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SEOmoz has changed its name to simply, ‘Moz,’ to better reflect the growing industry of which it is a part. The company, however, isn’t only rebranding itself. It’s also launching a completely new product.

SEOmoz now redirects to Moz.com.

“The Problem: There isn’t a product that measures the effectiveness and impact of inbound marketing efforts,” a spokesperson for the company tells WebProNews. “Sure, Google Analytics can give you traffic data—but it doesn’t give you data for all your efforts across other channels. Moz Analytics is built to expose that data and give marketers insight into how to improve their efforts. It helps users answer a difficult question: What is the ROI of inbound marketing?”

“The Pitch: Moz is the result of two years of product development, based on a trend that was clear to our Founder and CEO, Rand Fishkin,” the spokesperson adds. “The world of search marketing has evolved. Social media marketing matters, content matters, and SEO matters—they all contribute to the greater picture of inbound marketing, or earned marketing, as we like to call it. Moz manages and analyzes those marketing efforts on a single subscription platform.”

“For the past decade, we’ve fought to make SEO a legitimate, respected part of a web marketer’s arsenal,” says Fishkin. “Today that battle is expanding to include content marketing, social media, community building, brand tracking, and other inbound channels. While SEO remains a key part of our product, it’s no longer transparent or authentic to say we’re purely an SEO software company.”

The Moz Analytics platform includes SEO and link analysis features, social analytics and brand/web mention data. It will show where a brand, competitor, or industry topic is being talked about on the web, and companies can see where they’re being mentioned, but not linked to.

“The transformation of Moz over the past year is a direct result of the feedback we’ve received from our customers and community,” says Fishkin. “We’ve taken input from thousands of marketers, and built the tools they need to understand the impact of their efforts.”

Moz has over 25,000 customers, and boasts a community of over 300,000 online marketers. Moz Analytics is in private invite-only beta mode for the time being. They will start transitioning customers to the new software over the coming weeks.

Fishkin discusses the change more over on the Moz Blog.

You’d be hard pressed to find a better use case for big data number crunching than Formula 1 racing, where the cars blasting around the track are largely designed, simulated and built on computer screens. There’s a reason for that: as expensive as all that compute fire power is, it’s still cheaper than doing it all manually. Every day the real team spends testing a car out on track costs $400,000 to $450,000, said Patrick Louis, CEO of the Lotus F1 team. 

For that reason, with its use of advanced computational flow dynamics (CFD) and CAD/CAM operations, Formula 1 racing is a demanding test case for compute and storage infrastructure.  When the real cars do hit the track, each vehicle runs 240 sensors which generate 25 megabytes of data per lap driven. That data is uploaded via satellite link to the factory — the engine data is split from the chassis data and each stream is analysed for performance and wear and tear.

And now,  the Formula 1 racing circuit is navigating a massive mandated change — from V-8 engines with 2.4-liter displacement to more gas-efficient V-6 engines with 1.6 liter displacement. And they have to do that with no loss of speed. That means there are plenty of design challenges ahead, Louis acknowledged.

The upcoming Lotus F-1 car will look like this — complete with EMC, Microsoft and Symantec decals.

F-1 design draws on big data, big time

As a friend (thanks Rochelle!) who is a huge F-1 fan explained to me, the race’s governing body (the FIA) lays out detailed rules about how cars can be built. It mandates, for example, that a flat plank on the underside of the carriage must be X centimeters above the ground and no car can benefit from “moveable aerodynamics.”

Each car maker — companies including Lotus, Ferrari and McLaren – interprets those rules for its own design and spends what some estimate to be hundreds of millions developing cars for each season. Yikes. Each car — an intricate combination of 85 percent carbon fiber composites and 15 percent metal — can cost upward of $2 million.

EMC jumps aboard Lotus F-1 bandwagon

But while FIA rules change annually, the whole deck gets reshuffled this year in an effort to cut energy costs, Louis said. That means new engines and new transmissions. EMC put me on the phone with Louis because Lotus will be using an array of EMC gear, including Vblocks (actually bundles of EMC storage, VMware virtualization and Cisco servers) for its back-office functions that run on Microsoft Dynamics AX.

