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Howard Kurtz, the writer whose piece on Jason Collins drew backlash earlier this week, has been fired from The Daily Beast.

Kurtz alleged in his story that Collins, who has just come out as a gay man, didn’t come clean about his engagement to a woman. He also made several errors regarding Collins’ essay in Sports Illustrated, then updated his article to amend his original stance and ended up just making readers angry.

Collins’ piece read, “When I was younger I dated women. I even got engaged. I thought I had to live a certain way. I thought I needed to marry a woman and raise kids with her. I kept telling myself the sky was red, but I always knew it was blue.”

The Daily Beast retracted the article and released a statement about Kurtz’s errors, saying, “The Daily Beast sincerely regrets Kurtz’s error — and any implication that Collins attempted to hide or obscure the engagement.”

Since coming out in the most recent edition of Sports Illustrated, Collins is being recognized as the first openly gay professional athlete in the U.S. The story went viral this week, but Kurtz’s blog post picked up major media attention and may have had a hand in his termination. Kurtz had this to say on Twitter:

“I’ve enjoyed my time at the Daily Beast but as we began to move in different directions, both sides agreed it was best to part company,” he wrote. “This was in the works for some time, but want to wish all my colleagues continued success with a terrific website. Newsweek and the Beast are great brands, but the time had come for me to move on to other opportunities.”

What would you do with a Wi-Fi connected Arduino board and a cloud service that lets you write code to control your new Wi-Fi enabled computer? Would you design a refrigerator magnet that tweets? Maybe set your lights to flicker when your high school crush changes his or her relationship status? Or, why not build a multimillion-dollar product line of connected devices supported by the Spark Core service?

Spark Devices, a startup that’s part of the HAXLR8TR incubator in China, has launched a Kickstarter campaign for its Spark Core hardware and cloud service that advertises the first two ideas, but CEO and Co-founder Zach Supalla hopes that the last example is where the market eventually ends up. The company’s Kickstarter is already funded after a mere 75 minutes (the goal was a relatively low $10,000), but the hardware isn’t the really exciting offering here.

Essentially the hardware is an Arduino with the nicest Texas Instruments Wi-Fi shield attached. A shield is what people add to their Arduino boards for extra functionality. They come in all kinds ranging from LCD screen to Wi-Fi. But the point is that anyone can make this: The real value is, as Supalla said, in the software.

In a chat this afternoon Supalla explained that the company’s four employees have been coming up with the Spark Core idea and platform since its first Kickstarter project (and business idea) failed. They had offered a connected light bulb called Spark Socket just a few weeks after the Philips Hue and the LIFX light bulb came out, and apparently the market for connected lightbulbs was subsequently saturated.

Supalla didn’t let that slow him down. Like several other companies he recognized that while there are hundreds of thousands of makers out there willing to play around with connected devices, there were literally millions of people who would love to have the same kind of toys that DIYers hack together in a more polished form.

But the price of delivering that polished form was too high for Spark Devices; plus, there’s more value in software as open hardware becomes more tenable for businesses building consumer-grade hardware outside of DIYers. So Spark really wants to make the same play that Electric Imp is attempting, offering connectivity in an easy-to-integrate package with the primary value being a cloud-based platform for hosting and writing the code to build services associated with those connected devices.

In short, it’s another platform as a service for the internet of things. Thus, with the hardware components it is most like Electric Imp, but on the software side it competes with a bunch of companies such as Carriots, ThingWorx and likely many more.

So for those of you excited about pulling together a Wi-Fi powered RC car or a connected web cam, this project and hardware is for you. But to build a big business Spark Devices is going to have to entice more than makers.

The good news is the team knows this, and has a small amount of seed funding to get it started. Let’s see what happens.

Related research and analysis from GigaOM Pro:
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• Analyzing the wearable computing market
• GigaOM Research highs and lows from CES 2013
• The big theme of MWC: How to live in a connected world

Checkpoint Systems said Thursday that it completed the sale of its U.S. and Canadian CheckView business to Platinum Equity. Financial terms were not announced. Checkpoint announced the sale in march.

PRESS RELEASE
Checkpoint Systems, Inc. (NYSE: CKP) today announced that it has completed the sale of its U.S. and Canadian CheckView® business to an affiliate of Platinum Equity, a California-based private equity firm. On March 25, 2013, the Company announced that it had reached a definitive agreement with Platinum Equity to acquire all continuing business operations and assets associated with the U.S. and Canadian CheckView business.

Checkpoint Systems, Inc.

