Showing posts with label Technology. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Technology. Show all posts

Estonian pleads guilty in U.S. court to Internet advertising scam






NEW YORK (Reuters) – An Estonian man pleaded guilty on Friday in U.S. federal court for his role in a massive Internet scam that targeted well-known websites such as iTunes, Netflix and The Wall Street Journal.


The scheme infected at least four million computers in more than 100 countries, including 500,000 in the United States, with malicious software, or malware, according to the indictment. It included a large number of computers at data centers located in New York, federal prosecutors said.






Valeri Aleksejev, 32, was the first of six Estonians and one Russian indicted in 2011 to enter a plea. They were indicted on five charges each of wire and computer intrusion. One of the defendants, Vladimir Tsastsin, was also charged with 22 counts of money laundering.


In U.S. District Court in Manhattan on Friday, Aleksejev pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud and conspiracy to commit computer intrusion. He faces up to 25 years in prison, deportation and the forfeiture of $ 7 million.


The scam had several components, including a “click-hijacking fraud” in which the malware re-routed searches by users on infected computers to sites designated by the defendants, prosecutors said in the indictment. Users of infected computers trying to access Apple Inc’s iTunes website or Netflix Inc‘s movie website, for example, instead ended up at websites of unaffiliated businesses, according to the indictment.


Another component of the scam replaced legitimate advertisements on websites operated by News Corp’s The Wall Street Journal, Amazon.com Inc and others with advertisements that triggered payments for the defendants, prosecutors said.


The defendants reaped at least $ 14 million from the fraud, prosecutors said. However, Aleksejev’s lawyer, William Stampur, said in court on Friday that Aleksejev has no assets.


Estonian police arrested Aleksejev and the other Estonians in November 2011. One other Estonian, Anton Ivanov, has been extradited, and the extradition of the other four is pending, according to the U.S. Attorney’s office in Manhattan. The Russian, Andrey Taame, remains at large, according to the U.S. Attorney’s office.


Aleksejev told Magistrate Judge James Francis he assisted in blocking anti-virus software updates on infected computers. Francis asked Aleksejev if he knew what he was doing was illegal.


“I thought it was wrong,” Aleksejev said in broken English after a long pause. “But of course I didn’t know all the laws in the U.S.”


Francis set a tentative sentencing date of May 31 for Aleksejev.


The case is USA v. Tsastsin et al, U.S. District Court in Manhattan, No. 11-00878.


(Reporting by Bernard Vaughan; Editing by Dan Grebler)


Internet News Headlines – Yahoo! News





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China May (or May Not) Be Behind the Twitter Hack






You may not have heard, but roughly 250,000 Twitter accounts may have been compromised by hackers. There’s a theory that — if you read between the lines — Twitter is implying the Chinese are to blame for compromising their security. 


RELATED: The Chinese Want to Know Why Their News Is on Twitter and They Aren’t






Twitter revealed that roughly a quarter million accounts may have been compromised by hackers in a blog post Friday evening. (A classic Friday evening news dump if there ever was one; they got a $ 10 billion valuation the same day.) 


RELATED: A Punk Prince, Women in the Military, a New Tennis Controversy


Bandits might have made away with “usernames, email addresses, session tokens and encrypted/salted versions of passwords – for approximately 250,000 users.” They think. A Twitter representative stressed to the Verge that they’re still investigating; there’s a chance we’re all safe. 


RELATED: World Languages Mapped by Twitter


But was China behind it all?! That’s an emerging theory. We don’t know who was behind it. Twitter doesn’t say directly. None of the usual suspects have claimed ownership of the attack. (Yet.)


RELATED: The Good, the Bad, and the Fuzzy of Twitter’s New Censorship Rules


But Twitter mentions the New York Times and Wall Street Journal hacks in their opening paragraph, apropos of nothing, really. It could mean the company was just trying to show they’re not alone in being targeted — look at these bullies picking on these other kids, too. Or it could mean they’re subtly implying China is behind it all. 


RELATED: Did the Berlin Wall’s Fall Save China?


The last paragraph in Twitter’s statement is where the theory really gets its legs. Emphasis ours: 



This attack was not the work of amateurs, and we do not believe it was an isolated incident. The attackers were extremely sophisticated, and we believe other companies and organizations have also been recently similarly attacked. For that reason we felt that it was important to publicize this attack while we still gather information, and we are helping government and federal law enforcement in their effort to find and prosecute these attackers to make the Internet safer for all users. 



So, did they do it? These sophisticated hackers who targeted other companies and organizations sure sounds like they’re implying it was China.


Was it China in the basement with the Cheetos and Red Bull and impressive coding skill? We don’t know for sure, but we’re definitely looking for any and every clue we can find. 


Social Media News Headlines – Yahoo! News





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GS: Ignore the chatter, BlackBerry rebound is coming






BlackBerry’s (RIMM) next-generation BlackBerry 10 platform has received mixed reviews out of the gate, but most seem to agree that the new OS and first two BlackBerry 10 smartphones will do little to attract interest from users of rival platforms. But as analysts continue to back off BlackBerry and investors lose confidence, Goldman Sachs sees a big opportunity for clients.


[More from BGR: Here comes the PlayStation 4: Sony announces February 20th PlayStation event [video]]






In a recent research note to clients picked up by Barron’s, Goldman Sachs analyst Simona Jankowski urged investors to take advantage of BlackBerry’s recent slide and buy shares at a discount.


[More from BGR: BlackBerry 10 browser smokes iOS 6 and Windows Phone 8 in comparison test [video]]


“We continue to see significant upside to estimates over the next three quarters, as BB10 devices drive upside to the Street’s ASP and margin forecasts,” Jankowski wrote. ”With 110 carriers completing lab testing by February, 50 carriers offering integrated billing, and Verizon getting an exclusive for the white Z10, we continue to see strong carrier support for BB10. Consumer adoption will decide the ultimate outcome, but estimate revisions should be a positive catalyst in the meantime.”


Jankowski also noted that BlackBerry Z10 sales could reach roughly 1 million units in the UK and Canada alone. The analyst believes BlackBerry World is off to a solid start with more than 70,000 available BlackBerry 10 apps, and the new platform includes a number of novel features that will attract attention.


“Consistent with BB10s browser superior performance on industry benchmarks – the Ringmark and HTML 5 tests – our preliminary tests show it to be much faster than leading competitive offerings. Additionally, while the company provided a full demo of the BB10 OS, we believe the details around Hub, Flow, Peek, and Balance were largely known. BlackBerry believes its Keyboard functionality will be a key differentiator, with the capability to ‘flick’ entire words to the screen with a single thumb. It can also recognize multiple languages within a single text or email.”


She continued, adding that the new BBM, BlackBerry Remember, Story Maker and enhanced camera functionality are all compelling features that will draw attention to the new platform.


Jankowski reiterated a Buy rating on BlackBerry shares with a $ 19 price target.