Lotus is building  two projects running in parallel, Louis said. One is a factory where one section is dedicated to the aforementioned Microsoft Dynamics business functions and the second for all the Catia CAD/CAM design applications. The second is tasked with equipping the racing team — which obviously travels from track to track — with the same software and content.

Louis wouldn’t detail what hardware is being displaced but it’s safe to say it’s non-EMC servers and storage. EMC’s CMO Jeremy Burton (who likes to race Mazda Miatas in his spare time) said aspects of the Lotus deal could also include EMC’s Atmos for storage and managing content; Syncplicity to sync and share files across sites; and Data Domain for backup and recovery.

The massive computational fluid dynamics (CFD) applications that simulate how airflows will impact speed and performance, and how the hot exhaust of the car can create more downforce, are not part of this deal, Louis said.

This is a big, high-profile multi-faceted job —  one that any tech vendor would kill to be part of. So brace yourself for a wave of promotions from EMC, Microsoft, Symantec (judging from the decals plastered on the car above) and whoever else is involved.

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It’s big, black and can seat six comfortably in the rear cab. You can take it off-road and on-road with ease. And it is one of the most custom Toyota Tundra’s we have ever seen. What is it? It is a fully-loaded platinum edition 2013 Toyota Tundra Limousine for sale right now on Ebay for the asking price of $229,000.

This Platinum edition Toyota Tundra is really one-of-a-kind!

This Devolro Warrior “Big Boy” 5.7l V-8 limousine has just 5,987 miles, a clean title and is street legal with off-road capability. It has been custom engineered with an air-pressure controlled suspension for the length and the weight while keeping “high speed performance and off-road conditions.”

The interior of the truck looks like any other high-class limousine.

The interior features hand-made Italian leather seats and trim which took over 300 hours to complete. It also has a Microsoft-based, all-in-one touch screen operating system that is controlled by the passenger (s).

The list of engine features include:

• Ultimate TRD upgrade package
• TRD supercharger
• TRDAir Intake
• TRD Exhaust
• 520hp
• 550lb of torque
• Other mechanical:
• Upgraded alternator
• Dual A/C Heat system
• Heavy Duty Condenser

From the side, it is really, really long. Pretty sure turning and parking could be an issue.

Exterior features include:

• 70″conversion
• Full metal Slick Top
• Custom build suspension
• Remote Reservoir Front Coil-over Shock System
• Billet Aluminum Upper Control Arm System
• 2.5″ Series Piggyback Reservoir Shocks
• LiftRear Leaf Spring Expansion Pack
• Custom 6.5 inch suspension lift
• Devolro custom steel bumpers front and rear, painted
• Front 9500 lb winch with wireless remote
• Custom step bars
• Custom topper with full walk in door (carpeted, additional light inside)
• Custom roof rack
• Custom full LED off road lightening package: includes front 50 inch LED bar and 30inch LED bar on the back, 40 inch LED bars on the side. LED Day running lights
• Custom build 22 inch American Force forged aluminium wheels (5 pcs) wrapped in 37 inch Nitto Trail Grappler tires.
• Offroad fender flairs painted
• Hornblasters train horns
• Rearview camera
• Custom mesh grill
• 46 US gl auxiliary fuel tank

Interior features:

• Custom build cabin for 6 ppl
• Black leather with red stitching and piping,
• Alcantera diamond inserts
• Alcantara diamond headliner
• Limo Touch controls
• Sound System Upgrade
• CD/DVD/USBUnit
• 2×15″ Drop down TV’s
• Wood Flooring
• 12v outlet
• Full interior partition
• 2 side bars
• White LED light panels
• Custom floor , interior and bar lighting
• Removable Carpet Overlay

Go check it out on Ebay and to see a bunch more photos.

What do you think? Would you buy it if you could?

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The post 2013 Toyota Tundra Limousine For Sale – Featured Truck appeared first on Tundra Headquarters Blog.

