Category: News

Glimpse, the social discovery conference, is returning to San Francisco on Wed., June 12, to reignite the conversation around the discovery of people, products and places. As a Glimpse media sponsor, GigaOM is offering 20 percent off early-bird tickets to its readers.

Glimpse will be a day to discuss how the social sphere has permeated the everyday lives of consumers. Mingle with driving forces in the social discovery space, including CEOs, product gurus and directors shaping social experiences for brands and consumers alike, helping and guiding people in their daily decisions around what to buy, who to date and where to go. Taking place at San Francisco’s Bently Reserve, our stage will host experts from Facebook, Tagged, LinkedIn, Twitter, Pandora, Zappos and more companies leading today’s social trends.

Don’t miss this opportunity to see moderators from top-tier publications such as GigaOM, Fortune, Bloomberg Businessweek and VentureBeat as they ask the questions that you haven’t seen answered. To get the special GigaOM 20 percent discount on your 2013 Glimpse tickets, head to the Glimpse Eventbrite page and enter code: GO@GLIMPSE

We look forward to seeing you in our audience and diving into what’s in the future for social discovery.

You’ll never view TNG the same again.

[via reddit]

There is no need to emphasize the need for a password manager, since almost every online activity is secured through a username and a countersign. Solutions for storing this sensitive information are many, and most of them are very easy to use.

PassBox is not far from this description but, unlike the popular solutions in its category, it does not integrate in web br… (read more)

Microsoft invested $300 million into Barnes & Noble last year to create the Nook media subsidiary. Now the company may be looking to outright acquire the subsidiary from the national bookstore chain.

TechCrunch is reporting that Microsoft has offered to buy Nook Media from Barnes & Noble for a cool $1 billion. The information came from internal documents that also revealed the bookstore’s plans to completely renovate the Nook brand next year.

Aside from the Microsoft acquisition, the documents also say that Nook is planning on ditching its Android-based Nook HD and HD+ tablets in 2014. It’s a little strange considering that Nook just pushed the Google Play store onto these tablets, but it would be part of a larger move that would see Nook going mostly digital. In other words, Nook would be another third-party app on other devices with no dedicated hardware for itself.

Speaking of hardware, it seems that Nook may continue making e-readers despite ditching the tablet business. The logic here is that Nook will follow the gradual decline in e-reader sales while milking the business for as long as it can.

While that’s all well and interesting, the big news is here is a Microsoft buyout. It would only make sense, especially with Nook’s intention to go all digital, as Microsoft needs a killer app for its Windows 8 tablets. There’s already a Nook app for Windows 8, but a Microsoft-controlled and curated Nook app would be right up the Redmond-based company’s alley. It would also help the company compete with Amazon, Google and Apple – all of which operate their own e-book stores.

What makes this more interesting is the suggestion that Microsoft will be introducing a smaller Windows 8 tablet later this year alongside Windows Blue. A Microsoft-branded Nook app launching with Windows Blue could work wonders with a marketing campaign focusing on how Windows 8 provides music, movies and books from the Start menu.

Of couse, we can’t forget that a Microsoft buyout would fit well with Barnes & Noble founder Leonard Riggio’s plans to buy the Barnes & Noble retail operation while ditching the Nook business. Both could work together to ensure that Microsoft takes on the digital operation while Riggio can procede with his plans to take Barnes & Noble private.

Cray announced a new addition to its XC30 systems, with the XC30-AC (air-cooled) supercomputer. The new model includes all of the advanced high performance computing (HPC) technologies offered in the Cray XC30 system, and features aggressive price points intended to attract a new a class of HPC users – the technical enterprise.

The air cooled model economizes the packaging, networking, cooling and power options of the Cray XC30, while balancing customer price/performance requirements.  Prices for the XC30-AC start at $500,000. The XC30-AC enables technical enterprise HPC users in a variety of industries to apply supercomputing resources towards solving technical and business challenges. Additionally Cray has a line of cluster supercomputer offerings, the CS300 cluster supercomputers, to compliment the XC30-AC systems.

“Innovation is not limited to Fortune 100 companies. There are many Fortune 1000 companies, and even departments within Fortune 100 companies, with a growing need for a supercomputing system that provides a critical tool for taking advantage of performing complex simulations,” said Peg Williams, Cray’s senior vice president of high performance computing systems.

