 2011. The Company posted record quarterly revenue of $46.33 billion and record quarterly net profit of $13.06 billion, or $13.87 per diluted share. These results compare to revenue of $26.74 billion and net quarterly profit of $6 billion, or $6.43 per diluted share, in the year-ago quarter. Gross margin was 44.7 percent compared to 38.5 percent in the year-ago quarter. International sales accounted for 58 percent of the quarter’s revenue.

The Company sold 37.04 million iPhones in the quarter, representing 128 percent unit growth over the year-ago quarter. Apple sold 15.43 million iPads during the quarter, a 111 percent unit increase over the year-ago quarter. The Company sold 5.2 million Macs during the quarter, a 26 percent unit increase over the year-ago quarter. Apple sold 15.4 million iPods, a 21 percent unit decline from the year-ago quarter.

via apple.com

Saving this for eternity - make that one year till Apple breaks this record next year same time.

Gamification of Visual Studio

With the Visual Studio Achievements Extension, achievements are unlocked based on your activity. Your code is analyzed on a background thread each time you compile.  In addition, the extension listens for certain events and actions that you may perform in Visual Studio, reporting progress on these events to the server.
via channel9.msdn.com

Brilliant idea to engage developers and make them learn/use newer coding techniques.

End of an era at Yahoo

Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ: YHOO), the premier digital media company, today announced that Jerry Yang has resigned from its Board of Directors and all other positions with the company, effective today. In addition, Yang resigned from the Boards of Yahoo Japan Corporation and Alibaba Group Holding Limited, effective today.

In a letter to the Yahoo! Board Chairman Roy Bostock, Yang wrote:

"My time at Yahoo!, from its founding to the present, has encompassed some of the most exciting and rewarding experiences of my life. However, the time has come for me to pursue other interests outside of Yahoo! As I leave the company I co-founded nearly 17 years ago, I am enthusiastic about the appointment of Scott Thompson as Chief Executive Officer and his ability, along with the entire Yahoo! leadership team, to guide Yahoo! into an exciting and successful future."

via investor.yahoo.net

Wonder how it feels to leave something which you started and sustained for 17 long years. Yang created an internet powerhouse and more than that a very powerful brand and the way he created and marketed it, Yahoo will always be a young company. Whenever I think of yahoo, I think of young internet savvy people connecting with each other. I hope this stays to end of an era only and not end of Yahoo.

XBOX 360 growing as entertainment destination

  • The hours of video consumed globally on Xbox LIVE increased 140 percent from 2010 to 2011.
  • In December more than 60 percent of U.S. Xbox LIVE Gold members used entertainment apps on Xbox LIVE – for an average of an hour a day each.
  • The number of people using entertainment apps on Xbox LIVE increased by nearly 50 percent globally from November to December.
    • via majornelson.com

    One big reason for this is the new Metro design based XBOX Dashboard which puts entertainment to the center.

    Google Just Made Bing the Best Search Engine

    I just switched the default search engine in my browser from Google to Bing. And if you care about working efficiently, or getting the right results when you search, then maybe you should too. Don't laugh!

    The great thing is, of course, you can just switch. Hit up your browser preferences, and swap your default to Bing. I know, I know, but yes I'm serious. Sure, Bing had a rocky start. But if you haven't seen it recently it's worth another look. It has a super clean interface. It's fast. And operators work the way you expect them to. Best of all it's relevant.

    In short, it's a lot like Google. Not the Google of today, but the Google you fell in love with, the one that put your search results above its financial ones. The Google that delivered.

    via gizmodo.com

    I've been using Bing as my default search engine for over 1.5 years now, never had to goto Google during this time except for books search. Others are realizing that you can't feed the evil forever and make it stronger.

    Android ain't free

    Microsoft Corp. and LG Electronics have signed a patent agreement that provides broad coverage under Microsoft’s patent portfolio for LG’s tablets, mobile phones and other consumer devices running the Android or Chrome OS Platform. The contents of the agreement have not been disclosed.

    “We are pleased to have built upon our longstanding relationship with LG to reach a mutually beneficial agreement. Together with our 10 previous agreements with Android and Chrome OS device manufacturers, including HTC, Samsung and Acer, this agreement with LG means that more than 70 percent of all Android smartphones sold in the U.S. are now receiving coverage under Microsoft’s patent portfolio,” said Horacio Gutierrez, corporate vice president and deputy general counsel, Intellectual Property Group at Microsoft. “We are proud of the continued success of our program in resolving the IP issues surrounding Android and Chrome OS.”

    via microsoft.com

    70 percent of all Android smartphones sold in the U.S. are now receiving coverage under Microsoft’s patent portfolio. Like Samsung, Acer, HTC - LG also knows now, "Android ain't free".

    2012 - Year of Microsoft

    I’ll say it: I’m bullish on Microsoft in 2012. This could be the year that it shakes its malaise and takes its place alongside Apple, Google, and Amazon as a dominant innovator of the mobile age. For the first time in forever, Microsoft has a couple major products that are not merely good enough. They’re just plain great. I’ve been effusive in my praise for Windows Phone 7, Microsoft’s new mobile operating system. At the Consumer Electronics Show this week, we saw the one piece that has been missing from Microsoft’s new phone effort—killer hardware. Nokia unveiled the Lumia 900, the most powerful and beautiful Windows Phone to hit the United States yet (it will be released on AT&T sometime this year). Then there’s Windows 8, the spectacular desktop OS that Microsoft plans to release this year, and which will feature a new mobile-friendly touch interface that could make for the first viable Windows competitors to the iPad.

    If you consider Microsoft’s Xbox juggernaut, which now features not just games but lots of entertainment apps, you begin to see the outline of a strategy to win big. Here’s a company with a killer mobile and desktop OS, a place in hundreds of millions of offices and living rooms around the world, a great design team, an unbeatable sales and distribution arm, and billions in cash. When you put it that way, Microsoft almost sounds as good as Apple, doesn’t it?

    via slate.com

    I am bullish too especially with Windows Phone. It will see its best year once Nokia devices start rolling across. HTC and Samsung WP7 devices have struggled when compared to iPhone and Android devices. Nokia will push it the right way in Europe and Asia with its relationship with Telco's and market presence. Windows 8, whatever we have seen is cool, if combined with right hardware, it will excel as a great alternative to iPad. XBOX will continue and maintain its numero uno position. We will see many new ways Kinect's use is imagined but no concrete sellable implementation. Bing will grow even further and gain market share but that gain will come lesser from Google's share and more from Yahoo and others. In my view, 2013 will be even better. Fingers crossed.