TrackMaven said on Wednesday that it has received $1.25 million in funding. Among the investors that participated in the round were AOL Ventures; Roger Krakoff of Cloud Capital Partners; and Acceleprise Ventures. Based in Washington, D.C., TrackMaven is a competitive intelligence platform for marketers.

PRESS RELEASE

TrackMaven, the competitive intelligence platform for marketers, announced today that it has closed $1.25 million in funding from Aol Ventures and leading marketing investors. The round includes investments from:
AOL Ventures
Sean Glass (Former CMO of HigherOne, NYSE: ONE)
Hemang Gadhia (Former CEO of Condaptive, Acquired by Millenial Media, NYSE: MM)
Adam Riggs (Former President of Shutterstock, NYSE: SSTK)
Roger Krakoff (Cloud Capital Partners)
Tony Ayaz (Former VP of Public Sales for Splunk, NYSE: SPLK)
Marc Solomon (CFO of JackBe)
Acceleprise Ventures
Andy Klingenstein
David Cohen
Adam Falla
TrackMaven is the competitive intelligence platform for digital marketers. By aggregating data from paid, owned, and earned media channels, TrackMaven gives modern marketers one platform to track their competitors’ digital marketing activities in three ways: with a universal feed that displays content marketing, press mentions, social marketing on Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter, paid advertising, and other digital marketing activities in a single, filterable, real-time feed;via personalized alerts triggered by digital marketing activity of any type, from any competitor, of interest to the marketer as it happens or at the frequency of their choosing; and with competitor profiles that show how successful competitors are as compared to one another, and the user company, in every type of digital marketing activity monitored in TrackMaven, including SEO, Traffic, content marketing, social media, and more.

Competitive intelligence is a time-intensive process for marketers with results that are traditionally quickly out of date and labor intensive. The traditional process of gathering meaningful competitive intelligence usually involves cobbling together data from lots of different sources, aggregating it by hand, and then analyzing it to get a full picture of what your competitors are doing and whether it’s effective for them. It’s really difficult to do this well the old-fashioned way. TrackMaven eliminates the manual data gathering process and shows marketers everything their competitors are doing with digital marketing and how well it’s working for them in one place. This makes it easy for marketers to see what is working in their industry and build campaigns around that, benchmark their own programs, and keep up-to-date with their industry.
www.TrackMaven.com
Twitter.com/TrackMavenApp
Facebook.com/TrackMaven

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J.F. Lehman & Company, a middle-market private equity firm focused on the defense, aerospace and maritime sectors, said on Wednesday that it has promoted four employees. The changes are as follows: Lisa M. Steffens will become managing director of fund finance and investor relations; David L. Rattner will become managing director, legal, administration and compliance; William J. Hanenberg will become vice president; and, David F. Thomas will become senior associate. J.F. Lehman & Company has offices in New York and Washington, D.C.

PRESS RELEASE

May 29, 2013
NEW YORK – J.F. Lehman & Company, a leading middle-market private equity firm focused on the defense, aerospace and maritime sectors, is pleased to announce the promotion of Lisa M. Steffens to Managing Director, Fund Finance and Investor Relations; David L. Rattner to Managing Director, Legal, Administration and Compliance; William J. Hanenberg to Vice President and David F. Thomas to Senior Associate.
Ms. Steffens joined the firm in 2006 and served for six years as J.F. Lehman’s Director of Investor Relations. Her prior experience includes risk analysis at the Shaw Group, investment banking at Deutsche Bank and Goldman Sachs, and intelligence analysis and engineering for the C.I.A. Ms. Steffens graduated from M.I.T. with B.S. degrees in mechanical engineering and French and earned an M.B.A. from Yale University.
Mr. Rattner joined the firm in 2011 as General Counsel. Prior to joining the firm, Mr. Rattner spent eight years as general counsel of OAO Technology Solutions (“OAOT”), a former J.F. Lehman portfolio company. Prior to joining OAOT, Mr. Rattner held various general counsel and in-house legal positions at companies ranging from start-ups to a Fortune 500 company. Mr. Rattner began his legal career as an associate at Skadden Arps, earned a B.A. degree from Georgetown University and received his J.D. from the University of Pittsburgh School of Law.
Mr. Hanenberg joined the firm in 2008. Prior to joining J.F. Lehman, he was an investment banking analyst in the Global Industrials Group at Banc of America Securities. His prior experience includes analyst positions at Redwood Capital Group (a technology-focused M&A boutique) and Dealogic. Mr. Hanenberg earned a B.S. in economics from Duke University and an M.B.A. from Columbia University’s Graduate School of Business.
Mr. Thomas joined J.F. Lehman in 2010. Prior to joining the firm, Mr. Thomas was an investment banking analyst in Credit Suisse’s Mergers and Acquisitions Group where he supported a wide range of transactions. Mr. Thomas earned a B.A. in economics from Yale University.
J.F. Lehman & Company is a leading middle-market private equity firm focused exclusively on the defense, aerospace and maritime sectors. The firm has offices in New York and Washington, D.C.

