Yahoo Rolls the Dice on TV

Yahoo Rolls the Dice on TV

APRIL 13, 2014

David Carr

THE MEDIA EQUATION

Yahoo, a company that seems like a permanent adolescent in search of an identity, is about to try a new persona: high-quality television programmer. Read more of this post

Tech insiders dumped shares ahead of slide

April 13, 2014 4:47 pm

Tech insiders dumped shares ahead of slide

By Richard Waters in San Francisco

Insiders at some of the hottest private and publicly traded internet companies unloaded substantial personal stakes ahead of the slump in tech stocks that started at the beginning of March. Read more of this post

How Gmail Happened: The Inside Story of Its Launch 10 Years Ago Today

How Gmail Happened: The Inside Story of Its Launch 10 Years Ago Today

Google’s email breakthrough was almost three years in the making. But it wasn’t a given that it would reach the public at all

If you wanted to pick a single date to mark the beginning of the modern era of the web, you could do a lot worse than choosing Thursday, April 1, 2004, the day Gmail launched. Read more of this post

Steve Jobs promised ‘holy war’ on Google, court hears

Last updated: April 2, 2014 12:00 am

Steve Jobs promised ‘holy war’ on Google, court hears

By Tim Bradshaw in San Jose

Steve Jobs warned Apple’s leadership a year before his death that the company he founded faced an “innovator’s dilemma” over the growing threat from Google and promised a “holy war” on smartphones running its Android software, according to evidence shown in court on Tuesday Read more of this post

Apple and Samsung are again squaring off in the legal ring. But this is a sideshow. The more pressing issue is that the days of easy money in the smartphone business are over

Apple, Samsung Prize the Fight

DAN GALLAGHER

April 1, 2014 3:36 p.m. ET

Apple AAPL +0.91% and Samsung are again squaring off in the legal ring. It may be time to shake hands and call it a draw. Read more of this post

Amazon Will Now Allow Returns Using Lockers

Amazon Will Now Allow Returns Using Lockers

GREG BENSINGER

Amazon.com has quietly rolled out a new service to let customers return unwanted merchandise using large metal lockers it has installed for deliveries in garages, convenience and grocery stores in major metropolitan areas. Read more of this post

Windows XP: Old Platforms Die Hard, Security Risks Live On; Utilities, Banks Have Been Slow to Upgrade Machines, ATMs

Windows XP: Old Platforms Die Hard, Security Risks Live On

Utilities, Banks Have Been Slow to Upgrade Machines, ATMs

RACHAEL KING and DANNY YADRON

Some 300 million computers, including many that manage water, electric and sewage treatment plants and ATMs, will soon be left unprotected from new security threats. Read more of this post

Using Free Wi-Fi to Connect Africa’s Unconnected; Kenya’s Safaricom Outfits City Buses, Rural Markets to Get Consumers Hooked on Mobile Internet

Using Free Wi-Fi to Connect Africa’s Unconnected

Kenya’s Safaricom Outfits City Buses, Rural Markets to Get Consumers Hooked on Mobile Internet

HEIDI VOGT

Updated April 13, 2014 4:52 p.m. ET

NAIROBI, Kenya—As young pitchmen shout to potential passengers over blaring music, a graffiti-covered private minibus fills up more quickly than the other dozen in the scrum. It has free Wi-Fi. Read more of this post

Airline Industry Warms to Costly Real-Time Tracking After Flight 370

Airline Industry Warms to Costly Real-Time Tracking After Flight 370

ANDY PASZTOR and JON OSTROWER

Updated April 2, 2014 12:25 a.m. ET

The disappearance of Malaysia Airlines 3786.KU 0.00% Flight 370 is prompting leaders of the global airline industry to warm up to a safety measure they long have resisted as too expensive: real-time satellite tracking of practically all airliners. Read more of this post

How Dropbox Knows When You’re Sharing Copyrighted Stuff (Without Actually Looking At Your Stuff)

How Dropbox Knows When You’re Sharing Copyrighted Stuff (Without Actually Looking At Your Stuff)

Posted yesterday by Greg Kumparak (@grg)

Late last night, a tweet was spread far and wide showing that a DMCA notice had blocked a file from being shared on a Dropbox user’s account.

As of this afternoon, it’s seen just shy of 3 thousand retweets. Read more of this post

How a secret iOS feature could change the Internet

How a secret iOS feature could change the Internet

March 31, 2014: 11:38 AM ET

Mesh networks: An explainer.

By Ryan Bradley

FORTUNE — A few weeks ago, a messaging app called FireChat launched. It looks, at first, like just about any other messaging app in an already very crowded market, but FireChat is sneakily subversive and quite possibly the most important thing to happen to the Internet since international network hubs began to form in 1995. Read more of this post

Rewriting the gloomy headlines; Investment from the likes of Jeff Bezos is changing US journalism

Last updated: March 31, 2014 7:40 pm

Rewriting the gloomy headlines

By Emily Steel

Jeff Bezos, centre-right, visits the Post after buying it last year, but he does not sit in on news meetings Read more of this post

Yahoo Is in Talks to Buy Online-Video Service NDN to Compete With Google’s YouTube

Yahoo Is in Talks to Buy Online-Video Service NDN — Sources

Deal Would Help Yahoo Compete With Google’s YouTube

DOUGLAS MACMILLAN

Updated March 31, 2014 5:44 p.m. ET

Yahoo Inc. YHOO 0.00% is in preliminary talks to acquire online-video service News Distribution Network Inc., a deal that would help Chief Executive Marissa Mayer compete with Google Inc. GOOG -0.50% ‘s YouTube for viewers and ad dollars. Read more of this post

The Chamber of Commerce Comes to Silicon Valley; Powerful Lobby Group Tries to Win Over Startups, VCs