This article was originally published on BGR.com


Gadgets News Headlines – Yahoo! News





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3 Things That Still Worry Me About BlackBerry






BlackBerry put on a pretty good show on Wednesday when it revealed the Z10 and the Q10, its first new smartphones in a year and a half. The demos were crisp, and the new BlackBerry 10 software looked clever. At the very least, it seems that BlackBerry has finally joined the modern smartphone era.


But despite my interest in BlackBerry’s new phones, I’m still worried about the future of the platform, and not merely because it’s been off the radar for a while. Looking at what BlackBerry did and didn’t announce, and what reviewers are saying about the product, gives me a few big reasons for concern:






Apps, Both Present and Future


BlackBerry deserves credit for having lots of apps out of the gate–more than 70,000, the company says–including some important ones like Twitter, Facebook, Angry Birds and The New York Times. Still, there are some big names missing from the list, including Netflix, YouTube, Spotify and Instagram. You can’t expect a new platform to have everything right away, though, so I don’t want to judge BlackBerry’s current app count too harshly.


It’s the future that I’m really worried about. What happens when the next Instagram comes out, and becomes a sensation on the iPhone and Android? Will BlackBerry be like Windows Phone–that is, just an afterthought in the minds of up-and-coming app developers? The good news is that Android apps are relatively easy to port to BlackBerry 10 (in fact, roughly 40 percent of those 70,000 launch apps are simple ports, ReadWrite notes), so RIM just has to convince developers to make a relatively small effort. We’ll see if they do.


Never Neglect Maps


The consensus among BlackBerry Z10 reviews is that its Maps app is subpar. The Verge complained about inaccurate data, and said the software couldn’t reliably find local businesses. CNet bemoaned a lack of features, such as walking directions, transit maps and street views. Apparently the software doesn’t even let you jump into the Maps app by tapping on an address or map in the web browser. That’s just basic stuff. At least the Maps app includes voice-guided turn-by-turn directions.


In any case, having a good mapping service isn’t just about telling you where to go. It’s about using your location to deliver useful information. Google Now, for instance, can warn you about traffic before your commute home, and Apple‘s Passbook can call up a boarding pass when you get to the airport. These days, a really good standalone Maps app is only part of the equation, and BlackBerry doesn’t even have that yet.


Voice Commands and Virtual Assistants


BlackBerry has added voice commands in its new phones, but the list of supported actions is paltry compared to what Android and the iPhone offer. You can’t ask for movie times, the weather forecast, directions, or things to do. You can’t tell the phone to start playing music, answer a trivia question, calculate numbers or set reminders.


You may argue that it doesn’t matter, that most people don’t rely too heavily on voice commands to begin with. I think that will change as these virtual assistants become faster and support more types of queries. They’ll also become more useful in automobiles–in fact, some car makers are now starting to integrate Siri–and they may some day play a big role in wearable computing, allowing you to communicate by voice when your phone is just out of reach. It’s still early days for this kind of technology, but Apple and Google already have a huge head start. BlackBerry, by comparison, is just getting started.


I’m not saying the new BlackBerry phones are no good, or that no one should use them. Like I said before, the software has some clever ideas, such as the Hub that combines all communications into one area, and the Balance feature that acts as a separate login for business use. But the smartphone industry moves quickly, and BlackBerry’s period of rebuilding has taken its toll in a few key areas. As with before, it’s going to be hard for the company to catch up.


MORE: Check out a video about the new hardware and features


Wireless News Headlines – Yahoo! News





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Nintendo chief rules out price cuts for Wii U






TOKYO (AP) — Nintendo‘s president Thursday ruled out price cuts for its new Wii U home console as a way to boost sales, vowing to become profitable again in its core businesses as smartphones and tablets increasingly threaten specialized game machines.


Satoru Iwata, speaking at a Tokyo hotel to investors and reporters a day after earnings were released, acknowledged the sales momentum for the Wii U, as well as the 3DS hand-held game machine, had run out of steam during the key year-end shopping season, especially in the U.S.






But he said no price cuts were in the works. Price cuts are common in the gaming industry to woo buyers, but the move can backfire by trimming revenue. The Wii U now sells for about $ 300 in the U.S. and 25,000 yen in Japan.


“We are already offering it at a good price,” he said.


Iwata said he expects operating profit of more than 100 billion yen in the 12 months ending March 2014, promising that as “a commitment.”


But he acknowledged more work was needed to have consumers understand the Wii U, which went on sale globally late last year, as well as producing more game software to draw buyers.


All game machines have suffered in recent years from the advent of smartphones and other mobile devices that have become more sophisticated and offer games and other forms of entertainment.


Nintendo returned to net profit for the April-December period of 2012 from deep losses the previous year, but that was due to a perk from a weaker yen, which helps Japanese exporters such as Nintendo.


Its operating result, which removes currency fluctuations, was a loss of 5.86 billion yen ($ 64 million), and Nintendo expects that to swell to a 20 billion yen ($ 220 million) loss for the full business year ending March 2013 as sales of its game consoles fall short of expectations.


Iwata said Nintendo is preparing more game software, including those developed in-house, for the end of this year.


Kyoto-based Nintendo, which makes Super Mario and Pokemon games, lowered its full year sales forecast Wednesday to 670 billion yen ($ 7.4 billion) from 810 billion yen ($ 8.9 billion). It also said it was going to sell fewer Wii U consoles for the fiscal year through March than its previous projection. The Wii U has a touch-screen tablet controller called GamePad and a TV-watching feature called TVii.


The company forecasts it will sell 4 million Wii U consoles for the current fiscal year, ending March 31, down from its earlier estimate of 5.5 million units. The Wii U, which went on sale late last year, was the first major new game console to arrive in stores in years.


Nintendo, also behind the Donkey Kong and Zelda games, lowered its full year sales forecast for Wii U game software units to 16 million from 24 million.


Iwata said last year holiday sales quickly dissipated in the U.S. and some European nations, including Great Britain, the key market. He said the U.S. home console sales were the worst for Nintendo in nearly a decade.


He said Nintendo needs hit games to push console sales, and the company remains confident Wii U will prove more popular with time.


“The chicken-and-game problem has not been solved,” he said of the need for both game software and machine hardware.


“I feel a deep sense of responsibility for not being able to produce results for our year-end business,” said Iwata.


He declined to say what he would do if the company failed to attain the promised operating profits.


Nintendo sank into a loss the previous fiscal year largely because of price cuts for its hand-held 3DS game machine, which shows three-dimensional imagery without special glasses. That machine is also struggling in most global markets.


Shigeru Miyamoto, Nintendo’s famed game designer, said what was missing were games for the Wii U that made its appeal clear. The progress in smartphones has also posed a challenge for Nintendo, he said.


“People have to try it to see it is fun,” Miyamoto said of Wii U.


___


Follow Yuri Kageyama on Twitter at www.twitter.com/yurikageyama


Gaming News Headlines – Yahoo! News





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RIM to debut new BlackBerry smartphones in a heavily hyped unveiling






NEW YORK, N.Y. – Following several delays and much anticipation, the new BlackBerry smartphones will be unveiled this morning in New York.