For more information about J.F. Lehman & Company, please visit www.jflpartners.com.

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John Butman, author of Breaking Out, believes you need to embody the ideas you believe in.

Cooley LLP said on Wednesday that Jeremy Naylor has joined the firm’s New York office as a partner in its tax practice. In his new position, Naylor will work with the firm’s leading venture capital group. Prior to joining Cooley LLP, Naylor worked at White & Case.

PRESS RELEASE

NEW YORK, NY–(Marketwired – May 29, 2013) – Cooley LLP announced today that Jeremy Naylor has joined the firm’s New York office as a partner in the Tax practice. Naylor joins Cooley from White & Case where he specialized in the representation of private equity, real estate, venture capital and hedge fund sponsors in connection with the tax aspects of structuring investment funds. At Cooley, Naylor will work extremely closely with the firm’s leading Venture Capital group.
“Cooley has the top fund formation group in the country by all measures, and with fundraising activity running very high, our team is in equally high demand,” said Jim Fulton, partner-in-charge of Cooley’s New York Office. “Jeremy will play a key role in the critically important tax arena for these clients and strengthen our general tax practice more broadly, especially as our level of cross-border work continues to grow.”
“Recently, our Venture Capital group has been involved more frequently with structurally complex international funds that raise intricate tax issues,” said Craig Dauchy, head of the firm’s Venture Capital practice. “Jeremy has the international tax background to assist these clients in designing the most tax efficient structures for their funds. We are well acquainted with Jeremy’s work and reputation and are very excited to augment our fund formation team with his exceptional tax skills.”
In addition to his extensive work in the area of private equity and venture capital fund formation, Naylor also brings to Cooley experience with tax issues in domestic and cross-border mergers and acquisitions, structuring US real estate and joint venture transactions and executive compensation arrangements.
“I am tremendously excited to have the opportunity to collaborate with and support the tax needs of the country’s preeminent venture fund formation group,” said Naylor. “I am thrilled to join an extremely talented group of tax practitioners who day in and day out are providing forward thinking tax solutions to some of the country’s most innovative companies. When combined with the firm’s collegial culture, this is a unique opportunity for me both professionally and personally.”
Earlier this year, Mike Faber also joined Cooley’s New York office as a partner in the firm wide Tax practice. Prior to Cooley, Faber had been a tax partner at Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati.
Naylor earned his J.D. from Northeastern University School of Law in 1999, and his B.A. from Boston University in 1994.
About Cooley LLP
Cooley’s 700 attorneys have an entrepreneurial spirit and deep, substantive experience, and are committed to solving clients’ most challenging legal matters. From small clients with big ideas to international clients with diverse legal needs, Cooley has the breadth of legal resources to enable clients of all shapes and sizes to seize opportunities in today’s global marketplace. We represent clients across a broad array of dynamic industry sectors, including the financial sector, law firms, media, technology, life sciences, health care, venture capital, clean energy, real estate and retail.
Cooley has full-service offices in eleven major business and technology centers: Boston, MA; Broomfield, CO; Los Angeles, CA; New York, NY; Palo Alto, CA; Reston, VA; San Diego, CA; San Francisco, CA; Seattle, WA; Washington, DC; and Shanghai, China.