Checkpoint Systems is a global leader in shrink management, merchandise visibility and apparel labeling solutions. Checkpoint enables retailers and their suppliers to reduce shrink, improve shelf availability and leverage real-time data to achieve operational excellence. Checkpoint solutions are built upon more than 40 years of RF technology expertise, diverse shrink management offerings, a broad portfolio of apparel labeling solutions, market-leading RFID applications, innovative high-theft solutions and its Web-based Check-Net® data management platform. As a result, Checkpoint customers enjoy increased sales and profits by improving supply-chain efficiencies, by facilitating on-demand label printing and by providing a secure open-merchandising environment enhancing the consumer’s shopping experience. For more information, visit www.checkpointsystems.com.

Forward-Looking Statement

This press release includes information that constitutes forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements often address our expected future business and financial performance, and often contain words such as “expect,” “anticipate,” “intend,” “plan,” “believe,” “seek,” or “will.” By their nature, forward-looking statements address matters that are subject to risks and uncertainties. Any such forward-looking statements may involve risk and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from any future results encompassed within the forward-looking statements. Factors that could cause or contribute to such differences include: the impact upon operations of legal compliance matters or internal controls review, improvement and remediation, including the detection of wrongdoing, improper activities, or circumvention of internal controls; our ability to integrate acquisitions and to achieve our financial and operational goals for our acquisitions; changes in international business conditions; foreign currency exchange rate and interest rate fluctuations; lower than anticipated demand by retailers and other customers for our products; slower commitments of retail customers to chain-wide installations and/or source tagging adoption or expansion; possible increases in per unit product manufacturing costs due to less than full utilization of manufacturing capacity as a result of slowing economic conditions or other factors; our ability to provide and market innovative and cost-effective products; the development of new competitive technologies; our ability to maintain our intellectual property; competitive pricing pressures causing profit erosion; the availability and pricing of component parts and raw materials; possible increases in the payment time for receivables as a result of economic conditions or other market factors; changes in regulations or standards applicable to our products; the ability to successfully implement global cost reductions in operating expenses including, field service, sales, and general and administrative expense, and our manufacturing and supply chain operations without significantly impacting revenue and profits; our ability to maintain effective internal control over financial reporting; and additional matters disclosed in our Securities and Exchange Commission filings. We do not undertake to update our forward-looking statements, except as required by applicable securities laws.

The post Checkpoint Closes Sale of CheckView to Platinum Equity appeared first on peHUB.

If you’re constantly heading over to the homes of friends and family to supply some tech support, Google+ now provides a much more simple solution, via Hangouts Remote Desktop.  Powered by the same technology behind Chrome Remote Desktop, this new feature will provide a much more efficient way of getting things done.

Of course this application requires permission, so you don’t have to worry about hackers being able to swiftly commandeer your desktop without your approval.

Instructions to use the application are after the break.

In order to access Hangouts Remote Desktop, you’ll have to enter a Hangout, click View More Apps > Add Apps > Hangouts Remote Desktop.  Give this lightweight and simple tool a try and let us know what you think below in the comments!

Source: +Daniel Caiafa

Come comment on this article: Google+ Hangouts for desktop now allows remote control of other computers

Google likes to dabble in a little bit of everything, but it has largely stayed out of game development. It helps developers make games for Android and Google+, but it doesn’t actually make games itself. That all may be changing soon.

TechCrunch reports that Noah Falstein, the game designer behind arcade classic Sinistar, had updated his LinkedIn profile to say he was now the “Chief Game Designer” at Google. An even earlier version of the page listed the same position, but at something called “Android Play Studio.”

I don’t know about you, but that sounds like a game development studio to me. It could be that Google is starting to get serious about game development by either making its own games, or creating tools to help others more easily make games for Android. By hiring Falstein, it adds a lot of credibility to the studio as well.

It’s speculated that Falstein could even be working with Google’s Niantic Labs, the secretive part of the company that released Ingress last year. I would hesitate to call it a “game,” but it is another entry in the increasingly popular world of augmented reality experiences. Falstein could be working on complimentary experiences for Android to bring more AR games to the device.

Of course, all of this is simply speculation for now. All we know is that Google has hired Falstein for some unknown reason. It might not even be for games. I would be surprised if it wasn’t though.

[Image: Flickr/Georgina Goodlander]

Apple is about to hit another huge milestone, and once again they’re giving away a pretty sweet prize in celebration.

This time, it’s 50 billion App Store downloads that’s fast approaching, and the person who puts them over the top is going to win a $10,000 App Store gift card.

“As of today, nearly 50 billion apps have been downloaded worldwide. And we couldn’t have done it without you. So we want to say thanks. Download the 50 billionth app, and you could win a US$10,000 App Store Gift Card. Or download one of the first 50 apps after that, and you could win a US$500 App Store Gift Card,” says Apple.