Cray states that the new model has all of the features and functionality of its high-end Cray XC30 systems, and is suited for technical enterprise customers, helping them access supercomputing capacity at a lower price.

The XC30-AC has allowed Cray to enter new markets for its supercomputers, with early customers including a global consumer electronics company and a global financial services company. It is targeted at less-traditional HPC segments, as well as a broader class of users in more traditional HPC markets, such as academia, defense and earth sciences. While the XC30-AC contains many of the features of the XC30, it differs in that it is air cooled, has physically smaller compute cabinets with 16 vertical blades per cabinet, has a single fan for bottom-to-top vertical air flow, and has a lower power option supporting either 480V or 208V operation.

“Cray has a history of leveraging the supercomputing technologies featured in their high-end systems, and economically repackaging those same technologies to offer solutions to fit the needs of HPC users with smaller budgets,” said Earl Joseph, IDC program vice president for HPC. “Simulation is no longer bound by the high-end data center, and Cray’s new XC30-AC system continues the company’s tradition of creating purpose-built systems that appeal to new customers in expanding segments of the supercomputing market.”

Google Translate for Android 2.7, a major update, is available. There’s one new feature — support for the website’s Phrasebook feature — and an extension of the app’s camera-input feature to support an additional 16 languages.

The app is basically an extension of the Google Translate website, allowing users to translate both text and speech between more than 70 different languages.

Users wishing to take advantage of the camera-input feature should take a photo of the sign or text in question, then select the portion that requires translating using their finger. Google Translate for Android will then attempt to detect the text and translate it into the user’s native language. The 16 new languages supported in version 2.7 are primarily based in the Baltic, central and southern regions of Europe, but also include Icelandic and Indonesian.

The new Phrasebook feature basically gives Android users access to the Phrasebook already in use via the Google Translate website. This allows users to build a library of phrases they use regularly or wish to have easy access to while on the road, and utilises their Google Account to sync the Phrasebook across multiple devices. The Phrasebook replaces the old Favourites feature, with existing favourites added to the user’s Phrasebook.

Google Translate for Android 2.7 is available now as a free download for Android devices, while Google Translate 1.3.1 is also available for iPhone and iPad, albeit without support for camera input or Phrasebooks.

As Computex 2013 approaches, ASUS prepares to make a pretty big splash at the trade show.  The company recently released a teaser video showing their newest, sleekest innovations and how they impact daily life.  Using the tagline, “We Transform,” ASUS hopes to attract plenty of attention at Computex this year.  On ASUS’ site for the event there are spaces for other future videos and we’ll be sure to keep you updated when they add anything new.

Check out the video after the break.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Source: ASUS

Come comment on this article: ASUS releases “We Transform” teaser video in preparation for Computex 2013, more to come

Watch this video on YouTube

Today, as he heads to Austin, Texas, for a Middle Class Jobs and Opportunity Tour, President Obama signed an Executive Order directing historic steps to make government-held data more accessible to the public and to entrepreneurs and others as fuel for innovation and economic growth. The Executive Order declares that information is a valuable resource and strategic asset for the Nation. We couldn’t agree more.

Under the terms of the Executive Order and a new Open Data Policy released today by the Office of Science and Technology Policy and the Office of Management and Budget, all newly generated government data will be required to be made available in open, machine-readable formats, greatly enhancing their accessibility and usefulness, while ensuring privacy and security.

During his visit to Austin, President Obama will meet with technology entrepreneurs who are hiring workers with cutting-edge skills and creating the tools and products that will drive America’s long term economic growth.  This includes technology entrepreneurs utilizing government data to grow their company.  Under the President’s Open Data Executive Order, more data will be made available allowing these types of entrepreneurs and companies to take advantage of this information, fueling economic growth in communities across the Nation.

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We were hopeful that we would see Samsung’s flexible display by the end of the year, but 2014 seems more likely. In the meantime, we can get a little taste of what is coming from a couple of patent filings. The first one is based on the overall design and interaction from the controller that detects how much the display is bent. The above image shows a controller that controls the image displayed based on bending information received by the sensor. The display can be bent concavely or convexly and the display will zoom in or zoom out accordingly. You can even roll the display. The touch screen is capacitive and includes a top film, a first layer, and second layer. The bottom includes the ”bending detection part”.