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James Lipton is best known for hosting the TV show Inside the Actors Studio, in which he conducts serious interviews with big-name Hollywood actors and actresses. It turns out, however, that the 86-year-old Lipton has a much more interesting past that involves French bordellos.

In an interview this week with Parade, Lipton confirmed that he was a pimp in Paris during the 50s. He stated that he befriended a prostitute in the city, who arranged the job for him after he ran out of money. Lipton said that he represented an entire bordello of women, taking a cut of the revenue.

Lipton emphasized that he believes the women, who were desperate for money just after World War II, were not exploited. He stated that his efforts were “completely regulated” and that the girls received medical inspections on a weekly basis.

“The great bordellos were still flourishing in those days before the sheriff of Paris, a woman, closed them down,” said Lipton. “It was a different time.”

Lipton called the experience “a great year” of his life. He also stated that he doesn’t think people should buy sex, and that if someone can’t “earn it” on their own, they don’t deserve it.

Lipton also mentioned his role in the comedy series Arrested Development during the interview. He has reprised his role as Warden Gentles in the Netflix-produced fourth season of the show, which was released this weekend.

(Image courtesy David Shankbone/Wikimedia Commons)

Google announced on Wednesday that it has added new New York imagery to Google Maps Street View, including imagery of neighborhoods struck by Hurricane Sandy, a tour of the 9/11 Memorial, and 360-degree imagery of Central Park.

“To create a space where the New York community can share memories from before, during, and after the storm, we partnered with Historypin on a community photo and video album called Hurricane Sandy: Record, Remember, Rebuild,” says Susan Molinari, VP of Public Policy at Google. In the album, you can discover and contribute old and new images of the places that mean the most to you.”

“For example, I found this photo of a house on Staten Island’s New Dorp Beach,” adds Molinari. “‘You can take our home but you can’t take our heart’ is scrawled across its boarded up windows. That’s Staten Island for you — we persevere and help each other up when we fall.”

The 9/11 Memorial imagery includes panoramic images of the North and South pools, which let you see victims’ names engraved along the edges:

For Central Park, Google partnered with Central Park Conservancy, and collected 360-degree imagery of trails, paths and plazas:

A guy walks into a store. No, it’s not the opening salvo for a bad joke. It’s a critical moment of truth for the in-store and brand marketer that, today, is complicated — even compromised — by the hyperconnected consumer. You know this person. He’s standing in the aisle striking the familiar pose: feet planted, arms extended to form the smartphone hunch. He’s lost in a parallel world. What’s he doing? Searching, browsing reviews, comparing prices, cultivating social input. Is he gaining conviction or changing his mind?

That’s the question on the minds of retailers today. Gartner estimates that two-thirds of U.S. smartphone users reach for their devices to check prices, read reviews and compare product information — both inside and outside the store. This hyperconnected consumer is a game-changer for marketers. Why? Because the path to purchase, which was once relatively easy to model and influence, has become a muddled and meandering maze — more of a walkabout than a path that follows any deliberate course. Think of it as the flight of the bumblebee — not the seasonal migration of songbirds.

Brands need to tap into this new dynamic by ensuring that, as the path winds and wends, they’re part of the experience. It’s easier said than done. But here are some examples of how brands are meeting the challenge:

Develop customer intimacy. Every strategy begins with an understanding of your target customer. We already know that. But it’s worth restating because, here, it implies something vaguely different. It’s not only about like-kind segmentation based on customer needs and wants; it’s also about developing a deep understanding of customers’ connected behaviors, preferences, and usage patterns. Brands measure these patterns and, increasingly, look to advanced ethnographic techniques to observe what isn’t often reliably reported by customers.

Think mobile first. Ninety percent of consumers use multiple screens in sequence over the course of a day. And, within that sequence, Google suggests that 65% of purchases begin on a smartphone, from which 61% advance to a PC or laptop, and 4% terminate on a tablet. This points to the primacy of mobile. Many brands adopt a mobile-first strategy to direct multichannel experience design. By pegging your efforts to mobile you ensure that experiences are optimized to what is fast becoming the primary use case — and you ensure that the physical constraints of the mobile medium gets the first-order attention it requires.