Research In Motion (TSX:RIM), the company behind the once dominant smartphones, is holding a splashy event in Manhattan to usher in the new devices, which were originally due for release last year.






The debut is expected to showcase the device as well as provide key launch details.


That will likely include its release date, which is expected in the next four to six weeks, the phone’s features and how much it will cost.


The company says the new BlackBerry will be released first in a touchscreen version, while a keypad alternative will follow in the weeks or months afterward.


The new phone launch is RIM’s attempt to regain its position in the highly competitive North American and European smartphone markets, which are now dominated by iPhone and Android devices.


While the first hurdles to overcome are the opinions of tech analysts and investor reaction, the true measure of success — actual sales of the phones — is still weeks away.


The BlackBerry has dramatically lost marketshare in recent years after a series of blunders.


Several network outages left customers without the use of the smartphones they had come to rely on, while the BlackBerry’s hardware hasn’t received a significant upgrade in years.


RIM chief executive Thorsten Heins has already offered a glimpse of some features on the new devices. They include BlackBerry Balance technology, which allows one phone to operate as both a business and personal device entirely separate from each other.


The new BlackBerry will also let users seamlessly shift between the phone’s applications like they’re flipping between pages on a desk.


In the coming weeks, RIM will launch an advertising blitz to promote the phones, including aggressive social media campaigning, which includes plugs from celebrities on their Twitter accounts, and a 30-second advertisement on the Super Bowl, the most watched television program of the year.


Gadgets News Headlines – Yahoo! News





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Troubled smartphone pioneer RIM prepares to raise the curtain on BlackBerry 10






NEW YORK, N.Y. – After several technical blunders, two unexpected delays and one major shakeup in its leadership, BlackBerry-maker Research In Motion is about to raise the curtain for its new smartphone devices in hopes that consumers share the excitement.


The unveiling of the phones and operating system on Wednesday marks the start of an advertising blitz that will stretch to social media, the Super Bowl and beyond as RIM tries to regain the cool factor that was once firmly in its grasp.






If all goes according to plan, the event will also mark the end of a troublesome 12 months that has seen RIM try to stay afloat while its future was constantly in question by outsiders, and its stock price tumbled to the lowest level in about a decade.


While the first hurdles to overcome on Wednesday are the opinions of tech analysts and investor reaction, the true measure of success — actual sales of the phones — is still weeks away.


As a crowd of thousands gathers Wednesday at Pier 36, a massive entertainment venue on the shores of Manhattan, chief executive Thorsten Heins will step onto the stage holding the BlackBerry that has been at once considered the company’s last hope, but also its biggest hurdle.


Just over a year ago, when Heins took over the top spot at RIM, the smartphone maker was in a state of flux as its marketshare tumbled in North America against growing competition from Apple’s iPhone and various devices on the Android operating system.


Analysts had widely blamed the lack of leadership from former co-CEOs Jim Balsillie and Mike Lazaridis as the reasons that RIM failed to innovate its way out of trouble, but they also said that Heins had much to prove in hardly any time.


The company was in a bubble, insisting that it hadn’t lost its footing in the smartphone industry, even though from the outside their downfall was indisputable.


But as the dust settled from Balsillie’s exit in March 2012, Heins began to face the realities of RIM’s problems and launched a major overhaul of its middle management and deep cuts to its operations.


While Heins preferred to call it removing a “little fat on the hips,” the changes at RIM were a far more strategic and complex surgery.


The company closed some of its manufacturing facilities and announced plans to lay off about 5,000 workers, as it aimed to save $ 1 billion across RIM’s operations by February 2013. Heins reached that savings goal, and he did it three months ahead of schedule.


“He is probably one of the least dogmatic people at RIM,” said Carl Howe, vice-president of consumer research at Yankee Group.


“I think he learned from his predecessors.”


Despite all of the changes, Heins was still up against the fact that development of the BlackBerry 10 operating system was woefully behind schedule. Already delayed from a launch in 2011, the CEO was forced in June to further push the debut into 2013, missing crucial sales periods like the back-to-school and Christmas holiday shopping seasons.


While analysts hated the idea of another delay, it also bought the company some extra time to tweak the software to capitalize on the weaknesses of competitors’ smartphones.


One of those features is the BlackBerry Balance technology, which allows one phone to operate as both a business and personal device entirely separate from each other. Another one lets users seamlessly shift between the phone’s applications like they’re flipping between pages on a desk.


The BlackBerry Messenger chat program will also get an update that includes video chat and screen sharing options.


RIM’s executives also began an aggressive campaign last year to win the developer community. Under its previous leadership, the BlackBerry had practically ignored the growing popularity of smartphone applications for services like Netflix, Skype and Instagram.


A sea of change was coming under its new leaders, and Heins had managed to at least steady a company that was swaying on its pillars by coming up with unconventional ideas.


As the BlackBerry lost steam in North America and Europe, he turned to developing countries like Indonesia and Nigeria to keep revenues flowing in the near term. In those places, consumers were hungry for low-cost smartphones and the BlackBerry was still considered a status symbol.


The decision helped RIM keep its subscriber base steady, and maintain its $ 2-billion cash reserve, which was set aside for emergencies. It will use some of that money to promote the new phones.


“Up until now I think everything (Heins) laid out in terms of his plan … he’s shown that he’s executed on it,” said Richard Tse, an analyst at Cormark Securities Inc.


“In terms of what they’ve done on the development side, in terms of streamlining the operations and preserving the cash, I think he’s done a very good job to date.”


Investors aren’t satisfied with all of his decisions, however, especially when Heins unveiled a rough plan in December that will likely eat into the lucrative service fees charged to BlackBerry subscribers.


Heins told analysts on its most recent earnings conference call that RIM plans to launch an a la carte menu of services where both enterprise customers and casual smartphone users can pick their packages. The change would likely mean reduced revenues in one of the most lucrative areas of its business.


Even on the dawn of the new BlackBerry unveiling, there are still questions about whether RIM will exist in its current form this time next year. Some analysts have said the company will eventually be forced to sell off at least its hardware division, if not more.


“They’re in such a difficult position that I can’t think of a management change that would help them get out of it,” Tim Long of BMO Capital Markets.


“Clearly there are people out there that think the BlackBerry 10 is going to be something that gets them back on the map. We don’t think so.”


Long said his checks within the mobile phone industry have shown that carriers aren’t particularly interested in RIM’s touchscreen smartphone, but they’re more anxious for the keypad version, or QWERTY phone, due sometime after the initial launch.


“We think that’s an issue,” he said.


If the stock price is any sign, RIM’s investors are at least more confident this month then they’ve been in a long time. As of Monday’s closing price, RIM’s shares have risen 167 per cent from its lowest level in about a decade, reached in September, on the Toronto Stock Exchange.


Several analysts have boosted their target prices for the company’s stock in the past two weeks.


Whatever happens after the new BlackBerrys are unveiled, it’s certain that RIM isn’t in the clear yet.


