WWWorld.ru · Темы дня · Разделы дня · Интересы дня · 2012 · Свежие новости

U.S. and European regulators today approved Google's $12.5 billion acquisition of Motorola Mobility Holdings, giving the green light to move ahead, although government approvals are still pending in Israel, Taiwan, and most notably China. Google describes the acquisition as a move to supercharge its Android ecosystem. The company estimates that more than 150 million Android devices have been activated worldwide -- and more than 550,000 devices are activated every day -- through a network of about 39 manufacturers and 231 carriers in 123 countries. The announcement set off speculation about Google rocking the smartphone market. Analysts discussed everything from Google making Android exclusive to Moto phones, to Google subsidizing Motorola phones and making them free. There were also questions of whether Google did the deal solely to obtain Motorola's patents and whether or not Google can pull off the merger. Industry analysts are still discussing why Google really wants Motorola to begin with. A Fragmented Mobile OS "I think one of the reasons Google wants Motorola is because they have lost control of Android and they want to get it back," said Michael Disabato, vice president of network and telecom at Gartner. "Google wants all Android phones to look alike and operate alike and they know if they don't take back control, they are going to fragment [the Android] operating system into a million little pieces." One of the promises of the Android operating system was its open-source model, which would allow for various flavors of the mobile OS. Disabato said that's a good model when consumers can create their own experience, but it's not so good when there are multiple vendors and more than a dozen experiences -- and consumers are left without the power to make it their own. "You look at iOS. Apple comes out with a new version and everybody runs and... newsfactor.com »

As car companies pack more onboard gear into their products, Web-browsing, entertainment and all driver communication should be off limits to drivers while a vehicle is in motion, the U.S. Department of Transportation urged this week. The department's National Highway Traffic Safety Administration posted its guidelines online Thursday in the Federal Register, seeking public comment. They call for factory-installed equipment for secondary tasks, those not essential for driving, to be studied for their ability to distract drivers and, in a second phase, if found to be unacceptable, be designed as inoperable by the driver. Too Many Buttons Tasks believed to most interfere with driving include "displaying images and video not related to driving; displaying automatically scrolling text, requiring manual text entry of more than six button or key presses during a single task; or requiring the reading of more than 30 characters of text (not counting punctuation)." The goal is to keep drivers from watching videos, text messaging, Internet browsing or engaging in social media. Public meetings will be held next month in Washington, Chicago and Los Angeles to discuss the guidelines. Specific dates have not yet been announced. The guidelines define distraction as "a specific type of inattention that occurs when drivers divert their attention from the task of driving to focus on other tasks [from] navigation systems and cell phones." Distraction falls into three categories: Visual, aversion of the eyes from the road; manual, removing hands from the wheel; and cognitive, distracting drivers' attention. The NHTSA said crash data show 17 percent of all accidents, or 899,000 events, were caused by driver distraction in 2010. The guidelines are primarily concerned with integrated electronic devices, not more traditional equipment such as climate controls and other dashboard instruments or collision-avoidance control systems. The guidelines also focus on light vehicles rather than trucks because they comprise the... newsfactor.com »

The Amazon Appstore has quickly become a major force in paid mobile app sales for Google's Android platform, according to a new report from Distimo. The mobile app analytics firm found that 42 of the top 110 paid mobile apps available from both Google and Amazon generated more revenue through the Amazon Appstore than Android Market last month. Amazon's new Kindle Fire, which sold more than 3.9 million units in the final three months of 2011, was the driving force behind Amazon's mobile app sales in January. However, Amazon may also have benefited from having less clutter in its Appstore, which offers about 26,800 apps as opposed to the 400,000-plus apps on tap in Android Market. Only 32 percent of the mobile offerings at Android Market were paid apps in January. By contrast, paid mobile apps in Amazon's Appstore accounted for around 65 percent of the total and have also been selling for substantially less than what Google charges, on average. The average price of the top 100 paid applications in the Amazon Appstore is 40 percent lower than in the Google Android Market, said Hendrik Koekkoek, author of the report for Distimo, which is based in Utrecht, The Netherlands. "One of the reasons could be that Amazon is responsible for setting the price in its store," Koekkoek said. "While all available paid apps are $3.13 in the Google Android Market, these applications are $2.77 in the Amazon Appstore." Creating a Platform Within a Platform What Amazon appears to be doing is creating a platform within a platform, and is off to a good start with more than 26,000 apps already in stock, said Al Hilwa, director of applications software development at IDC. "By leveraging the Android ecosystem, Amazon is able to bring apps very quickly [to market]," Hilwa said. "The work involved in... newsfactor.com »

