Author: Rani Molla

Car and ride sharing are part of a small but growing segment of American transportation, as people particularly in urban areas turn to them for cost and convenience reasons. The RAND Corp. estimates that the pool of Americans that car share will jump from a quarter of a percent to 4.5 percent.

Last week, Lyft received $60 million in a Series C funding round, making it one of the most well-funded ride-sharing startups around. Meanwhile, one of the original car-sharing services, ZipCar, was bought by Avis at the beginning of this year; it went public in 2011. For this chart, we looked at some of the more well-established car-sharing services—as well as their taxi counterparts—to see how much money they’ve raised and how far they’ve traveled.

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• Opportunities and risks in the share economy
• Cleantech, meet connectivity: a new era of energy efficiency
• Connected world: the consumer technology revolution

It’s not all bankruptcies and lost government loans in the world of electric cars. Beneath the headlines about hard times for the companies, there’s a steady trickle of customers buying electric cars, charging stations being built, and at least one electric car company eking out a profit for the first time. The following charts point to some bright spots for electric cars in 2013.

Electric car sales are steadily increasing.

More electric car purchases leads to more public charging stations.

Not all models will succeed. Sales of Nissan’s LEAF, GM’s Volt, Tesla’s Model S:

Tesla, the beacon of the electric car industry, hits an all-time-high stock price.

 

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• The fourth quarter of 2012 in cleantech
• Cleantech and investment in 2013
• The next generation of battery technology

Last week in New York, hundreds of media professionals, influencers and watchers gathered at our paidContent Live conference to figure out exactly how the crazy disruption being visited up the media industry by the maturation of the internet will create winners and losers. We assembled our coverage of the event on this page, but we’re also providing transcripts to those videos through the links below for your enjoyment.

Thanks to those who helped make paidContent Live a success, and thanks for your interest in our speakers.

• 65 percent of Buzzfeed’s traffic now comes from mobile devices
• How the public is reshaping media at Reddit, Vox and LinkedIn
• Content personalization still has a long way to go
• One-third of the Guardian’s readers are American, with US traffic growing 37% last year
• Tumblr CEO David Karp says at least 70 users have turned blogging into book deals
• The definitive answer of web or apps as the future of mobile content? It depends.
• The Atlantic is going to launch a paid content offering soon
• Can brands evolve from digital advertisers to mass communicators?
• Why digital book publishers are starting to embrace data
• Native advertising: winners, losers and a lot of hype
• A lesson from the blogging elite: there are many ways to the top
• Aereo CEO says free content might be on the way

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• Connected world: the consumer technology revolution
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• How consumer media will change in 2013

Fitbit activity trackers are popping up in pockets across the country but, apparently, U.K.-based Fitbug believes it deserves some credit for its rival’s adoption.

In a lawsuit filed with the U.S. District Court for Northern California, Fitbug accuses San Francisco-based Fitbit (see disclosure) of trademark infringement that is causing “irreparable harm and damage” to the company.

Aside from the name similarity, Fitbug alleges that Fitbit’s logo, imagery and packaging bear a “striking resemblance” to early Fitbug marketing material and have caused “consumer confusion.”

Fitbug was founded in 2005 and Fitbit came along in 2007. Both digital health companies make wearable devices that track users’ activity and sync with web and mobile services to help users increase their fitness. And as evidence of customer confusion, the complaint says that, in the last year, it’s received more than 200 customer service inquiries from Fitbit customers and that several news reports and blog posts have mixed up the two services.

In response to the allegations, James Park, Fitbit’s CEO and co-founder said in a statement:

“Fitbit is very proud of our fantastic products and reputation, which we have earned solely through the tremendous efforts of the Fitbit team. We are surprised by the allegations contained in Fitbug’s complaint. We are confident of our legal position in the case and look forward to addressing the allegations in court.”

This is hardly the first time that companies have to come to blows over similar names. A few years ago, Facebook sued parody site Lamebook (and ultimately settled). Although the dispute never reached legal proportions, Chicago-based programming bootcamp Code Academy last year changed its name to Starter League partly because of confusion with online coding startup Codecademy.

Fitbug, which says it has two U.S. Trademark Registrations, is asking the court to require Fitbit to cease the use of its logo and refrain from conduct that causes confusion with Fitbug’s brand and services.

Disclosure: Fitbit is backed by True Ventures, a venture capital firm that is an investor in the parent company of this blog, Giga Omni Media. Om Malik, founder of Giga Omni Media, is also a venture partner at True.