“Product transitions are always pretty ugly,” said Howe.


“The good news is if you can get yourself through to the other side … you have an opportunity to disrupt the market yourself.”


Wireless News Headlines – Yahoo! News




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In Asia’s trend-setting cities, iPhone fatigue sets in






SINGAPORE (Reuters) – Apple Inc’s iconic iPhone is losing some of its luster among Asia’s well-heeled consumers in Singapore and Hong Kong, a victim of changing mobile habits and its own runaway success.


Driven by a combination of iPhone fatigue, a desire to be different and a plethora of competing devices, users are turning to other brands, notably those from Samsung Electronics Co Ltd, eating into Apple‘s market share.






In Singapore, Apple’s products were so dominant in 2010 that more devices here ran its iOS operating system per capita than anywhere else in the world.


But StatCounter http://gs.statcounter.com, which measures traffic collected across a network of 3 million websites, calculates that Apple’s share of mobile devices in Singapore – iPad and iPhone – declined sharply last year. From a peak of 72 percent in January 2012, its share fell to 50 percent this month, while Android devices now account for 43 percent of the market, up from 20 percent in the same month last year.


In Hong Kong, devices running Apple’s iOS now account for about 30 percent of the total, down from about 45 percent a year ago. Android accounts for nearly two-thirds.


“Apple is still viewed as a prestigious brand, but there are just so many other cool smartphones out there now that the competition is just much stiffer,” said Tom Clayton, chief executive of Singapore-based Bubble Motion http://www.bubblemotion.com, which develops a popular regional social media app called Bubbly.


Where Hong Kong and Singapore lead, other key markets across fast-growing Asia usually follow.


“Singapore and Hong Kong tend to be, from an electronics perspective, leading indicators on what is going to be hot in Western Europe and North America, as well as what is going to take off in the region,” said Jim Wagstaff, who runs a Singapore-based company called Jam Factory http://www.jamfactoryonline.com developing mobile apps for enterprises.


Southeast Asia is adopting smartphones fast – consumers spent 78 percent more on smartphones in the 12 months up to September 2012 than they did the year before, according to research company GfK http://www.gfkrt.com.


IN WITH THE YOUNG CROWD


Anecdotal evidence of iPhone fatigue isn’t hard to find: Where a year ago iPhones swamped other devices on the subways of Hong Kong and Singapore they are now outnumbered by Samsung and HTC Corp smartphones.


While this is partly explained by the proliferation of Android devices, from the cheap to the fancy, there are other signs that Apple has lost followers.


Singapore entrepreneur Aileen Sim, recently launched an app for splitting bills called BillPin http://www.billpin.com, settling on an iOS version because that was the dominant platform in the three countries she was targeting – Singapore, India and the United States.


“But what surprised us was how strong the call for Android was when we launched our app,” she said.


Indeed, 70 percent of their target users – 20-something college students and fresh graduates – said they were either already on Android or planned to switch over.


“Android is becoming really hard to ignore, around the region and in the U.S. for sure, but surprisingly even in Singapore,” she said. “Even my younger early-20s cousins are mostly on Android now.”


BillPin launched an Android version this month.


Napoleon Biggs, chief strategy officer at Gravitas Group http://www.gravitas.com.hk, a Hong Kong-based mobile marketing company, said that while Apple and the iPhone remained premium brands there, Samsung’s promotional efforts were playing to an increasingly receptive audience.


For some, it is a matter of wanting to stand out from the iPhone-carrying crowd. Others find the higher-powered, bigger-screened Android devices better suited to their changing habits – watching video, writing Chinese characters – while the cost of switching devices is lower than they expected, given that most popular social and gaming apps are available for both platforms.


“Hong Kong is a very fickle place,” Biggs said.


Janet Chan, a 25-year-old Hong Kong advertising executive, has an iPhone 5 but its fast-draining battery and the appeal of a bigger screen for watching movies is prodding her to switch to a Samsung Galaxy Note II.


“After Steve Jobs died, it seems the element of surprise in product launches isn’t that great anymore,” she said.


To be sure, there are still plenty of people buying Apple devices. Stores selling their products in places such as Indonesia were full over the Christmas holidays, and the company’s new official store in Hong Kong’s Causeway Bay has queues snaking out of the door most days.


But the iPhone’s drop in popularity in trendy Hong Kong and Singapore is mirrored in the upmarket malls of the region.


“IPhones are like Louis Vuitton handbags,” said marketing manager Narisara Konglua in Bangkok, who uses a Galaxy SIII. “It’s become so commonplace to see people with iPads and iPhones so you lose your cool edge having one.”


In the Indonesian capital Jakarta, an assistant manager at Coca Cola’s local venture, Gatot Hadipratomo, agrees. The iPhone “used to be a cool gadget but now more and more people use it.”


There is another influence at play: hip Korea. Korean pop music, movies and TV are hugely popular around the region and Samsung is riding that wave. And while the impact is more visible in Hong Kong and Singapore, it also translates directly to places like Thailand.


“Thais are not very brand-loyal,” says Akkaradert Bumrungmuang, 24, a student at Mahidol University in Bangkok. “That’s why whatever is hot or the in-thing to have is adopted quickly here. We follow Korea so whatever is fashionable in Korea will be a big hit.”


(Additional reporting by Lee Chyen Yee in Hong Kong; Khettiya Jittapong and Amy Sawitta Lefevre in Bangkok, and Andjarsari Paramaditha in Jakarta; Editing by Emily Kaiser)


Tech News Headlines – Yahoo! News





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Notre Dame’s Te’o says had no part in forming hoax






Jan 24 (Reuters) – Notre Dame football player Manti Te‘o said he was the victim of an elaborate online hoax and denied in an interview broadcast on Thursday having had any part in the construction of the dramatic story of his dying girlfriend.


“No, I did not,” Te’o said in the interview with Katie Couric broadcast on the daytime talk show “Katie.” “I think what people don’t realize is that the same day that everybody else found out about this situation, I found out.”






The reported deaths of Te’o's grandmother and purported girlfriend, both on Sept. 12, and his response to the tragedies, were often repeated stories during Notre Dame‘s bid for a national championship last season. His grandmother did die that day.


Te’o, who was a finalist for college football’s highest individual honor for helping drive Notre Dame to an undefeated regular season, admitted he maintained the public deception after he learned the truth that she had never existed, but he did not do so for personal gain.


Couric asked Te’o to respond to several theories people have raised since the hoax was revealed, including that he might be gay and created the relationship to hide his sexual orientation.


“No, far from it,” Te’o said when asked by Couric if he were gay. “Far from that.”


Te’o sat with his hands often clasped and responded in a soft tone to Couric‘s questions, telling her he did not know if the Lennay Kekua story had supported his Heisman trophy candidacy.


It was his first on-camera interview since sports blog Deadspin.com broke the story on Jan. 16 that Kekua did not exist. Couric also interviewed his parents, Brian and Ottilia Te‘o, who defended their son.