YouTube is enlisting Hollywood's help to reach a generation of viewers more familiar with smartphones than TV remotes. The online video giant is aiming to create 25 hours of programming per day with the help of some of the top names in traditional TV. The Google-owned site is spreading its wealth among producers, directors, and other filmmakers, using a $100 million pot of seed money it committed last fall. The fund represents YouTube's largest spending on original content so far. YouTube believes it is laying groundwork for the future. While the number of traditional TV watchers has leveled off in recent years, more and more people are watching video on mobile phones, tablets and computers, especially the 18- to 34-year-old age demographic that advertisers covet. The idea is to create 96 additional YouTube channels, which are essentially artists' home pages, where viewers can see existing video clips and click "subscribe" to be notified when new content goes up. Well-funded videos by a select roster of stars are likely to be more watchable than the average YouTube fare of cute cats and webcam monologues. YouTube is betting that a solid stream of good content will attract more revenue from advertisers, bring viewers back frequently and bolster its parent company's fledgling Web-connected-TV platform, Google TV. The cash has enticed some of TV's biggest stars, including "Fast Five" director Justin Lin, who directs episodes of "Community," "CSI" creator Anthony Zuiker and Nancy Tellem, the former president of CBS entertainment. Zuiker is teaming up on a horror series for YouTube after observing his own family's behavior. His three pre-teen sons spend more time on phones, iPads and computers than watching TV these days. "We want to jointly take the risk with YouTube and roll the dice on the future," Zuiker says. "The old regime is going to falter because everybody thinks... newsfactor.com »

Earlier this week, IBM showed of the first fruits of its Q1 Labs acquisition, rolling out the QRadar Security Intelligence platform based on technology it acquired last fall. QRadar serves as a control center that integrates real-time security intelligence data from more than 400 different sources. One of the significant planned integrations for the QRadar platform is IBM's X-Force Intelligence Threat Feed, which is based on the real-time monitoring of 13 billion security events per day, on average, for nearly 4,000 clients in more than 130 countries. The QRadar platform will have visibility into the latest security trends worldwide to help protect enterprises against emerging risks. We caught up with Michael Applebaum, Director of Product Marketing at IBM Security Systems Division, to discuss the QRadar approach to security and how it differs from other security platforms on the market. Q: The threats are definitely escalating. It seems like the bad guys are moving faster than the good guys. That's precisely the challenge with traditional security approaches. The volume and variety of attacks of exploit techniques is going to continue growing unabated. You can't catch up simply by trying to plug the gaps and the vulnerabilities that you discover every week. You have to step back and look at the situation holistically. How can we detect and prioritize what's going on across our organization in a unified way? Because the current approaches just don't scale and they don't work. Q: How is IBM's approach different from competing security platforms? It's about bringing more integration and automation to bear across a spaghetti, patchwork approach that most organizations have built in. Most security products fulfill a very specific but limited role, but attacks and threats today are multi-faceted. You might see a glimmer of an attack in one part of your enterprise and you might see a glimmer... newsfactor.com »