The second patent involves curved smartphone displays. The Galaxy Nexus already featured a slight curve, but this patent implies that the curve would be horizontal rather than vertical. You will notice in the image below that there is a flip-out feature around the camera. Unfortunately this design patent doesn’t explain it. Your guess is as good as mine. Maybe better.

Sources: Patentbolt (1) / Patenbolt (2)

Come comment on this article: Recent Samsung patent filings reveal how flexible displays will work

Catholics are no strangers to protests, and even nuns and priests have been arrested on occasion during protests. This week, an 83-year-old nun was convicted for her participation in a break-in protest at a nuclear facility last July.

According to a BBC News report, Sister Megan Rice and two other protesters, Michael Walli and Greg Boertje-Obed, were convicted this week of sabotage and depredation of government property. The trio cut a fence and broke into the Y-12 facility in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, which processes and stores uranium for use in nuclear weapons. They threw baby bottles filled with human blood onto the walls of the facility.

The protesters are part of a group called Transform Now Plowshares. The group issued a statement in conjunction with the protest, stating that the facility is “an ongoing criminal endeavor in violation of international al treaty law…” From a separate statement:

We come to the Y-12 facility because our very humanity rejects the designs of nuclearism, empire and war. Our faith in love and nonviolence encourages us to believe that our activity here is necessary; that we come to invite transformation, undo the past and present work of Y-12; disarm and end any further efforts to increase the Y-12 capacity for an economy and social structure based upon war-making and empire-building.

Sister Rice is well-known for her anti-war activism. According to a New York Times feature on Rice published in August 2012, she has been arrested “40 or 50 times” for civil disobedience.

Rice and her fellow protesters now face up to 20 years in prison for what authorities believe is one of the most serious U.S. nuclear facility security breaches in history.

It looks like Manchester United officially has its replacement for Alex Ferguson, who stepped down as manager this week. Ferguson’s replacement will reportedly be David Moyes, who is said to have signed a long-term six-year deal, and will take over as Manager on July 1st.

CNN tweets:

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CNN International
@cnni

BREAKING NEWS: Manchester United confirm Everton’s David Moyes will take over from Alex Ferguson as manager. http://t.co/gdCQ5ihI0K#MUFC

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The Guardian has also confirmed the news with Manchester United, and reports that Moyes will start after his completing his season with Everton. His first official game will reportedly be the Community Shield against either Manchester City or Wigan at Wembley on August 11th. The report quotes Moyes:

“I know how hard it will be to follow the best manager ever, but the opportunity to manage Manchester United isn’t something that comes around very often and I’m really looking forward to taking up the post next season.”

Ferguson, who as won 38 trophies for the club, will become a director and ambassador for it. He is 71 years old.

More background on Moyes here.

River guide Paul Templer was an experienced traveler by the age of 27; he led tours down the Zambezi River in Zimbabwe many times, and had encountered rambunctious animals there before. But none would prove to be so terrifying as the hippo that nearly ate him 17 years ago.

Templer recently sat down and wrote his tale for the Guardian and says he had met the same hippo before; it had even rushed at him in a “half-hearted” way when he moved to close to its territory. But on this day, the bull would become so agitated that a half-hearted attack grew into a full-fledged riot.

“We were near the end of the tour, the light was softening and we were taking in the tranquillity,” Templer wrote. “The solid whack I felt behind me took me by surprise. I turned just in time to see Evans, who had been flung out of his boat, flying through the air. His boat, with his two clients still in it, had been lifted half out of the water on the back of the huge bull hippo.”

Templer says he shouted to the other guides to get their clients to safety before turning to try and grab Evans. But just as he was about to grab the man’s hand, he was enveloped in darkness.

“There was no transition at all, no sense of approaching danger. It was as if I had suddenly gone blind and deaf,” he says.

What happened next is enough to make any reader shudder in terror.