Notre Dame, one of the most powerful institutions in U.S. collegiate athletics, held a news conference within hours of the Deadspin.com story to say that Te’o had been duped.


Te’o had told sports network ESPN in an off-camera interview on Friday that an acquaintance, Ronaiah Tuiasosopo, had told him he was behind the hoax.


CONFESSED HOAX


Te’o said in the interview with Couric that Tuiasosopo, who he had spoken to twice before and had believed was Kekua‘s cousin, confessed the hoax to him on Jan. 16.


Te’o said he received a telephone call from the person claiming to be Kekua on Dec. 6 – two days before the Heisman presentation – and he wasn’t really certain she never existed until Tuiasosopo‘s confession to him.


“My whole reality was she was dead, and now all of the sudden she’s alive. At that time I didn’t know that it was just somebody’s prank.”


He went along with the Kekua story the day of the Heisman presentation, though he knew at a minimum that she was alive, and did not tell his parents until Christmas, he said.


“Part of me was saying that if you say she is alive what would everybody think? What are you going to tell everybody who follows you, who you inspire? What are you going to say? At that time, on Dec. 8, two days after I just found out she was alive, as a 21-year-old, I wasn’t ready for that.”


Te’o said he “wasn’t forthcoming” about the extent of his relationship with Kekua, that they had never met in person, but reporters did not ask him directly if they had met in person.


He said he was most sorry for having told his father he had seen Kekua in person when he was in Hawaii, a story that his father repeated to media when asked.


When asked why he wouldn’t simply want a girlfriend he could spend time with on campus, Te’o said he was drawn to Kekua because her background appeared similar to his own.


“What I went through was real,” Te’o said. “The feelings, the pain, the sorrow, that was all real. That is something I can’t fake.”


Te’o said he did not know how the hoax would affect his position in the National Football League draft.


“As far as my draft status, I hope and pray that good happens obviously, but as long as my family is OK, I can live with whatever happens,” he said. (Reporting by David Bailey; Editing by Cynthia Johnston and Tim Dobbyn)


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Somalia militants’ Twitter account down after hostage threat






NAIROBI (Reuters) – A Twitter account run by Somali militant group al Shabaab was unavailable on Friday, days after the al Qaeda-aligned rebels used the social media site to boast about killing a French agent and threatened to kill several Kenyan hostages.


Al Shabaab often used its Twitter account to claim responsibility for attacks on African Union and Somali government troops, as well as senior officials in the Horn of Africa nation and other bombings in the region.






But the militant group’s official Twitter account, which had thousands of followers, was offline on Friday with a message saying “Sorry, that user is suspended”.


It was not immediately clear why the account, which was created in 2011 under the HSM PRESS Twitter handle, was suspended. The account was still unavailable as of 0930 GMT.


Twitter said it does not comment on individual accounts and the Kenyan government denied it had filed any request for the account to be taken down.


“It’s an emphatic no. We would not try to negotiate or have anything to do with the Al Shabaab. We didn’t even know the account was suspended,” said government spokesman Muthui Kariuki.


Al Shabaab posted on the account on Wednesday a link to a video of two Kenyan civil servants held hostage in Somalia, telling the Kenyan government their lives were in danger unless it released all Muslims held on “so-called terrorism charges” in the country.


“Kenyan government has three weeks, starting midnight 24/01/2013 to respond to the demands of HSM if the prisoners are to remain alive,” the group said.


Last week the rebel group said on its Twitter account that it had executed French agent Dennis Allex, who was held hostage since 2009, after a French commando mission to rescue him failed.


Al Shabaab wants to impose their strict version of sharia, or Islamic law, across Somalia. However, it has lost significant territory in the southern and central parts of the country in the face of an offensive by African Union troops.


(Reporting by Drazen Jorgic and George Obulutsa; Editing by Jon Boyle)


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Sony fined in UK over PlayStation cyberattack






LONDON (AP) — British regulators have fined Sony 250,000 pounds ($ 396,100) for failing to prevent a 2011 cyberattack on its PlayStation Network which put millions of users’ personal information — including names, addresses, birth dates and account passwords — at risk.


Britain’s Information Commissioner’s Office said Thursday that security measures in place at the time “were simply not good enough.” It said the attack could have been prevented if software had been up to date, while passwords were also not secure.






David Smith, deputy commissioner and director of data protection, acknowledged that the fine for a “serious breach of the Data Protection Act” was “clearly substantial” but said that the office makes “no apologies” for that.


“There’s no disguising that this is a business that should have known better,” he said in a statement. “It is a company that trades on its technical expertise, and there’s no doubt in my mind that they had access to both the technical knowledge and the resources to keep this information safe.”


Smith called the case “one of the most serious ever reported” to the data regulator.


Sony, which has previously apologized for the data breach, said Thursday it “strongly disagrees” with the ruling and plans to appeal.


David Wilson, a spokesman for Sony Computer Entertainment Europe Ltd., said the company noted that the ICO recognized that Sony was the victim of a criminal attack and that there is no evidence payment card details were accessed.


“Criminal attacks on electronic networks are a real and growing aspect of 21st century life and Sony continually works to strengthen our systems, building in multiple layers of defense and working to make our networks safe, secure and resilient,” he said in a statement.


————————


Cassandra Vinograd can be reached at http://twitter.com/CassVinograd


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Google’s 4Q earnings rise despite Motorola woes






SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Google eked out slightly higher earnings in the fourth quarter, despite a financial drag caused by the Internet search leader’s expansion into device manufacturing and a decline in digital ad prices as more people gaze into the smaller screens of smartphones.


The results announced Tuesday pleased investors, helping to lift Google’s stock by 5 percent in extended trading.






More advertising poured into Google during the holiday shopping season, fueling a moneymaking machine that has steadily churned out higher profits since the company went public in 2004. Google’s fourth-quarter ad revenue totaled $ 12.1 billion, a 19 percent increase from the previous year.


Some of that money, though, has been shifting away from personal computers as advertisers try to connect with an expanding audience that relies on smartphones and tablet computers to reach Google’s search engine, email and other online services. By some estimates, about one-fourth of the clicks on Google’s search ads are now coming from mobile devices.


So far, advertisers have been unwilling to pay as much money to market their wares on mobile devices, largely because the smaller screens leave less room for commercial links and other marketing messages. The trend is one of the reasons that the average price for the ads that Google shows next to its search results has fallen from the previous year in five consecutive quarters, including the final three months of last year.


In a positive sign, though, Google’s average ad prices in the most recent quarter dropped by just 6 percent from the same period in 2011. That’s the smallest decline during the pricing downturn, raising hopes that Google may be starting to solve the pricing problems posed by the growing usage of mobile devices.


In a conference call Tuesday, Google CEO Larry Page predicted ad prices will gradually rise as the devices become even more sophisticated to unleash new ways to reach potential customers at the times they are most likely to buy something.


“In today’s multi-screen world, the opportunities are endless,” Page said.