Broadcasters have sued a startup backed by media billionaire Barry Diller that sends live local TV feeds to iPhones and iPads in the New York area. Two groups of broadcasters, including ABC, CBS, NBC, Fox and the local PBS station, filed suits Thursday in federal court, saying Aereo Inc.'s service uses their content without permission. Aereo launched two weeks ago, but it's available by invitation only. Subscribers pay $12 per month for access to 27 locally broadcast TV channels through the Web browsers on their Apple devices. It's set to open up to more subscribers on March 14. The company hopes to expand service to other cities. Aereo says the suits are groundless and it looks forward to "a full and fair airing of the issues." Aereo has more than $25 million in venture capital backing, with more than $20 million of it coming from a funding round led by InterActiveCorp, which owns Match.com, Ask.com and other Web sites. Diller is the chairman of InterActiveCorp and the former CEO of Fox. The startup exploits what it believes is a loophole in the laws governing retransmission of local broadcasts. It doesn't use one big antenna to pick up the local broadcasts and relay them to the Internet. Instead, it uses one tiny antenna for each subscriber that's watching. People are entitled to watch local broadcast TV when they use their own antennas, and Aereo believes that what it's doing, legally speaking, is acting as a remote antenna for each subscriber, rather than taking broadcasts and retransmitting them. Broadcasters aren't buying that argument. "Aereo's service to the end user is similar to and competes with cable or satellite operators and telephone companies that also retransmit broadcast programming to their subscribers, except that Aereo's service is unlawful," said the suit filed by ABC, CBS, NBC and others. newsfactor.com »

Apple Inc. is investing $304 million in a new campus and more than doubling its workforce in the Texas capital, boosted by a $21 million incentive from a state fund designed to attract high-tech companies, Gov. Rick Perry said Friday. The investment from the Texas Enterprise Fund comes in exchange for a promise that Apple will add more than 3,600 employees at its new facility in Austin over the next decade, including customer support, sales and accounting staff, Perry said. "Investments like this further Texas' potential to become the nation's next high-tech hub," the governor said in a statement. Already the world's most valuable company, Apple's market capitalization topped $500 billion this month and remains above that mark -- rarefied air that only a few firms, including rival Microsoft and Exxon Mobil Corp, have ever exceeded. "Our operations in Austin have grown dramatically over the past decade, from less than 1,000 employees in 2004 to more than 3,500 today," said Steve Dowling, a spokesman for the Cupertino, California, company. This week, Apple unveiled its new iPad, featuring a sharper screen and faster processing chip, though the added features mean the tablet computer is slightly thicker and heavier than its predecessor, iPad 2. The enterprise fund is one of two designed to entice technology companies and top researchers to Texas. Perry said the payout to Apple is one of the largest and the company's job pledge one of the most ambitious since the fund was created in 2003. He said the fund has invested more than $443.4 million and signed contracts to generate 62,000 new jobs and more than $15.4 billion in capital investment. Critics of using state money to attract private enterprise call the fund an example of "crony capitalism," complaining that it funnels taxpayer dollars to politically connected firms with little guarantee of job creation. The... newsfactor.com »

Do you remember your first tweet? Six years is a near eternity in the social media world -- and that's the age of Twitter. People across the Internet are giving Twitter a hearty Happy Birthday. Twitter counts more than 140 million active users and a whopping 340 million tweets a day. Twitter did the math, and that equals more than 1 billion tweets every three days. And Twitter shows no signs of slowing down -- at least not anytime soon. Microsoft Windows announced, "Happy Birthday #Twitter!" while MTV turned the event into an occasion to dialog with its followers: "The first tweet was sent 6 years ago. How long have you been tweeting?" And Latoya Jackson got in on the celebration, tweeting "RT if you love #Twitter! I've met so many people I thought I'd never meet! Thanks Twitter!!! Twitter's Disintermediation Twitter has gone from a sheer microblogging tool to a cultural stethoscope. On Super Tuesday, for example, Twitter produced chart maps of conversations about each Republican presidential candidate over the course of the day, including volumes of tweets. Brad Shimmin, an analyst at Current Analysis, said some conventions, like CompuServe in the early days of the Internet and more recently MySpace and Facebook, have become part of mainstream popular culture. Social networking sites have left an indelible mark on society in terms of how consumers think about collaborating and working with one another, he said, but Twitter has done more than that. "Twitter hasn't just left a mark. Twitter has changed the way we view virtual life and what we think of traditional means of interacting with one another," Shimmin said. "Before Twitter there was a large distance between someone writing news and someone reading news. The people who are being interviewed and were making the news were separated from the consumer... newsfactor.com »