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• GigaOM Research highs and lows from CES 2013
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• The 2013 task management tools market

Apple has padded its lead as the top U.S. smartphone manufacturer in the first quarter of this year, according to comScore data released today. Samsung, the world’s top smartphone manufacturer , also had slight growth in its share of U.S. smartphone subscribers from the final quarter of last year.

All other major manufacturers lost share in a market that includes 133.7 million American smartphone owners. HTC, which today debuted HTC First, a phone that comes pre-installed with Facebook custom launcher Facebook Home, had the biggest decline, with its share of smartphone users dropping 1.7%. Apple, meanwhile, was up almost 3.9 percentage points.

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• New challenges for the IT organization
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Several hundred newspapers now have paywalls of some kind, but for the most part, it’s the small and mid-size papers that have been the early adopters. Last year, for example, Gannett put all 80 of its community newspapers’ websites behind metered paywalls, while keeping its flagship paper, USA Today, free online.

But the New York Times‘ ability to attract subscribers in the two years since its paywall went live – combined with the increasingly tough digital advertising market – seems to have caused some of the bigger newspapers to reconsider. In the last year alone, six of the biggest newspapers in the U.S. have announced plans to start charging for their digital editions: the LA Times, Washington Post, Chicago Tribune, Houston Chronicle, Philadelphia Inquirer, Orange County Register.

As of now, 12 of the top-20 U.S. newspapers (by weekday circulation) have either enacted a paid scheme or plan to do so.

Click the graphic to the left to see which of the biggest newspapers have paywalls.

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Burgeoning populations and pockets of lagging technology infrastructure make Asia a prime location for IT development. Google Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt surely thinks so with his recent stint of trips across the continent, where he’s been spreading messages of open internet and much more. Click on our map below to see what else he’s been up to.

Seoul, South Korea

Sept. 27, 2012: Last year Schmidt took a trip to much less controversial South Korea, where he met with Samsung execs, promoted Nexus 7 and showed a sillier side by dancing along with Psy and his viral “Gangnam Style.”

Pyongyang, North Korea

Jan. 7, 2013: Google’s executive chairman took what many saw as a strange and controversial trip to North Korea, where he advocated for a free and open internet in what he calls “the last really closed country in the world.”

Beijing, China

Feb. 20, 2013: Attending a TED-like event known as Geek Park, Schmidt made his first public appearance in China in three years. In his hour-long talk, he discussed Google’s Android operating system and encouraged developers to write apps for it.

New Delhi, India

March 21, 2013: While on a trip to the Big Tent Activate Summit in New Delhi, Schmidt warned about heavyhanded control over the internet in China, where he had visited the month before, and advocated for better IT infrastructure in India.

Yangon, Myanmar

March 22, 2013: Schmidt became the first top  U.S. executive to visit Myanmar after its decades-long military dictatorship. There he promoted a free and open internet in a country ripe for IT expansion.

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• Facebook’s IPO filing: ideas and implications
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If wearable technology wants to break into the mainstream, it has to overcome the geek factor. And that may be tough when King of the Nerds Sergey Brin is touting Google Glass on New York’s subways.

Some companies are actually opting for prominent devices as a way to show off your connectedness, or at least not lose your gadget in the wash. But as batteries get smaller, wearables could become less of a fashion statement and more about a new wave of immersive computing.

Either way, there will be a lot of competition. ABI Research predicts that the global market for wearable computing devices in health and fitness could reach 170 million devices by 2017.

At the end of the day, the design of the wearable and how it feels on your body is only half the battle. Wearable makers are hard at work making sure their gadgets can collect the right data and deliver a service to users that makes the data important and useful in their daily lives. If the body data isn’t helpful, then really, what’s the point?

We created this “bare-bones” infographic of wearable devices that are currently available and that fit the mold for what we see as the future of the connected you: data-driven services, and unobtrusive design. Which ones do you own or want to own? Click on each body section to read more about the companies and devices available.