In order to be eligible for the prize, you have to be at least 13 years old. And you can only be “entered” 25 times per day, which means that you only have 25 chances that the app you’re downloading is going to be the 50,000,000,000th. It’s like winning the lottery, but hey – you’re going to download apps anyway, might as well give yourself a chance to win a ton of iTunes money.

This isn’t the first time that Apple has offered such a prize for an App Store milestone. A little over a year ago, in March of 2012, Apple hit 25 billion App Store downloads. And they gave away a $10,000 App Store gift card then as well – to a Chinese man who downloaded the popular puzzle game Where’s My Water.

LinkedIn just reported its earnings for Q1, with revenue of $324.7 million for the quarter, up 72% year-over-year. Net income was $22.6 million, up from $5 million in the year-ago quarter.

CEO Jeff Weiner said, “Q1 was a strong quarter for LinkedIn with member engagement and financial results reaching record levels. We remained focused on delivering great products that increasingly make LinkedIn the essential daily resource for global professionals.”

Despite the revenue and earnings, LinkedIn stock is plummeting due to the company’s forecast, which didn’t meet Wall Street expectations.

Here’s the release in its entirety:

LinkedIn reports financial results for the first quarter ended March 31, 2013.

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif., May 2, 2013 – LinkedIn Corporation (NYSE: LNKD), the world’s largest professional network on the Internet, with more than 225 million members, reported its financial results for the first quarter of 2013:

 

• Revenue for the first quarter was $324.7 million, an increase of 72% compared to $188.5 million in the first quarter of 2012.

• Net income for the first quarter was $22.6 million, compared to net income of $5.0 million for the first quarter of 2012. Non-GAAP net income for the first quarter was $52.4 million, compared to $16.9 million for the first quarter of 2012. Non-GAAP measures exclude tax-affected stock-based compensation expense and tax-affected amortization of acquired intangible assets.

• Adjusted EBITDA for the first quarter was $83.4 million, or 26% of revenue, compared to $38.1 million for the first quarter of 2012, or 20% of revenue.

• GAAP diluted EPS for the first quarter was $0.20; Non-GAAP diluted EPS for the first quarter was $0.45.

 

“Q1 was a strong quarter for LinkedIn with member engagement and financial results reaching record levels,” said Jeff Weiner, CEO of LinkedIn. “We remained focused on delivering great products that increasingly make LinkedIn the essential daily resource for global professionals.”

First Quarter Financial Details and Operating Summary

 

• Talent Solutions: Revenue from Talent Solutions products totaled $184.3 million, an increase of 80% compared to the first quarter of 2012. Talent Solutions revenue represented 57% of total revenue in the first quarter of 2013, compared to 54% in the first quarter of 2012.

• Marketing Solutions: Revenue from Marketing Solutions products totaled $74.8 million, an increase of 56% compared to the first quarter of 2012. Marketing Solutions revenue represented 23% of total revenue in the first quarter of 2013, compared to 25% in the first quarter of 2012.

• Premium Subscriptions: Revenue from Premium Subscriptions products totaled $65.6 million, an increase of 73% compared to the first quarter of 2012. Premium Subscriptions represented 20% of total revenue in the first quarter of 2013, consistent with the first quarter of 2012.

 

Revenue from the U.S. totaled $201.4 million, and represented 62% of total revenue in the first quarter of 2013. Revenue from international markets totaled $123.3 million, and represented 38% of total revenue in the first quarter of 2013.

Revenue from the field sales channel totaled $184.0 million, and represented 57% of total revenue in the first quarter of 2013. Revenue from the online, direct sales channel totaled $140.7 million, and represented 43% of total revenue in the first quarter of 2013.

GAAP net income for the first quarter was $22.6 million, compared to net income of $5.0 million for the first quarter of 2012. Non-GAAP net income for the first quarter was $52.4 million, compared to $16.9 million in the first quarter of 2012.

Adjusted EBITDA for the first quarter was $83.4 million, or 26% of revenue, compared to $38.1 million for the first quarter of 2012, or 20% of revenue.

GAAP diluted EPS was $0.20 based on 115.4 million fully-diluted weighted shares outstanding compared to $0.04 for the first quarter of 2012 based on 111.3 million fully-diluted weighted shares outstanding. Non-GAAP diluted EPS was $0.45 based on 115.4 million fully-diluted weighted shares outstanding compared to $0.15 for the first quarter of 2012 based on 111.3 million fully-diluted weighted shares outstanding.

“Our continued focus on our operating priorities yielded strong results in the first quarter, resulting in record levels of revenue, profitability, and cash flow,” said Steve Sordello, CFO of LinkedIn. “We remain encouraged by the diversity of our business and size of our market opportunities, and we will continue to invest aggressively to realize LinkedIn’s long-term potential.”