Integrate experiences across channels. Today’s multichannel realities can easily create fragmented brand experiences. And, the presence of a mobile device can easily distract consumers from the buying journey. That’s why it’s so important to design experiences that make mobile an asset, not a liability — a magnet, not a wedge. Case in point: Beauty supply retailer Sephora integrates mobile across the in-store shopping experience, including the use of mobile payments, the ability to scan items to create shopping lists and access reviews in the store, and innovative tactics like “endless aisle,” which allows consumers to scan promoted QR codes for on-demand shipping of highly giftable items. One scan and Aunt Sally’s present is off of your mental checklist.

Deliver targeted experiences. Big data means that we know more about consumers than they care to contemplate. Creepiness aside, it also means we can deliver offers and experiences that are both relevant and welcomed. With mobile, targeting data encompasses elements of location and proximity. Of course, you can easily see how this story could end badly — after all, proximity doesn’t always mean permission. But, particularly for the most loyal customers, mobile can be a powerful way to engage with and influence consumers in close company to potential purchase moments.

Don’t forget the basics. It’s easy to get starry-eyed contemplating the universe of mobile possibilities, but sometimes the best tactics are close to the ground. For example, Gartner believes that mobile search yields higher conversion rates than traditional search. Why? Because mobile search is inherently local and exhibits high commercial intent. You search on your smartphone, not to chase shiny objects or to kill time, but to fulfill a near and present need. The upshot? Sometimes the mobile magic is the simple combination of a mobile search strategy tied to a mobile-optimized website. Or, it’s social reviews integrated into your mobile commerce site. It may not impress peers at the next industry cocktail party, but the ROI on the proven basics is bound to impress your boss.

So, next time you see the hyperconnected consumer, standing aisle-side and astride, performing the smartphone hunch, ask yourself: Is that the pose of a customer at risk — or is it a customer engaged? Smart mobile marketing is about finding ways to turn the former into the latter.

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Like other industries, call centers and their contact-center relatives have been looking more to cloud computing and relying less on on-premise gear. One of the beneficiaries of that trend is Five9, which makes software for call- and contact-center employees that runs on Five9 servers in colocation facilities.

Five9 was founded in 2001 “as a pure-play Software as a Service (SaaS) back in the ASP (application service provider) day,” said Mike Burkland, the president and CEO. Over the years, the San Ramon, Calif.-based company has moved from doing business mainly with small and medium-sized businesses to large companies, too. It claims more than 1,800 customers.

The company’s software lets customers have automated call-answering with voice recognition. It routes calls to available representatives and lets employees handle both inbound and outbound calls. It’s possible for managers to keep an eye on employee efficiency, and the system hooks in easily with customer-relationship management (CRM) software. Now, Burkland said, it’s just a matter of selling the concept to more companies.

That’s where Five9′s new round of funding comes in. On Wednesday the company announced $34.5 million in funding, including $22 million of series D equity led by SAP Ventures and $12.5 million in bank revolver debt from City National Bank. Previous investors Adams Street Partners, Hummer Winblad Venture Partners and Partech International also participated in the equity round. The company has now raised $71.6 million in total venture funding.

In its campaign to phase out proprietary software running on these facilities’ on-premise gear, Five9 naturally faces competition from vendors offering those solutions, particularly Avaya, Genesys and Cisco, Burkland said. As for smaller cloud-based competitors, Burkland said, “They tend to come and go.”

Part of the appeal of horizontal SaaS products from Five9 and their ilk is that customers don’t need to worry about paying up front for hardware or on an ongoing basis for external support or internal management. The pay is more granular, as customers pay per seat per month. While there are fewer revenue streams to count on, the revenue comes in more frequently. “There’s very low risk profiles compared to their classic enterprise software brethren, which used to have to make every new quarter with customer sales,” Burkland said. The trick is to keep existing customers while adding new ones, and that’s what Five9 is aiming to do.

