Author: Serkadis

Twitter has announced the launch of keyword targeting in timelines as a new feature for its ad platform. It is rolling out today in all languages and markets (where Twitter Ads are supported).

The feature is available in the full Twitter Ads user interface, as well as through the Ads API. It lets advertisers reach users based on the keywords in recent tweets, as well as the tweets with which they have recently engaged.

“Advertising on Twitter works well because the experience is built into the fabric of the product: a Promoted Tweet, for instance, is simply a Tweet targeted using the interest graph formed from public user signals like follows,” writes Twitter Revenue product manager Nipoon Malhotra in a blog post. “Until today, the content of Tweets has only been one factor among many in shaping the interest graph. Today, it becomes a first-class citizen.”

“This is an important new capability – especially for those advertisers looking for signals of intent – because it lets marketers reach users at the right moment, in the right context,” says Malhotra. “For example: let’s say a user tweets about enjoying the latest album from their favorite band, and it so happens that band is due to play a concert at a local venue. That venue could now run a geotargeted campaign using keywords for that band with a Tweet containing a link to buy the tickets. That way, the user who tweeted about the new album may soon see that Promoted Tweet in their timeline letting them know tickets are for sale in their area.”

Twitter says users won’t notice any difference in their own Twitter experience. In other words, just because there’s a new targeting capability, users won’t start seeing more ads crammed into their timelines.

Medium, the current company of Blogger and Twitter co-founder Evan Williams, has acquired Kickstarter-backed journalism startup Matter.

For a better idea of what Medium itself is, read this.

Matter describes itself as a publication based around a new way to create really great long-form journalism about science, technology and the future. Apparently Williams himself was one of the earliest Kickstarter backers for the project.

Paid Content points to this blog post from Matter discussing the acquisition. In that, Matter says, “He [Williams] and his team want Medium to be the best place on the internet to read and create high-quality content, and they suggested that we become part of that project.”

“Working with the team at Medium gives Matter a greater chance of success,” the company says. “The biggest draw for us is that they believe in high-quality writing, just like us, and want to see the journalism we produce be as successful as possible.”

Of course it remains to be seen just how successful Medium itself will become. However, Williams has an indisputable track record so far.

Continue reading…

With a vast array of content types and devices to consume them, publishers still can’t easily decide between using the web or native apps for their wares. Three high profile content providers debated the topic at the paidContent Live 2013 event in New York City on Wednesday and it’s clear that digital content will have a home in both native apps and online for at least a few years yet.

Jason Pontin, editor in chief and publisher of MIT Technology Review, has tried both and hated “every single moment of native apps.” His publication lost money, had to let go of resources and got nothing in return, he said, and decided to close down the native apps in October of last year.

“Traditional publishers figured the internet taught readers they could pay nothing. Native apps would expected to be like digital replicas but be better and would create monetization,” said Pontin, but that hasn’t happened for all publishers. “We’re moving to HTML5,” he noted, even though Pontin cautioned that the LocalStorage feature of HTML5 is the only agreed-upon function of the specification.

Some content types work better on native apps, however, or are supplemented only with HTML. Ryan Spoon, SVP, Product Development at ESPN, says that the back of every ESPN business card reads: ”Serve fans anytime anywhere.” That means going to where the users are and having content both in native apps and on the web.

“It depends on content: what you want to build, how you want to monetize it. The web experience is being built truly mobile first; that’s a shift. We think mobile and apply global. For rich experiences, however, I think it has to be native.” Spoon said. He also pointed out that apps are more powerful for re-engagement thanks to in-app notifications.

Nick Alt, VP of Mobile at Vimeo agreed: “Push notification and in app messaging shows far higher engagement than email marketing for our service.” With content, that’s really what it’s all about: engagement. If you can boost engagement and then monetize it, you’ve got a potent business model.

For Vimeo the goal is to “build a better user experience and obtain a more engaged customer, particularly on mobile devices.” Alt said that tablet adoption is moving at an aggressive clip, faster than smartphone usage of Vimeo ever was. Spoon agreed on the engagement point, saying “Our goal is to lift engagement: both usage and users. The rest will follow. And the best usage depends on the product. Native, for example can help with ads and transactions.”

All three speakers agree that ultimately, content providers have to choose the best vehicle for their content and that either — or a combination of both — is a smart strategy, at least until HTML5 standards are agreed upon by all. Pontin summed it up like this: “A good compromise is an HTML5 app wrapped in native code for now. It helps you keep a common code base and in the end, open standards usually win.”

Check out the rest of our paidContent Live 2013 coverage here, and a video embed of the session follows below:

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As you may or may not know, Taiwan’s Fair Trade Commission is investigating allegations that Samsung paid students to attack HTC smartphones on the web.