For additional information, please see the “Selected Company Metrics and Financials” page on LinkedIn’s Investor Relations site.

First Quarter Highlights and Strategic Announcements

In the first quarter of 2013, LinkedIn:

 

• Grew its member base to 218 million, and witnessed strong member growth through the quarter due to optimization initiatives. As a result, new sign ups increased to greater than two per second.

• Introduced a new version of search, which streamlines the experience and unifies results across multiple types of content including people, companies, and jobs. Early use indicates members have responded with increased search utilization.

• Improved its content offering for professionals by adding a number of Influencers including Mayor Bloomberg, Meg Whitman, Jack Welch, Jeff Immelt, and Martha Stewart. LinkedIn continues to take steps to become the definitive professional publishing platform.

 

Additionally, LinkedIn launched several new products since the quarter end including a new version of its smartphone applications; Contacts, a new contact management system on the web and iOS mobile devices; as well products that enhance LinkedIn’s content ecosystem including the ability for member to include rich media in LinkedIn profiles, and content channels to follow 20 different professional topics on LinkedIn. In April, the company also launched a redesigned version of Recruiter, its flagship Talent Solutions product platform.

Business Outlook

LinkedIn is providing guidance for the second quarter and full year of 2013:

 

• Q2 2013 Guidance: Revenue is expected to range between $342 million and $347 million. Adjusted EBITDA is expected to range between $77 million and $79 million. The company expects depreciation and amortization to be between $30 million and $32 million, and stock-based compensation to be between $49 million and $51 million.

• Full Year 2013 Guidance: Revenue is revised upward by $20 million to range between $1.430 billion and $1.460 billion. Adjusted EBITDA is revised upward by $15 million to range between $330 million and $345 million. The company expects depreciation and amortization to be between $130 million and $135 million, and stock-based compensation to be between $190 million and $195 million.

 

Quarterly Conference Call

LinkedIn will host a webcast/conference call to discuss its first quarter 2013 financial results and business outlook today at 2:00 p.m. Pacific Time. Jeff Weiner and Steve Sordello will host the webcast, which can be viewed on the investor relations section of the LinkedIn website at

http://investors.linkedin.com/. This call will contain forward-looking statements and other material information regarding the company’s financial and operating results. Following completion of the call, a recorded replay of the webcast will be available on the website. For those without access to the Internet, a replay of the call will be available beginning at 8:00 p.m. Pacific Time on May 2, 2013 through May 9 2013 at 11:59 p.m. Pacific Time. To listen to the telephone replay, call (855) 859-2056 within the US or (404) 537-3406 Internationally, access code 34761898.

Upcoming Events

Management will participate in upcoming financial Q&A discussions at industry events on May 16^th and 29^th, as well as June 4^th and 13^th. LinkedIn will furnish a link to these events on its investor relations website, http://investors.linkedin.com/ for both the live and archived webcasts.

About LinkedIn

Founded in 2003, LinkedIn connects the world’s professionals to make them more productive and successful. With more than 225 million members worldwide, including executives from every Fortune 500 company, LinkedIn is the world’s largest professional network on the Internet. The company has a diversified business model with revenue coming from Talent Solutions, Marketing Solutions and Premium Subscriptions products. Headquartered in Silicon Valley, LinkedIn has offices across the globe.

Non-GAAP Financial Measures

To supplement its consolidated financial statements, which are prepared and presented in accordance with GAAP, the company uses the following non-GAAP financial measures: adjusted EBITDA, non-GAAP net income, and non-GAAP diluted EPS (collectively the “non-GAAP financial measures”). The presentation of this financial information is not intended to be considered in isolation or as a substitute for, or superior to, the financial information prepared and presented in accordance with GAAP. The company uses these non-GAAP financial measures for financial and operational decision making and as a means to evaluate period-to-period comparisons. The company believes that they provide useful information about operating results, enhance the overall understanding of past financial performance and future prospects, and allow for greater transparency with respect to key metrics used by management in its financial and operational decision making.

The company excludes the following items from one or more of its non-GAAP measures:

Stock-based compensation. The company excludes stock-based compensation because it is non-cash in nature and because the company believes that the non-GAAP financial measures excluding this item provide meaningful supplemental information regarding operational performance and liquidity. The company further believes this measure is useful to investors in that it allows for greater transparency to certain line items in its financial statements and facilitates comparisons to competitors’ operating results.

Amortization of acquired intangible assets. The company excludes amortization of acquired intangible assets because it is non-cash in nature and because the company believes that the non-GAAP financial measures excluding this item provide meaningful supplemental information regarding operational performance and liquidity. In addition, excluding this item from various non-GAAP measures facilitates internal comparisons to historical operating results and comparisons to competitors’ operating results.