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Although the Samsung Galaxy S 4 is one of the hottest selling Android phones currently, its size is just too much for some hands to take. So it makes perfect sense for Samsung to create a smaller version dubbed the “mini”. The company did the same with it’s Galaxy S 3 last year. It’s likely Samsung will introduce a Galaxy S 4 Mini at a planned June event in London, but we now have a good idea of what to expect.

Once again, mobile device benchmarking applications provide the details: All About Samsung, a German enthusiast blog, caught sight of the likely Galaxy S 4 Mini specifications on Wednesday. If you were expecting the same phone in a smaller version, plan to be surprised because Samsung has cut back in some areas as compared to its flagship Galaxy S 4.

Instead of using Samsung’s latest Exynos silicon, the tested Galaxy S 4 Mini uses a dual-core 1.7 GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon S400 chip and Adreno 305 graphics. In comparison, the Galaxy S 4 uses a higher-end 1.9 GHz quad-core Snapdragon S600 processor. And although the benchmarks don’t indicate it, I wouldn’t expect the Mini to offer all of the same gesture functions found in its big brother, based on that chipset: The required screen digitizer would also add to the cost.

The Mini also looks to sacrifice display resolution — in a big way. I would have expected a drop from 1920 x 1080 to 1280 x 720 resolution, but the tested Mini uses an older qHD res of 960 x 540. Still, on an expected 4.3-inch display, that works out to a relatively crisp 240 pixels per inch.

The benchmarks also indicate an 8 megapixel rear camera, 2.1 megapixel front camera, what looks to be 1.5 GB of memory and Android 4.2.2 installed. If the benchmarks are correct — and we should know in a few weeks — the slightly smaller Galaxy S 4 Mini is less of a petite powerhouse and more of a mid-range phone that would fit in the $149 with contract price band.

But it could be perfect for folks like my wife: She pulled the SIM out of her iPhone 4S last week — she’s due for an upgrade — and popped it in the Galaxy S 4. Overall, she liked the phone, but said she couldn’t use it because it felt too big in her hands. Perhaps a Galaxy S 4 Mini would be the perfect fit?

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The Loop’s Jim Dalrymple is probably the best-connected Apple blogger on the planet at the moment, so when he posts an entry called “WWDC Expectations,” the entire community’s ears perk up. The annual Apple developer conference is only a couple of weeks away, and there’s been lots of speculation about what we might see. Dalrymple brings us back to earth, outlining pretty clearly what we will or won’t see.

WWDC, otherwise known as the Worldwide Developers Conference, is for developers, Dalrymple rightly reminds us, and that’s where we’ll see the bulk of the keynote focused. Those hoping for a new iPhone or iPad will have to wait a while longer, according to his report, but we won’t see a complete lack of new hardware.

The Loop says to look to the Mac family as a source of some fresh products at WWDC. That makes sense, given recent reports that MacBook Air stock at retail outlets in particular is dwindling, and given that we haven’t seen an update on that front since June last year. Apple also introduced the 15-inch Retina MacBook Pro at WWDC last June, so that’s another area where we might see an update, though it did just receive some mid-cycle changes back in February.

Other sources have said that we will see new MacBook Pro and Retina MacBook Pro refreshes at WWDC, and that Mac notebook refreshes will be the key focus in terms of hardware developments at the event.

Dalrymple quickly changes gears to what he believes will be the highlight of the show, which is on the software side. iOS and OS X will definitely be a highlight, he suggests, though he does caution that the changes on the iOS 7 side, which are rumored to be guided by Apple design lead Jony Ive and are said to be quite considerable, might not be as extreme as they are being characterized by some early reports.

The report closes by flagging deeper service integration between iOS and OS X, as bridged by things like iCloud that tie the two platforms together. Apple has definitely been moving in that direction in recent iterations of both its mobile and desktop OS, so that would not come as a surprise.

Apple has already done its best to manage expectations for this event without giving anything away, with CEO Tim Cook setting sights squarely on the fall and 2014 for new product launches during a recent conference call. Short of an official press release detailing its agenda, it doesn’t get much better than a post from The Loop in terms of giving us an even more accurate picture of what’s on the docket for the WWDC keynote.