You'll love the blistering data speeds on the new iPad models with 4G wireless. What you may not love is how fast you could exhaust your monthly data allotment, or the cost of using that data when the preferred method of connecting, Wi-Fi, is unavailable. Less than 24 hours after purchasing the Verizon Wireless version of the iPad + 4G -- and choosing a $30, 2GB monthly data plan from Verizon -- I was shocked by the notification on my iPad's screen: "There is no data remaining on your current plan." My remaining options for the month included changing to a $50 5GB data plan or an $80 10GB plan. (AT&T offers a 250MB plan for $14.99; 3GB for $30; and 5GB for $50.) I was all too aware that you can consume gobs of data while streaming a movie, say, on Verizon's or AT&T's speedy 4G LTE data networks. Heck, you can use up your entire monthly allowance watching an hour of high-definition video. You can also stream video on a 3G connection, and that same movie carries the same amount of data no matter how it is being delivered. The difference is that 4G provides a far superior viewing experience, without the hiccups and starts and stops that might make you give up on movie watching or certain other activities under 3G. And 4G LTE loads data faster than on the pokier networks. (Verizon claims that 4G downloads 10 times faster than 3G.) So by its very nature, 4G encourages you to do more -- and ultimately spend more. In my case, I wasn't watching video. What nailed me, I think, is that I was wirelessly downloading a number of the apps that I had already purchased for my older iPad onto the latest model. Those apps were made available through Apple's iCloud. To... newsfactor.com »

Have you ever lost a cell phone? You are not alone. In 2011, U.S. consumers lost more than $30 billion worth of cell phones, according to mobile security provider Lookout. Lookout just released the findings of its first-ever phone loss study. And the results are disturbing for enterprises concerned about mobile security. Lost phones, if unrecovered, could cost U.S. consumers more than $30 billion in 2012. "Each day, $7 million worth of phones are lost by Lookout users alone, and if unrecovered, it would take a significant toll not only on our wallets, but on our psyche too," said Kevin Mahaffey, co-founder and CTO Lookout. "Safeguarding your smartphone starts with protecting it from the number one risk you face -- losing it." Mobile Device Management? Based on more than 15 million users, Lookout's analysis found that demographics and behavior are the largest factors influencing phone loss. Over the course of 2011, Lookout located 9 million lost smartphones, which equals one phone every 3.5 seconds. In total, Lookout found that U.S. consumers lose their phone about once a year. If unrecovered, that could cost every smartphone owner more than $250 a year each. "The concept of Mobile Device Management is inherently flawed. I am not controlling the device. What I need to do is put a container out there that's encrypted, stuff everything in it and if it gets lost make sure there are no authentication credentials in it that can penetrate the container. Erase the container and it all goes," said Michael Disabato, managing vice president of network and telecom at Gartner. "If it's a BYOD all you are touching is the container and you get rid of all the enterprise information leaving the employee's information alone. If the phone gets stolen, you can then do a device reset and erase everything and give employees some... newsfactor.com »