Income tax effect of non-GAAP adjustments. The company adjusts non-GAAP net income by including the income tax effects of excluding stock-based compensation and the amortization of acquired intangible assets. The company believes that the inclusion of the income tax effects provides additional transparency to the overall or “after tax” effects of excluding these items from non-GAAP net income.

For more information on the non-GAAP financial measures, please see the “Reconciliation of GAAP to non-GAAP Financial Measures” table in this press release. This accompanying table has more details on the GAAP financial measures that are most directly comparable to non-GAAP financial measures and the related reconciliations between these financial measures. Additionally, the company has not reconciled adjusted EBITDA guidance to net income guidance because it does not provide guidance for either other income (expense), net, or provision for income taxes, which are reconciling items between net income and adjusted EBITDA. As items that impact net income are out of the company’s control and/or cannot be reasonably predicted, the company is unable to provide such guidance. Accordingly, a reconciliation to net income is not available without unreasonable effort.

Safe Harbor Statement

“Safe Harbor” statement under the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995: This press release and the accompanying conference call contain forward-looking statements about our products, including our investments in products, technology and other key strategic areas, certain non-financial metrics, such as member growth and engagement, and our expected financial metrics such as revenue, adjusted EBITDA, depreciation and amortization and stock-based compensation for the second quarter of 2013 and the full fiscal year 2013. The achievement of the matters covered by such forward-looking statements involves risks, uncertainties and assumptions. If any of these risks or uncertainties materialize or if any of the assumptions prove incorrect, the company’s results could differ materially from the results expressed or implied by the forward-looking statements the company makes.

The risks and uncertainties referred to above include – but are not limited to – risks associated with: our limited operating history in a new and unproven market; engagement of our members; the price volatility of our Class A common stock; general economic conditions; expectations regarding the return on our strategic investments; execution of our plans and strategies, including with respect to mobile products and features; security measures and the risk that they may not be sufficient to secure our member data adequately or that we are subject to attacks that degrade or deny the ability of members to access our solutions; expectations regarding our ability to timely and effectively scale and adapt existing technology and network infrastructure to ensure that our solutions are accessible at all times with short or no perceptible load times; our ability to maintain our rate of revenue growth and manage our expenses and investment plans; our ability to accurately track our key metrics internally; members and customers curtailing or ceasing to use our solutions; our core value of putting members first, which may conflict with the short-term interests of the business; privacy and changes in regulations in the United States, Europe or elsewhere, which could impact our ability to serve our members or curtail our monetization efforts; litigation and regulatory issues; increasing competition; our ability to manage our growth; our ability to recruit and retain our employees; the application of US and international tax laws on our tax structure and any changes to such tax laws; acquisitions we have made or may make in the future; and the dual class structure of our common stock.

Further information on these and other factors that could affect the company’s financial results is included in filings it makes with the Securities and Exchange Commission from time to time, including the section entitled “Risk Factors” in the company’s Annual Report on Form 10-K that was filed for the year ended December 31, 2012, and additional information will also be set forth in our Form 10-Q that will be filed for the quarter ended March 31, 2013, which should be read in conjunction with these financial results. These documents are or will be available on the SEC Filings section of the Investor Relations page of the company’s website athttp://investors.linkedin.com/. All information provided in this release and in the attachments is as of May 2, 2013, and LinkedIn undertakes no duty to update this information.

Last month we reported that Rovio was planning a big release on the Google Play Store.  That time has come now, with a new version of Angry Birds that is sure to go viral in the coming weeks.

Ported from the online version, Android users everywhere are now able to experience the social features of Angry Birds Friends for free.  This new version allows gamers to connect with Facebook friends, challenging them to matches of the classic game.  You can gather daily rewards, send and receive gifts, post about the game via Facebook connectivity, and collect trophies.

For those worried about losing your progress after playing on Facebook, have no fear— the app picks up right where you left off on the computer with seamless integration.  Nice!  There’s also a pretty cool tournament feature included that users will definitely have to check out.

Check out the link to the app in the Play Store after the break.

 Play Store Download Link

Come comment on this article: Rovio unleashes Angry Birds Friends to Android

Quarterback Tim Tebow gained notoriety for his skills on the field with the Denver Broncos, as well as for his outspoken Christian beliefs. Now, an injury and decreased playing time with the New York Jets has led to him being without a team.

According to an NFL.com report, casual speculation by an agent on a Miami radio program sparked rumors that Tebow could end up playing for the Miami Dolphins. The flimsy reasoning behind this guess was that Dolphins owner Stephen Ross is a fan of the quarterback.