“I was aware that my legs were surrounded by water, but my top half was almost dry. I seemed to be trapped in something slimy. There was a terrible, sulfurous smell, like rotten eggs, and a tremendous pressure against my chest. My arms were trapped but I managed to free one hand and felt around – my palm passed through the wiry bristles of the hippo’s snout. It was only then that I realized I was underwater, trapped up to my waist in his mouth.”

He managed to free himself when the hippo took a breath, only to be dragged under again. Just when he began to resign himself to a dark, watery death, the animal spat him out and he was dragged to safety by his friends. He was alive, but just barely; the hippo left him with over 40 puncture wounds–one so deep that part of his lung was visible–and only one arm.

As for Templer’s friend Evans, he wasn’t so lucky. His body was found downriver two days later.

“Attempts were made to find and kill the rogue hippo, but he seemed to have gone into hiding,” Templer says. ” I’m convinced, though, that I met him one more time. Two years later I led an expedition down the Zambezi and as we drifted past the stretch where the attack had taken place, a huge hippo lurched out of the water next to my canoe. I screamed so loudly that those with me said they’d never heard anything like it. He dived back under and was never seen again. I’d bet my life savings it was the same hippo, determined to have the final word.”

Independent testing organization AV-Comparatives has released its latest performance tests evaluating the impact of security software on system performance. It carried out the tests on a 64-bit Windows 7 system and measured a number of everyday activities including copying files, installing and uninstalling applications and launching programs as well as running the PCMark 7 benchmarking suite.

The results of these tests have been used to produce a system impact score measuring how much difference the various antivirus programs make compared to having no security installed at all. This makes for some interesting reading.

At the top of the tree tied with impact scores of 0.4 (lower is better here by the way) come F-Secure, Sophos and Kaspersky. Second with a score of 0.6 comes ESET. Of what you might call the household names Symantec does best with a score of 1.3 whilst McAfee turns in a disappointing 14.4.

Microsoft’s own Security Essentials scores a reasonable 5.6, behind BitDefender’s 2.4 but ahead of AVG’s 7.1 and BullGuard’s 8.7. Bottom of those tested comes Kingsoft with an impact score of 25.6. You can read the full results and the test methodology by visiting the AV-Comparatives  site.

Of course all of this only tells you how the software impacts on your PC, not how well it protects you. As always with security there’s a trade off involved but if performance matters then the report will at least help you make an informed decision. You can find data on comparative protection levels elsewhere on AV-Comparatives to help you make up your mind.

The 2013 Tesla Model S has received a rave review from Consumer Reports. This was just published (though a subscriptions is required), and is bound to be huge for the car maker.

The car got a 99 out of 100, which is reportedly the highest it has ever rated a car. Here’s Consumer Reports’ overview:

The Tesla Model S takes everything you know about cars and stands it on its head. It’s a very agile, super-quick electric luxury sedan (with a hatchback!) that seats seven and gets the equivalent of 84 mpg. Got your attention yet? With the 85 kWh battery, the largest available, it can go between 180 and 225 miles on a charge, depending on the weather. That’s about twice as far as any other electric car. With optional equipment, it can be charged from empty in as little as five hours. Performance all-around is exceptional, with short stops, a superb ride, and an eerily hushed cabin. Almost all controls are done through a quick and capable iPad-like center screen. Tight access and visibility and initial teething pains are demerits, as is the luxury-car price.

Here’s their quick take:

“We’ve been testing cars at Consumer Reports for a very long time, but we’ve never seen anything quite like the Tesla Model S,” says Jake Fisher, Director, Auto Testing at Consumer Reports. “This car performs better than anything we’ver ever tested before. Let me repeat that – not just the best electric car, but the best car. It does just about everything really, really well.”

The car, he says, ties as the quietest car they’ve ever tested, in addition to be extremely energy efficient.

It turns out that 99 out of 100 was originally 110 out of 100. Matt Hardigree at Gawker’s Jalopnik says:

I spoke with CR’s Jake Fisher who explained to me that the car actually scored 110 out of a 100-point scale, but that because of the limitations still inherent in owning an electric car (range, access to charging) they regularly subtract about 10% from a car’s score. It’s still the best score they’ve ever given, tied only with the 2007 Lexus LS but that car, according to Fisher, isn’t even in the same league as the Model S.