Here’s the fun NMA Taiwanese animation take on the story:

Cloud-based web publishing service provider Instart Logic emerged from stealth Wednesday, with a $17 million Series B funding round. This brings its total investment to $26 million, which includes earlier investments from Andreesen Horowitz, Greylock Partners, Sutter Hill Ventures and Tenaya Capital.

Mountain View-based Instart Logic offers a cloud-based service for web publishers that is a radical departure from traditional CDN and web optimization offerings, that delivers rich, personalized web experiences, even over mobile and WiFi networks.

“Today’s web and mobile users expect near instant delivery of applications, but the explosion of apps combined with the proliferation of mobile devices has resulted in debilitating performance issues that degrade the user experience,” said Peter Levine, partner at Andreessen Horowitz. “Enter Instart Logic, which has developed a unique and elegant solution that was built from the ground up to resolve the mobile bottleneck and transform the user experience.”

Team Has Experience at Aster Data

The Instart Logic team of Manav Mital, Hariharan Kolam and Raghu Venkat came from the engineering group at Aster Data, which was acquired by Teradata for $263 million in 2011. The company has been in stealth mode for two years, and its staff brings years of experience from Google, Facebook, Amazon, VMware, Citrix, Akamai, Adobe and Mozilla.

“Yesterday’s solutions for speeding up delivery of web and applications are showing their age, as they addressed core network congestion but not the last mile,” said Dr. Peter Danzig, who formerly served as a vice president at Akamai and was an early investor in Riverbed. “By approaching this problem thinking mobile first, Instart Logic was able to develop a sophisticated solution.”

Instart’s technology is designed to solve the last-mile bottleneck of wireless networks. With web sites growing in complexity and morphing into immersive applications, the user experience for applications served over wireless and WiFi deteriorates and result in longer wait times. The Instart Logic service deploys entirely new technology to allow users to start interacting with rich web applications, making them stickier and more profitable for publishers. This reduces the time-to-engagement and improves the user experience significantly.

Instart Logic successfully completed its beta program in December 2012. The company says the majority of beta customers are now using the service in production for mission-critical applications. These paying customers use Instart Logic’s service to drive conversions and increase user engagement across a broad set of industries including retail, travel and hospitality, enterprise SaaS, online gaming, and media sectors.

UPDATE: Apple shares have fallen below the $400 mark, hitting $389.11 at 12:51 p.m.

Intel may be struggling on the PC side of its business, but the chip giant is making aggressive moves in the data center and enterprise computing sector. After buying networking silicon vendor Fulcrum in 2011, Intel introduced a few products and hinted at its plans, but on Wednesday at the Open Networking Summit it revealed its SDN strategy and took the gloves off.

Intel is showcasing its networking silicon, but it’s also offering two reference designs — one for new switches and one for new servers that would use Intel’s new chips. It’s also showing of a software layer called the Intel Data Plane Development Kit for OpenVSwitch that will accelerate packet processing on Intel’s CPUs instead of on dedicated network processors. One of the reference designs is aimed at the data center and the top of rack switches made by Cisco, Juniper, Arista and Force10 (owned by Dell), and the other is more of a punch for Cisco and Juniper in that it’s aimed at service providers. In fact, at the event Intel said Verizon was testing a prototype version of its reference design.

With these offerings, Intel is putting Broadcom, a popular maker of merchant silicon, on notice that it’s going directly after its business. That’s not surprising. The only question is how low Intel will go in pricing to put the hurt on Broadcom. But it’s also providing designs and capabilities that could obviate the need for special-purpose silicon that Cisco and Juniper currently rely on in their high-end boxes. Intel has gone after special purpose hardware before when it took on Sun and IBM in the server world with its x86 chips for personal computers.

Intel’s moves into the networking world are a symptom of the broader shift in computing. On the consumer side, mobility is changing the devices we use. In the enterprise, considerations of power consumption can now trump performance. In fact, super chips like the ones Intel traditionally sells can cause their own challenges in a virtualized world because using all of that capacity requires data center operators to virtualize the hardware and complicate their lives.

On the enterprise side the architecture to support our computing needs is changing as well as the workloads. The business considerations are changing too. This is a trend that’s shifting the ground underfoot all of the large IT vendors. So to see Intel going after its fellow chipmakers is perhaps unsurprising, but to see it going after Cisco’s and Juniper’s markets is like watching a rat resort to cannibalism during a time of starvation.

IT companies aren’t starving yet, but they are under stress, as Intel’s lackluster earnings indicate. The very real disruptions caused by a new generation of computing and web infrastructure are going to eat away at the margins and business models supporting today’s giants. Seen in this context, Intel’s moves aren’t surprising, but they are a symptom of the overall disruption in the IT world.