Now, the Tebow/Dolphins rumor seems to have been definitively put to rest. Miami Herald columnist Armando Salguero today tweeted out a quote from an unnamed “high ranking Dolphins source” that states the Tebow rumors are “totally untrue.”

So, there is still no one who knows what’s next for Tebow, though the Arena League and the Lingerie League have both made offers for the quarterback.

Tebow himself has not commented on any of the rumors surrounding his career. His most recent Twitter posts indicate that he is leaving his fate in the hands of his god:

The folks over at LevelUp Studios have developed a free version of its hugely popular app, Beautiful Widgets.  Although augmented by in-app purchases for additional functionality and customization, it’s still worth a download due to the great looking widgets it provides for your home screen. Through in-app purchases it’s possible to unlock every feature that is included in the full paid version of the app.  This is nice because it allows users to pick and choose what kind of features they want, without having to pay for the full app.

Due to this welcome addition to the Google Play Store, the full app has been renamed Beautiful Widgets Pro. According to LevelUp Studios, both versions will maintain feature parity in future app updates.

Check out the link to the app in the Play Store after the break.

 Play Store Download Link

Come comment on this article: Free version of Beautiful Widgets with in-app purchases now available

There’s a lot of crap television out there, but I’m sure you know that. Hell, you probably watch some of it. I know I’m guilty.

But there’s always room for the good stuff. The stuff that opens our eyes to the wonders of the world, and in the process makes us more human. To combat the decline into brain-melting mush, the PBS dream team of Bill Nye, Mr. Rogers, Carl Sagan, and Bob Ross assemble, Avengers style:

[GrittyReboots]

Netflix’s chief content officer has a novel way to combat online piracy: give people easy and affordable ways to access content. In an interview with Stuff, Netflix content chief Ted Sarandos said that “the best way to combat piracy isn’t legislatively or criminally but by giving good options” and observed that “when we launch in a territory the Bittorrent traffic drops as the Netflix traffic grows.” Sarandos went on to explain that the growth in overall television content means that people will naturally “want access to it” and said that content providers “can’t use the internet as a marketing vehicle and then not as a delivery vehicle.” It goes without saying that Sarandos’s vision for combatting online piracy sounds a lot more consumer-friendly than seizing 9-year-olds’ Winnie the Pooh laptops.

If Apple is “de-glitzing” iOS to make way for a flatter look with fewer real-life textures later this year, as has been reported, it’s likely to inspire a App Store-wide re-evaluation of what makes an app look good. After Apple shows off a new-look iOS at WWDC, it’s a good bet third-party app makers are going to want to make sure their apps look more in tune with the new overall look and feel of the operating system.

Since the beginning, Apple has set the bar for good design, which is reflected in the majority of what you find in its iOS App Store. But as the iOS platform has aged, new design trends have emerged. The faux-leather texture on the Contacts app, or the wooden bookshelves on iBooks and Newsstand were welcoming and familiar six years ago. But like smartphones, they are no longer new. And as a design philosophy, the overly textured look that incorporates real-world objects is becoming less necessary in a world where mobile computers are more familiar than ever.

That’s why we’ve already seen some of the best and most adventurous third-party designers on Apple’s platform already embracing new design techniques on their own, incorporating flatter design elements as seen in places like Microsoft’s Metro design for Windows UI and elsewhere.

But if Apple embraces a new look that’s flatter and tones down the stylized textures, more will probably follow what we’ve seen in Letterpress, Clear, Embark and others: apps with a flatter look that still incorporate what we’ve come to understand as the standard iOS user experience.

Good design practice

Major design tweaks will ripple out into custom-designed apps, Phill Ryu, co-founder of mobile design shop Impending and a designer behind Clear, told me.

“Apps with custom UI benefit from, and in a way rely on, incorporating design features from the OS that its users would already be familiar with, as stepping stones to guide them through a new unexplored experience,” he said. “The stepping stones may need to be swapped out or tweaked if iOS 7 changes significantly.”

Michael Simmons of Flexibits, maker of Mac and iOS app Fantastical, pointed out that the most important aspect of app design isn’t following trends, it’s that they’re easily understandable to users.

“The point of native apps is the user is familiar with that — give them an app with that same user interface so they don’t have to learn something new,” he said.

“If Apple changes the user interface … we would have to adapt at some point to make our app more OS-like. We have a red header [in Fantastical, which stands out from Apple’s usual neutral blue] but we still use standard [iOS] controls,” Simmons said. “It still fits into the ecosystem. And that’s the key: you do want to follow what Apple’s doing because you want your experience to be as close to the native experience as possible.”

Still, if there are changes to iOS 7, he isn’t anticipating them to be so startingly different that it will require app makers to retrain iPhone and iPad users.