Groupon's announcement that its revenue and earnings were lower than what it reported in February is sparking fresh worries about the young company's business model. Trouble arose when the online deals company said late Friday that it had to revise its previously issued fourth-quarter results to increase the money it set aside for refunds to customers. A big reason: It is selling more expensive deals, such as vacation packages and Botox procedures, which have higher return rates. Investors responded by selling Groupon's stock on Monday, and shares fell 17 percent. Some analysts are wondering if Groupon, which began trading publicly less than five months ago, will be able to leave behind its growing pains. "We believe Groupon is now a `show-me' story, where a company's ambitions are higher than the level of its internal planning and controls," Jordan Rohan, an analyst with Stifel Nicolaus, said in a note to investors. He downgraded the company's stock to "Sell," from "Hold." "The company claims that the returns do not threaten its expansion and growth," Rohan wrote. "We prefer to wait and see." Internal controls are systems that companies have in place to make sure that their financial reporting is accurate and that they can meet business goals. Late Friday afternoon -- a popular time for companies to release bad news -- Groupon also disclosed that its auditors found a weakness in its internal controls, but insisted that its business is solid. Founded in November 2008, Groupon pioneered the online daily deals market, which offers subscribers deep discounts on everything from restaurant meals to tech gadgets to weekend getaways if enough people buy in. It sparked many copycats, including LivingSocial, Google and Facebook, though the latter ended up abandoning the effort. In terms of mere numbers, the financial restatement doesn't amount to much. The revision lowered the company's fourth-quarter revenue... newsfactor.com »

So you thought Macs couldn't fall prey to hackers? Think again. A Trojan horse is entering through the back door of Apple computers with a nasty payload -- and it hit more than a half-million users before Apple slammed it shut. The Flashback Trojan infects computers running Mac OS X. The massive botnet is now using upward of 550,000 infected Macs, most of which are reportedly in the United States and Canada, according to Russian anti-virus vendor Dr. Web. Here's how victims are getting infected: the Trojan is redirecting Mac users to a bogus site from a compromised resource or via a traffic distribution system. Then, Java code is used to load a Java applet that contains the exploit, Dr. Web explained. News reports indicate links to more than 4 million compromised pages were on Google at the end of March. Target On Your Mac? We asked Graham Cluley, senior security analyst at Sophos, about his thoughts on the latest attack against the Apple platform. "Undoubtedly more and more Mac users will be targeted by malware," Cluley said. "Although there is much more malware for Windows than Mac, that's not to say that Mac malware doesn't exist." Why so much focus on Mac when they have so little market share? Because, Cluley says, Mac market share is growing and, unfortunately, many Mac users have been far too laid-back when it comes to security, incorrectly believing that they're somehow immune to attacks. "Inevitably, some cybercriminals will target Mac users because they are a 'soft target' which hasn't protected itself as well as Windows users," Cluley said. "Run an anti-virus, keep your Mac patched with the latest security updates. Luckily there are free anti-virus products for Mac home users." Sophos has a free anti-virus product on its Web site. Apple has issued a patch that fixes... newsfactor.com »

Google is tweaking its social network, Google Plus, to make it easier to use and to distinguish it from rival Facebook. The most visible change is a new navigation ribbon on the left side of the Google Plus page with icons for the most used features, such as games, photos and your personal profile. Hover over an icon to do specific tasks, such as add photos from your phone or an online album. You can reorder the features in the ribbon and hide the ones you don't use often. The changes, announced Wednesday, are designed to help Google Plus adapt more easily to growth -- and to make room for new features in the future. In a blog post, Google calls the ribbon "an obvious (and clutter-free) space for The Next Big Feature, and The Feature After That." Google Inc. CEO Larry Page has made Google Plus the centerpiece of his effort to tie all of the company's services together. Google is worried that Facebook has been carving out a competitive advantage by stockpiling valuable information about people's social circles and interests. The data has given Facebook the means to target ads precisely and deliver content tied to a user's hobbies and tastes. Google said Google Plus has attracted more than 170 million users since its debut nine months ago. That lags Facebook's 845 million user count, but it's far greater than Facebook's tally at that stage in its history. Google Plus has yet to hold most users' attention. Visitors have been spending an average of just a few minutes per month on the network, compared with six to seven hours on Facebook, according to the research firm comScore Inc. The new design could help Google retain users by making the experience more pleasant. The navigation ribbon, for instance, offers users more flexibility than Facebook in customizing a... newsfactor.com »