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At its annual Collaboration Summit in San Francisco, the Linux Foundation and Citrix (CTXS) announced that the Xen Project is becoming a Linux Foundation Collaborative Project. Started ten years ago, Xen Project open source virtualization platform has led to Citrix XenServer becoming a powerful cloud platform. The project has seen contributions from organizations such as Amazon, AMD, Cambridge University, Citrix, Fujitsu, Intel, National Security Agency (NSA), Oracle and SUSE.

“Linux Foundation Collaborative Projects have at least one thing in common and that is they all use collaborative development to advance and accelerate technology innovation,” said Jim Zemlin, executive director at The Linux Foundation. “The Xen Project is an important open source community project that provides valuable technology to the entire Linux and open source ecosystem. It’s a natural move for us to help nurture collaboration to advance this technology.”

The Linux Foundation will provide infrastructure, guidance and a collaborative network. The neutral, member-led community will help accelerate cross-industry innovation around the Xen Project hypervisor, bringing guidance and contributions from a more diverse group of technology leaders. The following technology leaders are aligned in advancing the Xen Project initiative in the Cloud Era: Amazon Web Services, AMD, Bromium, Calxeda, CA Technologies, Cisco, Citrix, Google, Intel, Oracle, Samsung and Verizon.

“Industry interest in Xen has been growing rapidly over the past few years, thriving on strong industry support and commitment from the project’s founding members,” said Peder Ulander, VP, Open Source Solutions at Citrix. “By widening the scope of collaboration under The Linux Foundation, the Xen Project community can set the bar even higher for innovation. Citrix remains committed to the project and advancing the technology for Xen Project-based products across the industry, including its own Citrix XenServer.”

Citrix believes that the open source community will play a vital role in the Cloud Era, leading the way for proprietary innovations rather than following them. The Linux Foundation recently announced the OpenDaylight project, a community-led and industry-supported open source framework that will accelerate adoption, foster new innovation and create a more open and transparent approach to Software-Defined Networking (SDN).

In January, Vice President Joe Biden participated in a Google+ hangout, discussing gun violence. Today, he will do so again.

This is part of the White House’s series of fireside hangouts. Biden will discuss reducing gun violence with mayors from across the country. Specifically, he’ll be joined by Karen Freeman-Wilson from Gary, Indiana, Stephanie Rawlings-Blake from Baltimore, Maryland, R.T. Rybak from Minneapolis, Minnesota, and Steve Scaffidi from Oak Cree, Wisconsin.

You can watch it live here. It starts at 2:45 PM Eastern.

Google is celebrating the birthday of Costa Rican-born Mexican singer Chavela Vargas with a doodle on its homepage in Mexico.

She was apparently known best for her rendition of Mexican rancheras.

Here’s a look at Google’s knowledge panel for Vargas:

Here, you can see a performance:

It’s not necessarily broadband related – but I think it’s a good sign for a community that can make good use of broadband. According to Movoto (a real estate site), Minneapolis makes the Top Ten Nerdiest City list.

Here’s the full list:

1. Atlanta, GA
2. Portland, OR
3. Seattle, WA
4. Sacramento, CA
5. Minneapolis, MN
6. Boston, MA
7. Las Vegas, NV
8. Miami, FL
9. San Jose, CA
10. Denver, CO

And the criteria for nerdiness…

• Number of annual comic book, video game, anime, and sci-fi / fantasy conventions
• People per comic book store
• People per video game store
• People per traditional gaming store
• People per computer store
• People per bookstore
• People per LARPing group (live action role-playing)
• People per science museum
• Distance to the nearest Renaissance faire

Pivot Data Centres announced the construction of an 80,000 square feet data center in the greater Calgary area. The facility will be undergoing Uptime Institute’s Tier 3 certification process for design and construction. When complete later this year the expansion will have 450 racks, with capacity for over 1,000 total.

“This is a very exciting day for Pivot Data Centres and we are proud to be announcing the construction of this state-of-the-art colocation data centre, the largest and most advanced of its kind in Alberta,” said Michael Koury, Chief Executive Officer. “Beyond local interest, we are seeing a strong uptick from companies across Canada and internationally, who are looking for a data centre presence in Western Canada.”

The new data center will include features such as indirect outside air cooling capability, biometric security systems, redundant power and advanced fire detection and suppression systems, as well as 7×24 on-site security and technical support teams. The data center will also house a fully-equipped business resumption center for its customers and will be SSAE 16 PCI compliant.

Pivot’s six month old 40,000 square foot data center in Edmonton is more than 50 percent occupied and the company has added a full megawatt of power to its Calgary data center. Pivot’s 30 percent year-over-year growth is reflected in its capacity, which has tripled in the last two years, and the company continues to have strong financial support to achieve its growth objectives.