“Apple doesn’t make drastic changes — they evolve,” Simmons points out. “It’s never been Apple’s thing to make a massive change.”

A good bet as to the kinds of changes we’ll see? Apple’s own Podcasts app. The recent redesign didn’t alter the overall user experience, but they did nix the old-school reel-to-reel tapedeck. It still kept the basic functionality, but freshened up the look and feel with less gimmicky elements.

Design philosophy is just one aspect of the changes afoot at Apple. The competitive field in mobile is vastly different than it was when Steve Jobs first introduced the iPhone and iOS. As we’ve seen already, the company no longer can market the iPhone the same way it used to six years ago or even two years ago, so it’s adapting with new tactics to match a more realistic understanding of that market. The same is true for mobile OSes: a redesigned iOS 7 would be another example of how the company is looking toward the future by breaking with the past. The key will be to help third-party app makers and their users navigate these changes as painlessly as possible.

Related research and analysis from GigaOM Pro:
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• The future of notebooks: Following in the footsteps of the MacBook Air
• Mobile Q2: Smartphone growth surges; iPad’s rule continues
• Why iPad 2 Will Lead Consumers Into the Post-PC Era

Inequality in engineering isn’t just a product of how few women are in the profession: the tasks women perform within engineering are relevant, too. Deep-rooted ideologies also contribute to a gender wage gap, according to a Rice University sociologist.

As “first generation” bias — discrimination based on overt factors like gender or ethnicity — is becoming unacceptable, we need to dig deeper into cultural processes that reproduce inequality. That’s what Erin Cech has done in a new study. After all, inequality is still apparent, with women and minorities continuing to be underpaid and underrepresented in many job sectors. Cech thinks an implicit dualism in engineering — the notion of “hard” technical work versus “soft” social or people-focused activities — contributes to women’s lower pay.

To test her theory, Cech used data gathered by the National Science Foundation from nearly 10,000 recent college graduates who identified as being employed as engineers. Women made up only 11 percent of the sample. There was a clear pay gap between men and women — $13,000 annually or about a 16 percent difference — across all engineering subfields. Cech found that women more likely worked in “softer” fields like industrial engineering, or chemical and bioengineering, than in electrical, computer, or mechanical engineering. Women were also underrepresented in technical work activities, like research and development, and overrepresented among management, administration, or teaching activities.

When she drilled down further into the numbers, though, she found that women actually experience a pay penalty for engaging in technical work, and also a slight penalty when their work is related to their highest academic degree. As Cech wrote in the paper, “women are devalued for engaging in technical primary work activities but not social ones.” Apparently, culturally benign beliefs that are persistent in engineering, like the separation of the technical and social aspects of engineering, thus seem to contribute to the wage gap.

In engineering especially, the “purest” forms of the profession, like design, research, or computational activities, are valued more highly than management, sales, or teaching, according to Cech. She compared the data from the engineers to other scientists, but found that the same wage inequality patterns were not apparent in biology or physical sciences. The technical/social dualism doesn’t appear to drive segregation in those fields.

Cech thinks this is because the ideology is especially strong in engineering, where judgments of professional competence or fit are associated with the parts of the profession that are most valued. Thus, what’s driving the devaluation of women isn’t their gender, but their engagement in undervalued parts of the profession, like management, or perceived unsuitability for its more valued technical aspects.

Cech thinks the cultural ideologies that contribute to the wage gap in engineering could be changed through training and by refuting the technical/social dualism in college engineering education, where the professional culture for tech gets ingrained. The simple realization that both men and women engage in heterogeneous work activities in engineering could be a start. Because the cultural contributions to pay inequality appear to be strongly specific to engineering, Cech believes training may be more effective than attempts to create broad “inclusive climates.”

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Google announced today that it is making some changes to how reporting works in AdSense accounts. The company is updating the way certain data is shown.

AdSense product manager Matt Goodridge explains on the Inside AdSense blog:

As you may know, your earnings at the end of each month currently reflect the amount you’ve earned less any deductions for invalid activity. This is a step we’ve always taken to ensure advertisers are not charged for such activity. Until now, however, clicks and impressions associated with this activity still appeared in AdSense performance reports. Starting May 1st, we’ll remove those associated clicks and impressions to address this discrepancy and provide you with the most accurate reporting.

So what does this mean for your AdSense account? First and foremost, this change will not impact your earnings in any way. In most cases, removing the invalid activity from your reports means you can expect to see a slight decrease in clicks and impressions, causing a slight increase in CPC (cost-per-click) and RPM (revenue per thousand impressions). The clicks and impressions that we’ll no longer show in reports include activity like accidental clicks, so metrics like your CTR (clickthrough rate) will more accurately reflect your site’s performance. You might also see a more noticeable difference in your AdSense reporting when compared with your own account statistics measured through other tools. Please note that this change won’t affect the way we screen for invalid activity.