Google earned nearly $ 2.9 billion, or $ 8.62 per share, during the fourth quarter. That compared to net income of $ 2.7 billion, or $ 8.22 per share, at the same time last year.


If not for the costs of employee stock compensation and certain other accounting items, Google said it would have earned $ 10.65 per share. On that basis, Google exceeded the average earnings estimate of $ 10.54 among analysts surveyed by FactSet.


It proved to be a difficult quarter to decipher because of an accounting quirk and the additions of new business lines that muddied the comparisons with the previous year.


For instance, Google Inc. didn’t own Motorola Mobility in 2011, having completed its $ 12.4 billion acquisition of the troubled handset maker eight months ago. What’s more, the Google is bringing in more revenue from tablet computers, which it began selling under the Nexus brand during the final half of last year.


Things were further complicated by Google’s recent agreement to sell a part of the Motorola Mobility division that makes cable TV boxes. That division is now accounted for as a discontinued operation whose revenue wasn’t booked in the latest quarter, even though it will remain a part of Google until the $ 2.35 billion sale is completed later this year.


Under that equation, revenue surged 36 percent from the previous year to $ 14.4 billion.


After subtracting advertising expenses, Google’s revenue totaled $ 11.3 billion. That figure was well below the average analyst estimate of $ 12.1 billion, according to FactSet.


But many of the analyst forecasts included revenue from Motorola Mobility’s set-top division, which Google excluded from its breakdown. Had the set-top division been included in Google’s accounting, the company’s net revenue would have matched analyst estimates.


The performance boosted Google’s stock by $ 35.33 to $ 738.20 in Tuesday’s extended trading.


Google would be doing even better if not for problems at Motorola Mobility, a cellphone pioneer that has been struggling since Apple revolutionized the industry with the release of the iPhone in 2007.


Motorola Mobility suffered an operating loss of $ 353 million on revenue of $ 1.5 billion in the fourth quarter


Google has been able to offset the slump in its search advertising prices by selling more video advertising on its YouTube subsidiary and other more graphical forms of marketing. The number of clicks on Google ads has still been rising, too. That’s important because the company typically gets paid by the click. In the fourth quarter, Google’s total ad clicks rose 24 percent from the previous year.


To gain a foothold in the mobile market, Google bakes its services into its Android software, an operating system that it gives away to makers of smartphones and tablets.


Android is now powers more than 500 million mobile devices worldwide, giving it a wide lead over Apple’s software for iPhones and iPads. Through September, Apple had shipped about 370 million iPhones and iPads. Apple Inc., which has morphed from a Google ally to bigger rival in the past five years, is scheduled to release its fourth-quarter results after the stock market closes Wednesday.


Google, which is based in Mountain View, Calif., didn’t update how many more Android devices were activated in the fourth quarter..


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Cycling-No sympathy for Armstrong on social media






LONDON, Jan 21 (Reuters) – Lance Armstrong’s televised doping confession has done nothing to restore his shattered reputation, a study of responses posted to the Twitter social media site showed.


“What was particularly noticeable in our analysis of the Armstrong revelation was the sheer lack of sympathy out there,” said Charlie Dundas of sports market research company Repucom.






“The tone of the discussion around the Oprah Winfrey interview highlighted the level of disappointment and anger that exists. It’s clear the public are far from ready to forgive Lance Armstrong,” he added.


In the interview, Armstrong admitted to using performance-enhancing drugs on his way to his seven Tour de France titles. The Texan also said he hoped a lifetime ban would one day be lifted to allow him to compete in events like marathons.


The Armstrong interview generated 1.9 million Twitter posts between Jan. 14-20, Repucom said. America accounted for more than a quarter of these, with Australia the second most active nation on the site. (Writing by Keith Weir, editing by Mark Meadows)


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Notre Dame hoax tip was emailed: Deadspin.com editor






CHICAGO (Reuters) – The tip that led to the revelation that one of the most widely recounted U.S. sports narratives of the past year was a hoax came to the editors of an online sports blog as many of their news tips do: an unsolicited email.


That email led Deadspin.com assignment editor Timothy Burke on the hunt of a story that exposed the heart-wrenching tale of standout Notre Dame linebacker Manti Te’o's dead girlfriend as a fabrication, Burke said on CNN on Thursday.






Te’o sprang to national prominence last fall when the senior co-captain was seen heroically leading the Fighting Irish to an underdog victory against the Michigan State Spartans within days of learning his grandmother had died. Moreover, it was widely reported, Te’o's girlfriend had died of leukemia just hours after his grandmother’s death.


From that point, Te’o's narrative was a prominent feature in coverage of the team, which has a dedicated following and whose games are televised nationally each week.


Notre Dame went on to an undefeated regular season, culminating in a berth in the national championship game, which the Fighting Irish lost to the Alabama Crimson Tide on January 7.


“We got an email last week at Deadspin.com that said ‘Hey, there’s something real weird about Lennay Kekua, Manti Te’o's allegedly dead girlfriend. You guys should check it out,’” Burke said.


The email prompted Burke and co-author Jack Dickey to begin searching online for background on Kekua. “So we start Googling the name Lennay Kekua. We can’t find any evidence of this person that wasn’t attached to stories about her being Manti Te’o's dead girlfriend.”


Their investigation led about a week later to a 4,000-word expose, published Wednesday under the headline “Blarney,” that painstakingly debunked the story of Kekua’s existence. The story went viral online.


Within hours of its publication, officials at Notre Dame, one of the most powerful institutions in college football and U.S. collegiate athletics overall, held a hastily organized press conference to assert that Te’o had been duped in a hoax perpetrated by a friend of his.


The girlfriend, who called herself Kekua and claimed to be a Stanford University graduate, was merely an online persona who “ingratiated herself with Manti and then conspired with others to lead him to believe she had tragically died of leukemia,” university spokesman Dennis Brown said in a statement.


Notre Dame Athletic Director Jack Swarbrick said the university learned of the hoax from Te’o on December 26. Te’o answered questions forthrightly and private investigators uncovered several things that pointed to Te’o being a victim in the case, Swarbrick said.


Deadspin’s Burke said he remains skeptical of this being a hoax perpetrated on Te’o rather than by Te’o.


“Ask yourself why and what incentive a person would have to execute such a lengthy, time-consuming and expensive con that would involve multiple people and essentially consume his entire life just to screw around with a guy that he knows?” Burke said on CNN.


Deadspin.com said the woman whose photograph was frequently shown on TV and in news reports about Kekua was actually a young California woman who had never met or communicated with Te’o. The website declined to identify her by name.


On Thursday, TV newsmagazine “Inside Edition” said the woman in the photograph was a 23-year-old marketing professional in Los Angeles named Diane O’Meara. Inside Edition, which is syndicated by CBS Television Distribution, said O’Meara was a former classmate of one of Te’o's friends. It Aredid not give the friend’s name.


In the expose published Wednesday, Deadspin.com said a friend of Te’o's named Ronaiah Tuiasosopo was “the man behind” the hoax.