Nineteen technology companies have announced plans to become Platinum and Gold members of the new, independent OpenStack Foundation, which will manage and house the OpenStack open-source cloud operating system. The companies include AT&T, Canonical, Hewlett-Packard, IBM, RackSpace, Red Hat, Cisco, Dell and Yahoo. The members plan on providing technical and financial support to the foundation, as well as supporting the OpenStack concept. More than 150 Companies Jonathan Bryce, a member of the OpenStack Project Policy Board and co-founder of the Rackspace Cloud, said in a statement accompanying the announcement that, "in less than two years, we've had five software releases from hundreds of contributors from more than 50 companies." He added that the cloud operating system has grown in that time from two core projects to five, focused on computing, storage, and networking. The foundation is now in the process of forming a drafting committee to create the bylaws, which will be offered for community review. The intent is to have them ready for ratification by third quarter. OpenStack is an open-source platform and software for building public and private clouds. It currently has support from more than 150 companies, over 2,600 project participants worldwide, and has been downloaded more than 100,000 times. It is designed to allow businesses to manage computing, storage and networking resources in the cloud through a self-service portal and APIs that are used on standard hardware, in a massively scalable cloud operating system. In summer of 2010, hosting provider Rackspace announced it was opening the code for its cloud infrastructure, and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration said it would provide its Nebula cloud technology to the initiative. Nebula was an open-source cloud computing project and service for providing an alternative to additional data centers for NASA scientists and engineers. It was first developed in 2008 at the NASA... newsfactor.com »

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Social-network Path lined up more than $30 million in venture funding from Redpoint Ventures and others, illustrating investors' increasing willingness to pour money into variations on the basic theme of online networking. Reuters: Internet News »

Apple's efforts to improve working conditions at the factories that make its iPhones and iPads in China may resonate more with consumers in that fast-growing market than in the U.S. That's because consumers in China and other emerging markets say they're more willing to support or boycott companies based on their business practices, a growing body of research shows. In a survey last year of more than 10,000 consumers in 10 countries by Cone Communications and Echo Research, nearly three of four respondents in China said they were very likely to switch brands to one associated with a good cause, if there was an alternative in the same price range and of similar quality. That compares with half of respondents in the U.S. and about half of all respondents surveyed. Meanwhile, 83% of respondents in China said they refused to buy a company's product when they learned that the company acted irresponsibly, compared with 50% in the U.S. and 56% overall. A 2010 Edelman study of more than 7,000 consumers in 13 countries also showed that those in China, India, Brazil and Mexico were more likely than those in the U.S. to switch products to support certain causes. One key cause, labor rights, found support among 94% in China, compared with 76% in the U.S. and 79% overall. The findings highlight one of the challenges of doing business in emerging markets. But what consumers say and what they do can be two different things. "I've done these surveys for years, and I hear the same thing," that a company's corporate responsibility might lead consumers to support or shun a product, says Tim Bajarin, president of Creative Strategies, a high-tech research firm in Campbell, Calif. In reality, "corporate responsibility is rarely factored into consumer buying decisions." Despite problems in Apple's supply chain, its handheld devices and computers remain wildly... newsfactor.com »

When Facebook paid a cool 1 billion dollars for photo-sharing app Instagram recently, there was plenty of eye-rolling about such a young company using its overvalued stock to pay too much for an even younger player. By some measures it was a bargain. Instagram CEO Kevin Systrom initially demanded 2 billion dollars for his fledgling, 14-employee company, the Wall Street Journal reported this week. Nevertheless, coming just days after social game maker Zynga paid 200 million for OMGPop, the maker of the hit game DrawSomething, the deal seemed to many to signify that the dreaded froth of the dot com bubble was once again fizzing to the surface. But to understand the reasons for these deals it can be just as helpful to put yourself in the flip flops of a typical American teenager as the loafers worn by a Silicon Valley executive. Fifteen-year-old Mason Tate, the proud owner of an iPhone 4, often checks her Facebook page on her smartphone, but is even more enchanted with the tricked-out photos her friends send her on Instagram. One of the more than 30 million users of the app which launched less than two years ago, she says the photo-sharing app fits her mobile style far better than Facebook. "It's fun, it's simple and it's quick," she says. "What more could we ask for?" That kind of sentiment is what probably persuaded Facebook founder and chief Mark Zuckerberg to reach deep into his investors' pockets for the company. Of course the purchase price represents just 1 per cent of Facebook's predicted value at its imminent initial public stock offering, but it nevertheless underscores what could be the most significant shift in digital lifestyle since the Internet went mainstream -- the superceding of the trusty PC by mobile computers and the rise of the app economy. Instagram commanded a... newsfactor.com »