The car is designed and built in California. The rear wheel drive vehicle does not use gasoline, and is engineered to perform in both hot and cold climates. It accelerates to 60 mph in 4.2 seconds, according to Tesla (though Consumer Reports said a “lightning quick 5.6 seconds”). More specs here.

Ouya, the company behind a small $99 Android gaming console, has picked up $15 million in funding. The investment, announced on Thursday, follows the $8.6 million raised by Ouya on the crowd-sourced Kickstarter platform in August of 2012. Long-time executive at EA, Bing Gordon, will be joining the Ouya board as part of the deal, which was funded by Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers (KPCB), along with participation from the Mayfield Fund, NVIDIA, Shasta Ventures, and Occam Partners.

The Ouya console is a small box, designed by Yves Behar, that runs Google’s Android software on an Nvidia Tegra 3 chip. The console costs $99 with additional controllers priced at $49 each. Unlike other gaming devices, Ouya focuses on a free-to-play model:

“For gamers, every game will be free to play: what this means is that there will at least be a free demo, or you’ll be able to play the entirety of the game for free but may have access to additional items, upgrades, or other features that come at a cost.

For developers, free to play means that they can set their own prices. Developers know best: There is no better way to sell a game than to have folks that have actually touched the game share glowing reviews with their friends. By allowing some form of free play, we’ll help them do just that.”

Some early Kickstarter backers of the Ouya project have received their devices but the general public won’t be able to purchase one until June 25 in the U.S., Canada, and the U.K. through retailers Amazon, Best Buy, GAME, GameStop, and Target. The company is taking pre-orders now, however.

While the funding is important to help the Ouya founders complete their vision, the bigger help may be having Gordon join the board. Early reviews show the Ouya to still be a work in progress in areas, while some have even called the device a “beta”. With guidance from Gordon — and the additional $15 million in funding — Ouya could prove to be a better gaming console than originally expected.

Related research and analysis from GigaOM Pro:
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CapLinked,  a Los Angeles, Calif.-based startup whose cloud-based platform enables investors to manage business transactions like mergers, acquisitions, financings, asset sales and reporting, has closed on a Series A round that the firm has been assembling since last year. The round, which is being closed with $2.1 million, includes new investors Conversion Capital, Inflection Ventures, and The Artesian Group. Previous investors in the company include 500 Startups and venture capitalist Peter Thiel. To date, CapLinked has raised more than $3 million.

PRESS RELEASE:

CapLinked (https://caplinked.com), the cloud-based platform that makes business transactions simple and secure, announced additional investors and the final results of its Series A financing round today.

The total size of the financing round came to $2.1 million. The new investors include Conversion Capital, Inflection Ventures, The Artesian Group, Chris Harris (software engineering manager at Google), and Lee Essener (founder of AccessDNA). The company previously disclosed that FF Angel, Siemer Ventures, 500 Startups, and Peter Thiel (co-founder of PayPal), among others, had invested $1.6 million in the Series A round. The new funding brings the company’s aggregate amount of capital raised to over $3 million.

CapLinked empowers its clients to manage complex business transactions such as mergers & acquisitions, financings, asset sales, and investor reporting. The company’s easy-to-use collaborative workspaces enable users to speed up the complicated and tedious process of managing a large deal. Built with workflow optimization in mind, CapLinked helps all parties involved in a transaction to communicate and securely exchange files, while providing customers with deal analytics and a complete audit trail.

“We’re using the proceeds from our financing round to invest in our technology, build new features, and increase sales and support,” said CapLinked CEO Eric M. Jackson. “We’re proud of our product, and I can confirm that we used our own software to manage our capital raise.”

“I was particularly drawn to CapLinked’s team, technology and vision,” said investor Lee Essner. “They have a beautiful, modern, workflow-friendly transaction management solution for corporate development teams, sell-side advisors, and private equity firms, as well as an extremely driven and impressive team that is perfectly positioned to take advantage of this big opportunity to disrupt the financial technology sector.”

Additionally, the company announced several new clients, including Edwards Lifesciences, Draper and Kramer, and Proprietary Capital. They join a growing and impressive roster of previously disclosed CapLinked clients that includes Thomson Reuters, Sun Capital, and NextView Ventures.