Outside Tuiasosopo’s home in Palmdale, California on Thursday, a member of his family who did not identify himself told reporters, “Please, we have no comment. Please respect that.”


The Te’o hoax is the latest black eye Notre Dame’s legendary football program has suffered in recent years.


In 2011, the school was fined $ 42,000 by an Indiana agency over the death of football videographer Declan Sullivan, 20, who died in October 2010 after a hydraulic lift he was using to record practice toppled over in high winds.


In 2010, Elizabeth “Lizzy” Seeberg, a freshman at nearby St. Mary’s College, killed herself ten days after accusing a Notre Dame football player of sexual battery. Her family began questioning the campus police department’s reluctance to gather evidence and a 15-day delay in interviewing the accused.


After a federal investigation into the matter, the school agreed to revise its policies on sexual misconduct.


(Additional reporting by Dan Burns, Dana Feldman, David Bailey and Mary Wisniewski.; Editing by Vicki Allen, Greg McCune and Andrew Hay)


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Hundreds attend NYC memorial for Internet activist Aaron Swartz






NEW YORK (Reuters) – Supporters of Aaron Swartz, the 26-year-old Internet activist who committed suicide last week, gathered in New York to remember the computer prodigy on Saturday, with some calling for changes in the criminal justice system they blame for his death.


Swartz, who at 14 helped create an early version of the Web feed system RSS and believed the fruits of academic research and other information should be freely available to all, was found dead a week ago in his Brooklyn apartment.






The city’s chief medical examiner ruled the death a suicide by hanging.


He had been facing trial on federal charges he used the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s computer networks to steal more than 4 million articles from JSTOR, an online archive and journal distribution service.


Swartz, who had also worked on the popular website Reddit, had faced a maximum sentence of 31 years in prison and fines of up to $ 1 million.


“He told me about the 4.5 million downloads of scholarly articles, and my first thought was why isn’t MIT celebrating this?” Edward Tufte, an emeritus professor of computer science at Yale University and a friend of Swartz, said to applause from the crowd gathered in The Cooper Union’s Great Hall in Manhattan.


Taren Stinebrickner-Kauffman, Swartz’s partner, criticized what she described as MIT’s “indifference” to the saga, saying the school could have acted to end his prosecution.


The president of MIT said this week the school was investigating its role in Swartz’s case. JSTOR has said in a statement it settled any dispute with Swartz in 2011 and praised his “important contributions to the development of the Internet.”


CALL FOR CHANGE


At the memorial, attended by hundreds of friends and supporters, the strongest criticisms were reserved for prosecutors in the office of Carmen Ortiz, the U.S. Attorney for Massachusetts.


Roy Singham, the chairman of ThoughtWorks, a software consultancy firm where Swartz worked, called the case against Swartz “an abuse of state power” intended to intimidate Swartz. He called for the reform of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act under which Swartz was prosecuted.


Swartz’s partner said it all became too much for him to bear.


“He was so scared and so frustrated and more than anything so weary I just don’t think he could take it another day,” Stinebrickner-Kauffman said, adding the pair had discussed getting married after the trial.


Ortiz has defended her office’s actions, saying prosecutors “took on the difficult task of enforcing a law they had taken an oath to uphold, and did so reasonably.”


She said they offered Swartz a deal to plead guilty to multiple counts of wire fraud and computer fraud and spend six months at a low-security facility.


Swartz was remembered as a precocious talent who began addressing technology conferences as a teenager and whose quirks included being loath to wash his dishes and preferring bland foods like crackers and white rice.


Many speakers said he was by far the smartest and most intellectually curious person they had known, and called on those in attendance to continue his work of trying to widen the public’s access to information and communication channels.


Stinebrickner-Kauffman said Swartz disliked grand ceremonies and would have been uncomfortable with some aspects of his own memorial.


“But memorial services are for the living,” she said, repeating it several times like a mantra, “and last Friday he forfeited his right to decide that.”


(Editing by Cynthia Johnston and Xavier Briand)


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Samsung updates Galaxy Note 10.1 and Galaxy Tab 2 to Jelly Bean






Owners of the Galaxy Note 10.1 and Galaxy Tab 2 will be happy to learn that Samsung (005930) has begun to update their tablets to Android 4.1 Jelly Bean. The company announced its plans earlier this week, revealing that the Note’s update includes “dramatic improvements to the multitasking and S Pen features,” while the Tab 2 will bring the company’s Premium Suite of features and productivity apps to the device. The addition of Jelly Bean will also give the tablets access to Google Now, Google’s (GOOG) personal assistant feature, and improved performance with Project Butter. The update is available now for Wi-Fi models of the Galaxy Note 10.1, Galaxy Tab 7 and Galaxy Tab 10.1.


[More from BGR: Nintendo’s Wii U problems turn into a crisis]






This article was originally published on BGR.com


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Tina Fey Wants Boring People to Get a License to Twitter






We realize there’s only so much time one can spend in a day watching new trailers, viral video clips, and shaky cell phone footage of people arguing on live television. This is why every day The Atlantic Wire highlights the videos that truly earn your five minutes (or less) of attention. Today:  


RELATED: Jimmy Kimmel Really Hates Kids; Call Me Again Maybe






Tina, you can be in charge of Twitter-licensing any day. And, please, start with Donald Trump….


RELATED: A Bad Lip Read of Edward and Bella; Kimmel Continues to Make Kids Cry


RELATED: The Honey Boo Boo Nature Special; Everyone’s Favorite Sleepwalking Mom


The Atlantic Wire staff (with the exception of our Canadian correspondent) travels on the New York City subway system every single day. We have never seen this man. If you have, give him a dollar for us:


RELATED: Ai Weiwei’s ‘Gangnam Style’ Isn’t Bad


RELATED: So Which Boyfriend Is Taylor Swift Singing About Now?


Parents, please take this piece of advice: If Jimmy Kimmel comes knocking, the answer is always yes. 


And finally, Notre Dame’s Manti Te’o has changed the way we think about Internet relationships. But before you bemoan the terribleness of Internet dating and how awful everyone’s become, we present you this: 


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PC titans take notes from tablets to regain customers






SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Personal computer makers, trying to beat back a tablet mania that’s eating into their sales, are making what may be a last-ditch attempt to sway customers by mimicking the competition.


Many of the laptops to be unveiled around the world in coming months will be hybrids or “convertibles” – morphing easily between portable tablets and full-powered laptops with a keyboard, industry analysts say.






The wave of hybrids comes as Intel Corp and Microsoft Corp, long the twin leaders of the PC industry, prepare to report results this week and next. Wall Street is predicting flat to sluggish quarterly revenue growth for both, underscoring the plight of an industry that has struggled to innovate.


In 2013, some are hoping that will change.


With the release of Microsoft’s touch-centric, re-imagined Windows 8 platform in October and more power-efficient chips from Intel, PC makers are trying to spark growth by focusing on creating slim laptops with touchscreens that convert to tablets and vice versa.


Microsoft, expanding beyond its traditional business of selling software, is expected this month to roll out a “Surface Pro” tablet compatible with legacy PC software developed over decades.