Google Glass

Google’s “augmented reality” glasses allow you to do anything you’d normally do on your phone or laptop — record video, find directions, message your friends — but without your hands. It’s currently available only to select “creative individuals” in colors Charcoal, Tangerine, Shale, Cotton and Sky and perhaps soon in more attractive styles. ($1,500)

Watches

A number of companies including Motorola, Pebble and Basis Science have all thrown their hats in the connected watch arena. Adding new purpose to a time-warn accessory, these smart watches read texts out loud, play music, and track your exercise and health — in addition to telling time. Apple is even working on a watch that could run iOS. ($115-$300) 

Bracelets

Companies like Jawbone  and Fitbit are marrying data and design for a wearable computing experience that’s seamless and attractive. Their wristbands and bracelets are being used to track fitness, sleep and calories but look like a simple accessory.  ($99-$129)

Jewelry

Sensors are the essential part of all wearable devices. Companies like Misfit and its Shine device use sensors that can also function as jewelry for a seamless way to track your activity. A recent Apple filing shows the company might have even broader ambitions for wearable sensors, too. ($59-$99)

Shoes

From connected shoes to connected clips and inserts, feet are often the preferred place for activity trackers that show where and how far you’ve run. ($ price varies on technology)

Disclosure: Fitbit is backed by True Ventures, a venture capital firm that is an investor in the parent company of this blog, Giga Omni Media. Om Malik, founder of Giga Omni Media, is also a venture partner at True.

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• Analyzing the wearable computing market
• Connected world: the consumer technology revolution
• The quantified self: hacking the body for better health

To say Hadoop has become really big business would be to understate the case. At a broad level, it’s the focal point of a immense big data movement, but Hadoop itself is now a software and services market of its very own. In this graphic, we aim to map out the current ecosystem of Hadoop software and services — application and infrastructure software, as well as open source projects — and where those products fall in terms of use cases and delivery model. Click on a company name for more information about how they are using this technology.

A couple of points about the methodology might be valuable: The first is that these are products and projects that are built with Hadoop in mind and that aim to either extend its utility in some way or expose its core functions in a new manner. Another is that the “Hadoop Repackaged” category is used to characterize companies that are reselling Hadoop in some way (e.g., in an appliance or as part of their existing product suites) but that haven’t developed their own technology at the Hadoop level and instead rely on existing distribution software from companies such as Hortonworks or Cloudera.

This is the second installment of our four-part series on the past, present and future of Hadoop. Part I is the history of Hadoop from the people who willed it into existence and took it mainstream. Part III will look into the future of Hadoop and serve as an opening salvo for much of the discussion at our Structure: Data conference March 20-21 in New York. Finally, Part IV will highlight some the best Hadoop applications and seminal moments in Hadoop history, as reported by GigaOM over the years.

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• The importance of putting the U and I in visualization
• Pervasive Software retools for cloud, big data: will it be heard?
• AWS Storage Gateway jolts cloud-storage ecosystem

When it comes to online storage, we live in a time of plenty: Products like Google’s Chromebook Pixel offer 1 TB of online storage (enough to save 1,000 hours of video), while services like DropBox let us deposit huge files in the cloud for free, and most email providers offer virtually unlimited space.

It’s easy to forget that it wasn’t always this way. Remember when you had to delete emails before receiving new ones? Back in the late ’90s, providers like Hotmail and Yahoo allowed users on a couple of megabytes—essentially, the size of a single song.

From Hotmail to Gmail to Dropbox, here’s a look back at some of the key moments in the evolution of free online storage.

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• NewNet Q4: Platform mania and social commerce shakeout

When you think about a “connected car,” you probably think of fancy car stereos that can play songs from  your smartphone. But the connected car is evolving into something much more complex. In the next couple of years, automakers like Ford, GM, BMW and Honda will be pushing way beyond the dashboard to connect our cars in all kinds of new ways. Our cars won’t just be connected to our phones and the internet, but to other cars and even the highway itself.

And automakers aren’t the only ones vying for a piece of the connected car of the future. Carriers see the car as the next big device on their networks, while device makers like Apple and technology developers like Nuance Communications want to ditch the whole concept of a dashboard screen and replace it with a system of voice-activated commands. When that happens, we’ll be able not only to dictate emails while driving– we’ll be able to program our home TVs from the car, too.

But building a connected car presents some unusual challenges. For one, if carmakers don’t pick the right technology, they can be handcuffed for years. The planning for a new car starts years before it hits the showrooms, and carmakers then have to continue to support those technologies for as long as their customers are driving those vehicles.  If they make a bad technology bet, carmakers can be living with the consequences for a long time.

Another challenge: Open development platforms have allowed companies like Google and Apple to thrive, but carmakers can’t fully take advantage of that movement: For safety reasons, they can’t just give developers access to, say, the engine — they need to have some restrictions.

Hover over the yellow buttons to see how we at GigaOM see the connected car evolving in the coming years:

Image map by Rani Molla

Click here for a text version. 

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