Reports for dates from before May 1st will not be affected by the changes.

A couple weeks ago, Google announced changes to the Terms and Conditions for Adsense. More on that here.

It wasn’t too long ago that ASUS unveiled their MeMo Pad Smart 10, and it looks like the company is already at it again with a successor to their budget full sized-tablet.  Expected for a summer release, this one certainly won’t disappoint.

Some of the rumored specs include a Full HD touchscreen on a 10-inch display, a quad-core 1.5 GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 Pro processor, 1GB of RAM, a 13 MP rear camera, a 1.2 MP front camera, 16 GB of built-in storage, a microSD card slot, full Wi-Fi capabilities, GPS, Bluetooth, support for 4G LTE, and a 5,050 mAh battery.  It is expected to come with Jelly Bean on board.

In comparison to its predecessor, the new model is a big step up in a number of different specs. There is an increase in MP for the rear camera, a Qualcomm processor will be used this time rather than NVIDIA, and the screen’s resolution will be better as well.  In terms of mid-range affordable tablets, this one looks like it’s going to be a pretty solid option.  Please note that the specs are still unconfirmed, but let us know what you think about what you see so far!

Source: TechBlog
Via: unwiredview

Come comment on this article: ASUS developing better, faster, stronger ASUS MeMO Pad Smart 10 successor, release this summer

Fans of HBO programming have called on the network to make a standalone streaming service for quite a while now. The initial response from the network said it was impossible, but a little hope came in March when the network’s CEO said that it might offer a standalone service if it could “make the math work.”

Unfortunately for fans of HBO, the network doesn’t get to call all the shots. The network is owned by Time Warner, and its CEO, Jeff Bewkes, says that a standalone streaming service just isn’t happening. He told Deadline that they would do it if it was “in [their] economic best interest.” He further elaborated by saying that the potential market for such a service isn’t yet big enough in the U.S.

In short, Time Warner is ignoring the rising trend of cable cutters opting instead to pretend that it’s not a market worth investing in. It’s a strategy that will work out over the short term, but data suggests that cable subscriptions are quickly becoming obsolete as more people look to services like Netflix and Hulu for content consumption.

It’s a fact that HBO will have to follow suit sooner or later. The problem for it is that competitors, like Netflix, are now creating content that rivals the kind of quality content that HBO offers. That strategy has already paid off for Netflix as its latest earnings report revealed that it now has about half a million more subscribers than HBO. That gap may widen even more as series like Arrested Development and Orange Is The New Black start airing on the service.

It will be interesting to see what happens when HBO finally does get with the times. The network must lament the fact that Game of Thrones is the most pirated content on the Web, but its lack of a standalone streaming services leaves many fans with no choice. Netflix recently found that piracy rates over BitTorrent go down when it introduces its instant streaming service in countries, and it’s a given that the HBO would see a similar reduction in piracy if only it offered a standalone service.

You’re never going to see that reduction in piracy, however, until Time Warner realizes that its potential market in the US are all those who are pirating Game of Thrones for lack of a better option.

[h/t: BGR]

Deftones played a show at The Pageant in St. Louis last night, and after learning of Kris Kross rapper Chris Kelly’s death, paid a bit of a tribute, adding some lyrics from the smash hit “Jump” to their own song Engine No. 9.

Luckily, YouTube user OARDarby shared some video:

The sound quality isn’t great unfortunately, but you get the idea. The studio version isn’t hard to find.

It was only a couple of weeks ago that Deftones suffered a death in their own group, as bassist Chi Cheng passed away after recovering from a coma.

Kelly died from an apparent drug overdose. You can pay your respects by checking out this awesome Sprite commercial Kris Kross did in the 90s.

[via MetalSucks]

Today, President Obama will make his fourth visit to Mexico and continue on to Costa Rica on what is also his sixth visit to Latin America. On this journey, the President hopes to highlight and reinforce the deep cultural, familial, and economic ties that so many Americans share with Mexico and Central America, and to promote economic growth across the region.

Ahead of these visits, President Obama convened two important consultations at the White House to hear from U.S. businesses and U.S. Latino leaders. The purpose of these meetings was to hear from business working directly in the region, and organizations with a particular interest in Latin America and its diaspora in the United States, about ways to foster economic development and growth for our shared future as a hemisphere.
 
Last Friday, a group of business leaders, representing a cross-section of companies doing business in Mexico and Latin America, held a lively discussion with the President. The meeting was a chance for the President to hear about emerging trends in the Western Hemisphere and what the United States government can do to foster economic growth in the Americas to help companies create jobs for middle class families on both sides of the border.

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