That’s a major selling point for corporate customers like German business software maker SAP, which plans to buy Surface Pros for employees that want it, said SAP Chief Information Officer Oliver Bussmann.


“The hybrid model is very compelling for a lot of users,” Bussmann told Reuters last week. “The iPad is not replacing the laptop. It’s hard to create content. That’s the niche that Microsoft is going after. The Surface can fill that gap.”


Apple’s iPad began chipping away at demand for laptops in 2010, an assault that accelerated with the launch of Amazon.com Inc’s Kindle Fire and other Google Android devices like Samsung Electronics’ Note.


With sales of PCs falling last year for the first time since 2001, this year may usher in a renaissance in design and innovation from manufacturers who previously focused on reducing costs instead of adding new features to entice consumers.


“People used to be able to just show up at the party and do well just because the market was going up,” Lisa Su, a senior vice president at Advanced Micro Devices, which competes against Intel. “It’s harder now. You can’t just show up at the party. You have to innovate and have something special.”


At last week’s Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, devices on display from Intel and others underscored the PC industry’s plan to bet more on convertible laptops.


Lenovo’s North America President Gerry Smith told Reuters last week that over the holidays he sold out of the company’s “Yoga”, a laptop with a screen that flips back behind its keyboard, and the “ThinkPad Twist”, another lightweight laptop with a swiveling screen.


Intel itself showed off a hybrid prototype laptop dubbed “North Cape”, housed in a thin tablet screen that attaches magnetically to a low-profile keyboard. And Asus showed a hefty 18-inch, all-in-one Windows 8 PC that converts to a tablet running Google’s Android operating system.


Lenovo and Asus, which have both won positive reviews for their devices in recent months, increased their PC shipments by 14 percent and 17 percent respectively last year, according to Gartner.


“The number of unique systems that our partners have developed for Windows has almost doubled since launch. That gives an indication of how much innovation is going into the PC market,” Tami Reller, chief financial officer of Microsoft’s Windows unit, told Reuters.


FINGER-POINTING


To be sure, hybrids with detachable or twistable screens do not yet account for a significant proportion of global PC sales, and consumers still need to be sold on their benefits.


Previous attempts by PC makers to reinvigorate the market have had limited success. Pushed by Intel, manufacturers launched a series of slimmed down laptops early last year with features popular on tablets, like solid-state memory.


They were too expensive, often at more than $ 1,000 apiece, and failed to arrest the PC decline.


Microsoft’s Windows 8 launch in October brought touchscreen features but failed to spark a resurgence in PC sales many manufacturers had hoped for. A round of finger-pointing ensued, with PC and chip executives blaming a shortage of touchscreen components and others saying it was the manufacturers that sharply underestimated consumer demand for touch devices.


Regardless, the entire PC ecosystem is onboard for 2013. Almost half of the Windows laptops rolled out this year may have touch screens. Of those, most will be in convertible form, according to IDC analyst David Daoud.


Further blurring the distinction between kinds of devices, about a quarter of upcoming Windows 8 gadgets will be tablets that can easily act as laptops with the help of keyboard accessories, he added.


But buyers may have to wait until the second half of the year to see many of them.


“The most likely scenario today is for the industry to have these products ready for the back-to-school season,” Daoud said.


(Reporting and writing by Noel Randewich; Additional reporting by Poornima Gupta and Bill Rigby in Seattle; Editing by Tim Dobbyn)


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“Banshee” head Greg Yaitanes: secrets galore, but hold the olives






NEW YORK (TheWrap.com) – Like many TV creators, Greg Yaitanes isn’t crazy about the alternate identities people adopt online – and the Emmy-winning former “House” executive producer gets to explore anonymity and becoming someone else in the new Cinemax series “Banshee.”


“I’ve been harassed by ‘House’ Twitter fans for years now. I’m always kind of surprised at people’s level of saying something that they would never say to my face – that they would never say to another human being’s face,” he said.






Not that Yaitanes has a problem with social media – he was an early investor in Twitter, and used a litany of apps and new technology to make his pulpy drama, executive produced by Alan Ball, as scrappy as a tech startup.


With “Banshee,” Yaitanes gets to explore “the best of the wish fulfillment that people have of reinventing themselves or being able to disappear. In a way, all the characters are reinventing themselves.”


Those characters include a thief who steals the identity of the sheriff in Banshee, Pa., his cat burglar ex-girlfriend, who has eked out a new life as a homemaker, and the villain, a man who becomes a criminal mastermind after he is ousted from his Amish community. Then there’s the identity thief – Job – who keeps changing which gender he appears to be.


We talked with Yaitanes about how he made his show look expensive, how to describe Job, and the importance of counting olives.


The Wrap: The show looks expensive – starting with a sequence in New York in which a bus falls over and skids through an intersection. Can you talk about how you kept costs down?


Yaitanes: It’s a way of thinking from working with startups. They’re often one, two, three man operations when they first operate. Twitter was an example of that. You have to look at what is the simplest, most effective way to do this, to deliver to the consumer. We had a very specific box that “Banshee” could be made in, in terms of our budget.


The first thing that came to mind was what I call the “one olive.” The one olive is a story that originates with American Airlines back in the ’80s, when American Airlines took one olive out of their inflight meal – and saved $ 40,000. It’s all about challenging and making everybody their own producer and their own CEO and asking, ‘What is that one thing I can take out that either saves money or makes us that more efficient over the course of 100 days?’


Maybe $ 1,000 isn’t particularly exciting, but when you do it across a season, that’s an official day of shooting. That’s seven more minutes of content that we can get done that day.


We just looked for all these small ways that I feel put nearly an episode’s worth of saving back into the show, so we could make our show more robust and make the action scenes that much bigger and get the actor that we really want.


These are things that the audience gets to enjoy.


What are some of the cost-saving measures?


We also tried to find our olives by using the apps and technology that’s right in front of us, like Skype and Facetime and iChat so we don’t have to fly everybody around? I think probably 75 percent of the crew including directors were hired through some form of video conferencing. You saw the pilot, with the bus crash. We scouted all of that via Google Streetview. We could find blocks and circle around and look up and down and did all the legwork until we absolutely had to go to New York. So we saved on those flights, those hotels, those per diems.


You’ve invested in so many social media sites. Is there something that want to say on the show about the changing nature of identity when we can all take on different personalities online? Your main character, Lucas Hood (Antony Starr) actually takes on another person’s life.


Lucas does the most obvious adoption. A lot of people’s secrets and new identities and new lives are happening before the series starts, which is why we’ve shot an entire online series with our cast.


One of those characters, Job, is constantly in flux – even in terms of whether he appears male or female. Is he transgendered?


He’s straddling this line of androgyny. We specifically don’t want to answer questions about Job’s sexuality… he is a chameleon. He has something that he can tap into depending on his situation. By the time you get to the finale you won’t believe where Job goes.


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Title Post: “Banshee” head Greg Yaitanes: secrets galore, but hold the olives
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