The Chamber of Commerce Comes to Silicon Valley

Powerful Lobby Group Tries to Win Over Startups, VCs

JONATHAN KRIM

March 31, 2014 7:34 p.m. ET

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, among the most powerful business lobbying organizations in Washington, is planning a second outpost in Silicon Valley in an effort to broaden its membership and clout. Read more of this post

HBO’s ‘Silicon Valley’ tackles tricky, quirky tech world for TV; “It’s a world where someone could be worth a billion one day and nothing the next. So there is a lot at stake and a lot of really interesting introvered brilliant people”

HBO’s ‘Silicon Valley’ tackles tricky, quirky tech world for TV

5:58pm EDT

(Note explicit language in paragraph 17)

By Mary Milliken

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – If Mike Judge’s new tech-world television comedy “Silicon Valley” were a start-up, Google Inc Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt might be an angel investor. Read more of this post

Facebook Has Become The New Yahoo, And It’s Obvious Mark Zuckerberg Knows It

Facebook Has Become The New Yahoo, And It’s Obvious Mark Zuckerberg Knows It

NICHOLAS CARLSON TECH  MAR. 31, 2014, 3:18 AM

One thing Silicon Valley industry insiders like to knowingly whisper to each other is that Facebook is the new Yahoo. Read more of this post

Internet security firm Trend Micro teamed up with Taiwanese gaming companies to launch a mobile security app on Monday that promises a safer environment for local gamers

Trend Micro launches security app for gaming industry

CNA
March 31, 2014, 12:08 am TWN

TAIPEI — Internet security firm Trend Micro Inc. teamed up with Taiwanese gaming companies to launch a mobile security app on Monday that promises a safer environment for local gamers. Read more of this post

Is Facebook Too Big to Care?

Is Facebook Too Big to Care?

By VINDU GOEL

MARCH 30, 2014, 1:00 PM  16 Comments

Facebook’s chief executive, Mark Zuckerberg, has always followed his own instincts when making decisions about the company he founded 10 years ago. But several events over the last week make you wonder: Has the company gotten so successful that it doesn’t care what other people think about it? Read more of this post

World Wrestling Entertainment has positioned itself on the cutting edge of Internet television with its new subscription-only streaming video service

WWE Network Is Loud Introduction to the Video Streaming Ring

By SETH BERKMANMARCH 30, 2014

When listing the visionary media moguls of the digital age, Vince McMahon, the professional wrestling impresario, might not immediately come to mind.

Yet Mr. McMahon and his company, World Wrestling Entertainment, have positioned themselves on the cutting edge of Internet television with the WWE Network, a new subscription-only streaming video service. Introduced in February, the network broadcasts the pro wrestling extravaganzas that were once available only on cable and satellite television. Read more of this post

How a 19-year-old hacker behind Oculus Rift set out to invent a gaming headset but ended up reviving a dead technology and building a global communications platform

The Virtual Genius of Oculus Rift

Lev Grossman @leverus

March 26, 2014

How a 19-year-old hacker behind Oculus Rift set out to invent a gaming headset but ended up reviving a dead technology and building a global communications platform, worth $2 billion to Facebook in a surprise deal announced this week Read more of this post

Battle of the Dash: Tech Companies Try to Get Their Apps in a Row

Battle of the Dash: Tech Companies Try to Get Their Apps in a Row

By JOHN R. QUAINMARCH 28, 2014

Will Apple’s CarPlay dominate the dashboards of future cars? Is Ford planning to kick Microsoft out of its Sync system? Are Audi and General Motors going for Google? Or does QNX, a dark horse whose software is already in tens of millions of vehicles, have the cards to trump other high-tech companies? Read more of this post

Did Facebook Buy Virtual Reality Too Soon?

Did Facebook Buy Virtual Reality Too Soon?

By NICK BILTON

I wasn’t in the room when Mark Zuckerberg tried on the Oculus Rift virtual reality goggles for the first time, but if it was anythinglike my experience, I’m pretty sure I can guess how he reacted. Read more of this post

The Artificial Leaf Is Here. Again. An energy source based on photosynthesis still appears tantalizingly close. But consumers first need to become accustomed to what else is needed for it to work

The Artificial Leaf Is Here. Again.
By JACK HITTMARCH 29, 2014

Prof. Daniel Nocera in his laboratory at Harvard. The artificial leaf he developed — mimicking the process of photosynthesis in plants — will require widespread use of fuel cells if it is to become an energy source for the mass market. CreditMylan Cannon/The New York Times Read more of this post

In Some Ways, It’s Looking Like 1999 in the Stock Market

In Some Ways, It’s Looking Like 1999 in the Stock Market

MARCH 29, 2014

By JEFF SOMMER

It sure looks like a bubble.

Maybe not the entire stock market, but consider this: Airbnb, an Internet middleman that connects travelers and people with rooms to rent, was recently valued at more than $10 billion. Read more of this post

Warner’s C.E.O. Is Bullish on the Big Screen; When a quiet and courteous DVD executive named Kevin Tsujihara ascended to the Warner Bros. throne last year, Hollywood did not know quite what to make of him

Warner’s C.E.O. Is Bullish on the Big Screen

By BROOKS BARNESMARCH 29, 2014

Kevin Tsujihara, C.E.O. of Warner Bros., in a recording studio with a scene from “The Lego Movie.” The film, a surprise hit for Warner, came after it acquired the maker of Lego video games — a deal he engineered.  Read more of this post

Encryption Companies Rise as Anxiety Over Data Mounts

Encryption Companies Rise as Anxiety Over Data Mounts

By John Biers on 02:07 pm Mar 29, 2014

New York. Investors are pumping millions of dollars into encryption as unease about data security drives a rising need for ways to keep unwanted eyes away from personal and corporate information. Read more of this post