CapLinked provides a welcome alternative to Virtual Data Room (VDR) services for coordinating on complex business deals. The VDR industry has long been dominated by three large players (IntraLinks, Merrill Datasite, and RR Donnelly’s Venue), and the resulting lack of competition has lead to a lack of innovation for a technology that originated in the 1990s. Poor workflow, difficult set-up, and exorbitant pricing (including hidden per-page charges) have long plagued VDR customers. By contrast, CapLinked is easy to set up, workflow-friendly, and has transparent pricing.

About CapLinked
CapLinked is a cloud-based platform that makes business transactions simple and secure. CapLinked is used by companies for managing M&A transactions, raising capital, selling assets, updating investors, and conducting due diligence. The site was launched in 2011 by Eric M. Jackson (PayPal’s first head of US marketing and author of the award-winning book The PayPal Wars) and Christopher Grey (former senior private equity executive and managing director at a subsidiary of Emigrant Bank). Its investors include FF Angel, Hercules Growth Fund, Siemer Ventures, 500 Startups, 7th Rig, and Peter Thiel (the co-founder of PayPal). The Wall Street Journal called CapLinked “the go-to place for setting up and closing deals,” and Inc. named CapLinked to its list of “5 Back-Office Tech Innovations.” The company is based in Los Angeles.

Contact Information
For more information or to arrange an interview with CapLinked CEO Eric M. Jackson, contact Luke Cherrington at [email protected] or (310) 896-5045.

The post CapLinked Announces New Investors appeared first on peHUB.

Since purchasing the Vizio Co-Star several months ago, I have become a fan of Google TV. I even considered using online services to “cut the cord“. With my Amazon Prime subscription and network TV sites I will miss little. What stops me? The NFL and those networks. The league stubbornly refuses to move into the future, where other professional sports already reside, while many network websites block the Google device.

Today, PlayOn makes the barrier in front me even smaller. This is a huge move for MediaMall software. The company announces it brings full service to Google TV free of charge. It does so because of the slight that Google’s living room solution has been shown by networks. “We’ve decided to make PlayOn completely free on Google TV. Why? Well, Hulu and the Networks have been discriminating against Google TV owners by not creating apps that enable folks to watch their content on Google TV”, the company tells us.

PlayOn brings Hulu Plus (you still need a subscription), ABC, CBS, Fox, Comedy Central, MTV, VH1, Nickelodeon, and 50-plus more channels to the set-top box.

“Just go to www.playon.tv/googletv and you can download PlayOn to your PC from there. No need to buy a license key — the non-licensed software will just magically work on Google TVs. Then, from your Google TV, go into the Google Play Store and get the PlayOn app”, the company explains.

You will first need to install the PlayOn server software to a computer on your network — preferably one that is always on. Then visit the Google Play store to grab the brand new app.

I am now set. Sorry DirecTV, but we are breaking up. Perhaps we can get back together when Sunday Ticket time rolls around again. Or maybe the NFL will finally greet the 21st century.

Photo Credit:  holbox/Shutterstock

Though this week’s events have pushed Boston Marathon bombing headlines from the front pages of newspapers, the city of Boston is still reeling from the attacks and investigators are still digging into the bombers’ pasts.

Today, the Boston Globe is reporting that the body of suspected bomber Tamerlan Tsarnaev has finally been buried. The location of the burial has been kept secret, though the Globe cites an unnamed “funeral home official briefed on the situation” as stating it did not take place in Massachusetts.

Tsarnaev’s body was reportedly taken just before midnight from the funeral home where it has been since being released to the Tsarnaev family. Tsarnaev’s uncle, Ruslan Tsarni, is reported by the Globe to have approved the burial site after having difficulties finding a cemetery that would accept the body.

The burial and transportation of the body was coordinated by Worcester police, who have also confirmed the burial. From the police statement:

As a result of our public appeal for help, a courageous and compassionate individual came forward to provide the assistance needed to properly bury the deceased. His body is no longer in the City of Worcester and is now entombed.

Tsarnaev was killed during a shootout with police that occurred shortly after the FBI determined he and his brother were the bombing suspects. Tamerlan’s brother, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, is currently behind bars and cooperating with police. He faces up to the death penalty for charges of using a weapon of mass destruction.

(Image courtesy the comment/Johannes Hirn)