When Louis C.K. released his comedy special "Live at the Beacon Theater" by himself on his Web site for $5, it was little more than a cautiously optimistic experiment. Less than two weeks later, it had reaped more than $1 million. Already among the most respected stand-ups in the country, Louis C.K. was suddenly a new media trailblazer, too. On Tuesday, the Webby Awards announced Louis C.K. is their "person of the year" for setting "a new precedent for distribution." Comedians Aziz Ansari and Jim Gaffigan have since similarly released albums online. The Webbys, which celebrate Internet achievement, announced the winners of its 16th annual awards on Tuesday. The International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences, which present the awards, shared the winners with The Associated Press shortly before they were to make an official announcement. The awards spanned the breath of the Internet, from mobile apps like Instagram and Pinterest that have disrupted social media, to entertainers charting new digital ground, like Louis C.K. and Bjork. Bjork was named artist of the year. Last year, the Icelandic musician released the album "Biophilia" as a multimedia presentation of music and apps. She was among the special recognitions named by the Webbys, which also cited the photo app Instagram as breakout of the year. It was recently acquired by Facebook for $1 billion. "It's been a huge year of change," said David-Michel Davies, executive director of the International Academy of Digital Arts & Sciences, a group of about 1,000 Web experts and Internet professionals. Also specially honored were Juliette Lewis and Graydon Sheppard, who share the award for best actress for the viral video "S--- Girls Say." The video, which parodies common expressions, has been watched more than 16.2 million times on YouTube and spawned a viral sensation of countless similar videos. Sheppard, a male comic, appears in drag... newsfactor.com »

He famously wears a hoodie, jeans and sneakers, and he was born the year Apple introduced the Macintosh. But Mark Zuckerberg is no boy-CEO. Facebook's chief executive turned 28 on Monday, setting in motion the social network's biggest week ever. The company is expected to start selling stock to the public for the first time and begin trading on the Nasdaq Stock Market on Friday. The IPO could value Facebook at nearly $100 billion, making it worth more than such iconic companies as Disney, Ford and Kraft Foods. At 28, Zuckerberg is exactly half the age of the average S&P 500 CEO, according to executive search firm Spencer Stuart. With eight years on the job, he's logged more time as leader than the average CEO, whose tenure is a little more than seven years, according to Spencer Stuart. Even so, the pressures of running a public company will undoubtedly take some getting used to. Once Facebook begins selling stock, Zuckerberg will be expected to please a host of new stakeholders, including Wall Street investment firms, hedge funds and pension funds who will pressure him to keep the company growing. Young as he may seem -- especially in that hooded sweatshirt -- Zuckerberg will be about the same age as Michael Dell and older than Steve Jobs when those two took their companies, Dell Inc. and Apple Inc., public. In his years as Facebook's CEO he's met world leaders, rode a bull in Vietnam while on vacation, started learning Mandarin Chinese and as a personal challenge, wore a tie for the better part of a year. Facebook, of course, got its start in Zuckerberg's messy Harvard dorm room in early 2004. Known as Thefacebook.com in those days, the site was created to help Harvard students -- and later other college students -- connect with one another... newsfactor.com »