Despite a slow uptake of Microsoft Windows RT, Dell appears committed to the platform. The company has “future generations” of its Dell XPS 10 tablet in the works, according to Neil Hand, vice president at Dell. Speaking to Computerworld, Hand says the new slates will be both lighter and faster, alluding to improved ARM-based chips that can run Windows RT.

That’s a nice vote of confidence from Dell; particularly as other Microsoft hardware partners don’t seem sold on Windows RT. Samsung, for example, decided not to offer its Windows RT slate in the U.S. and recently pulled the device from Germany, citing weak demand. Even Nvidia, which has a chip that powers Windows RT, has expressed disappointment in Windows RT sales. So why is Dell staying the course?

I suspect this another Dell attempt at relevancy in the mobile market. And it’s not the first. Dell had a line of Axim PDAs, offered smartphones and was actually developed a precursor to the big-screened phone with its 5-inch Dell Streak handset running Android.

But each of these products has come and gone, without Dell becoming a big player in mobile. And at this point, where else can Dell turn to maintain relevancy? It could offer another Android device but that’s a crowded market. It’s easier to take a bet on Windows RT becoming a success and standing out from today’s crowd.

Unfortunately, that’s not a smart bet. While I like the Windows RT hardware and experience in general, the same can be had with an Intel Atom tablet with similar weight and battery life. Plus, at roughly the same price point, users gain the full Windows 8 platform with legacy app support. Think of these as Windows 8 in a Windows RT form factor and price. Where’s the value add of Windows RT, given the situation?

Even worse: Intel suggests that future Windows 8 tablets could cost as little as $200, or about 40 percent of what they cost now. If Intel’s new Bay Trail chips help that happen, Windows RT won’t stand a chance unless devices that support it drop in price; as much as if not more than Windows 8 tablets. It’s always fun — and potentially profitable — to place a high-odds bet, but this time, I think Dell is backing the wrong horse.

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Teehan+Lax Labs has put together a Google Street View “hyperlapse” video. It’s pretty cool:

Luckily there are no dead bodies or people having sex featured (though it does go through the imagery pretty fast, so we might just be overlooking them).

All imagery in the video was captured using hyperlapse.tllabs.io. Source code for this can be found here.

[via PictureCorrect]

Someone submitted a Google Maps link to reddit, which shows a person face down on the ground on the side of the road. The image is from Table Bay Boulevard, Cape Town in South Africa.

Here’s the link.

The reddit submission comes under the title “a dead body on Google street view (Cape Town)“. It has not been confirmed that it’s a dead body.

One redditor coments, “Probably just drunk and sleeping, not dead.”

Another suggests, “Or a homeless person?”

One, who claims to be a South African, who has lived in Cape Town, says, “People sleeping on the side of the road is a common sight in S.A.”

Another adds, “This is Table Bay Boulevard, a pretty busy road, no ways a dead body is going to be laying there for very long, especially not on a nice sunny day.”

Others in the thread still think it might be a dead body.

You wouldn’t immediately think Google would include an image of a dead body in its Street View imagery, but it actually wouldn’t be the first time it has happened. Here’s an article from 2010 reporting that Google was showing dead bodies on Street View in Brazil. On the other hand, another image thought to be a dead body turned out to just be a girl playing a prank.

Blogger Greta Franzini shared a Street View image last may that may or may not have been another body.

It’s not as though Street View does not capture questionable images. See last week’s story about the imagery of a couple having sex on the side of the road.

Demand for international bandwidth grew 39 percent last year, and at a compounded annual rate of 53 percent between 2007 and 2012, according to Telegeography. The interesting bit here is that the growth is coming not just from developed regions, but all regions of the world.

Cheaper mobile phones with access to the web are certainly a part of that demand growth in developing nations, while in more traditional technology markets, hotspots, larger applications and cloud computing are to blame. Whatever the reason for demand, carriers are responding accordingly, with new submarine cables connecting more countries than ever before.

Telegeography tracks bandwidth supply, pricing and data on submarine cables, and the latest data shows how carriers that range from traditional players like Level 3 and Tata to newer investors such as Google are connecting all areas of the world. The firm estimates all regions are getting about 10 to 12 new terabits per second of capacity each year. All in all in the last five years the world has gained 54 Tbps of new capacity.

This is great, because additional cables means more redundancy, so when accidents happen or cables get cut — as happened late last month off the coast of Egypt – traffic can route around the nicks in the system. That redundancy also allows new players into the market and can result in lower bandwidth costs, which is good for businesses buying bandwidth and indirectly for consumers.

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