Facebook is updating its data use policy in an attempt to give people more clarity on how the company uses information they share. As part of the changes, Facebook is also signaling that it may start showing people ads on sites other than Facebook, targeting the pitches to interests and hobbies that users express on Facebook. The move comes a week before Facebook Inc.'s expected initial public offering of stock. Facebook held events with potential investors this week, including one in Silicon Valley on Friday, and it has posted a version of its road show online. The offering could value Facebook at nearly $100 billion -- more than Kraft, Ford and other major brands. The policy changes are in response to an audit by Irish data-protection authorities last year, Facebook said Friday. The commission had asked Facebook to be more transparent about how it collects people's data and uses it for advertising, as well as how long it keeps such information. Facebook plans to notify its more than 900 million users of the changes through advertisements around the site and on its mobile apps. Users who want to dig deeper can read a version of the policy that highlights the changes word by word. Erin Egan, Facebook's chief privacy officer, will host an online chat Monday to answer any questions. Egan said the company wasn't substantially changing its business practices, but wants to "err on the side of providing too much information." Facebook's overseas headquarters are based in Dublin, Ireland, a member of the European Union. This means the company is required to comply with European data privacy laws. Facebook said the changes were also a response to feedback from its users. As part of the changes to the policy, Facebook has created a section to explain how it uses technologies such as cookies to deliver ads,... newsfactor.com »

LightSquared Inc., which hoped to create an independent wireless broadband network in the U.S., filed for bankruptcy protection on Monday. Regulators blocked its plan this winter because of concerns that its transmissions would interfere with GPS navigation. LightSquared hasn't given up. Chief Financial Officer Marc Montagner said in a statement that the bankruptcy filing is intended to gain the company "breathing room" while it continues to work through its regulatory issues. It has said that it has invested more than $4 billion in the network. LightSquared listed assets and liabilities of more than $1 billion each in the filing Monday with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York. The company, which is based in Reston, Virginia, is owned by Harbinger Capital Partners, a private-equity firm that made billions betting against subprime mortgages ahead of the collapse of the housing market. Harbinger bought SkyTerra, a provider of satellite communications services to businesses, in 2010. It then lobbied the Federal Communications Commission to allow it to use the spectrum set aside for SkyTerra for ground-based communications -- essentially, a conventional wireless broadband network, rather than a satellite-based one. But SkyTerra's licenses were for spectrum adjacent to a band used by GPS satellites. On the ground, GPS units had no problem filtering out transmissions from SkyTerra's satellites, but regulators determined that they could be disrupted by strong, ground-based signals. LightSquared's CEO, telecom veteran Sanjiv Ahuja, resigned in February. The company's largest creditors are Boeing Satellite Systems Inc., owed $7.5 million, and telecom equipment maker Alcatel-Lucent, owed $7.3 million, according to the filing. newsfactor.com »

"Android" and "fragmentation" are two terms that go together so often, it's sometimes hard to remember that Android is supposed to be a single platform. But how fragmented is Android? An app provider is now trying to answer that question with a study and some images. The company, Open Signal, has been logging over the last six months new Android devices that have downloaded its OpenSignalMaps, which recommends the best network in an area. The data shows the model, brand, API level, and screen sizes for more than 680,000 devices. The result: 3,997 distinct devices and 599 brands. Samsung Galaxy S II Open Signal noted that the actual number of different devices is probably somewhat lower, since those devices with custom ROMs report back their identities differently than other devices. Open Signal created a Device Model Map of its data, and another of Brands. Each contains larger squares representing the most popular devices and tiny ones standing in for the obscure ones. The resulting image looks like a distorted map of Manhattan, dominated by a few larger squares and then breaking into tiny slivers in one corner. The most popular Android device in their survey is the Samsung Galaxy S II, with more than 61,000 users of Open Signal's app. The obscure devices represented by tiny slivers include the Concorde Tab from Hungary, the Lemon P1 in India, and the Energy Tablet i724 in Spain. On the brand front, Samsung won again, representing about 40 percent of the total, or about 270,000 devices. Others include HTC, Sony Ericsson, Motorola, Verizon, Sprint, Huawei, KDDI, T-Mobile, Vodafone, Google, Cingular, and more -- nearly 600 in all. There are also a variety of API levels, which are determined by their Android version. Open Signal said that API levels "have become more fragmented over time," which, they added, "seems natural" since... newsfactor.com »