If a Samsung Galaxy Note 8.0 with only WiFi isn’t good enough for you, the opportunity to buy an LTE version could be coming soon. The FCC just put their blessing on a version that is packing an 850 / 1900 GSM radio along with LTE Bands 2, 4, 5, and 17. These should work on AT&T’s network.

Now FCC certification doesn’t mean that it will definitely be released or that AT&T will announce a carrier version, but if you’re wishing for an LTE version, there is reason to hope.

source: FCC
via: Engadget

Come comment on this article: Samsung Galaxy Note 8.0 passes through the FCC with AT&T LTE radio in tow

Apple CEO Tim Cook made an appearance at the All Things Digital conference to talk about everything from wearable computers and Google Glass to taxes and Apple’s market share. It’s an incredibly fascinating look into the mind of one of the most powerful men in tech today, and it’s worth a watch.

The full interview talk clocks in at 81 minutes in length, but Apple fans, and tech fans in general, will want to check it out.

Those looking for new product announcements will be disappointed by the above video, but Apple fans won’t have long to wait to hear of what the company has up its sleeve as WWDC is only a few weeks away. A rumored iOS 7 redesign, and other software and hardware products will presumably be shown during the opening keynote on Monday, June 10.

In a piece in Focus Taiwan, analyst Laura Chen of BNP Paribas Securities Taiwan Ltd talked about HTC’s successes in the first half of the year and praised their plans for the second half, revealing some details in the meantime. While this isn’t official information, Chen seems to know what she’s talking about as a lot of her information fits perfectly with earlier rumors, all but confirming a June release for the HTC M4 and a fall release for the new version of the HTC Butterfly (currently called the Butterfly S).

Chen also mentions another flagship device with a 5.9-inch screen and an “upgraded” CPU (maybe the Snapdragon 800?), which we will presume to be the HTC One with a bigger screen as we’ve reported before. She also reveals that the Butterfly S will be aimed at Asian, European, Middle Eastern and African markets, while the M4 will likely be released worldwide.

As we have gathered from other rumors, both new devices will feature BoomSound speakers, 2 GB of RAM an UltraPixel camera and Sense 5 (featuring BlinkFeed among other software). The Butterfly S will ship with a full HD display and a body presumably similar to the original Butterfly. The M4 will have a smaller, 4.3-inch 720p resolution display and a weaker dual-core processor with 16 GB of internal storage.

While none of these rumors have been verified by HTC just yet, an official confirmation is inevitable. Let us know in the comments if either of these devices interest you and stay tuned for more information as we get it.

Source: Focus Taiwan

Come comment on this article: HTC M4 set for a June release date with the Butterfly 2 to follow in the third quarter of 2013

Last night, President Obama delivered remarks before over 200 members of the Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) community at a White House celebration of AAPI Heritage Month. The audience included national, state, and local community leaders; elected officials; leaders of philanthropic, youth, and arts organizations; and members of the President’s Administration, including Sri Srinivasan, who was recently confirmed unanimously by the Senate to become the first South Asian American federal appeals court judge.

President Barack Obama delivers remarks at the Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month celebration in the East Room of the White House, May 28, 2013. (Official White House Photo by Lawrence Jackson)

In his remarks, the President highlighted the contributions of generations of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders who, in his words, “helped build this country, and helped to defend this country, and to make America what it is today.”  He said:

We value these voices because from the very beginning, ours has been a nation of immigrants; a nation challenged and shaped and pushed ever forward by diverse perspectives and fresh thinking.  And in order to keep our edge and stay ahead in the global race, we need to figure out a way to fix our broken immigration system — to welcome that infusion of newness, while still maintaining the enduring strength of our laws.  And the service and the leadership of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders have proved that point time and again. 

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Maroon 5 singer Adam Levine is feeling the heat of American scorn today after saying, “I hate this country” live on NBC’s The Voice. Levine is a judge and coach on the show, and was upset about two of his singers not advancing. However much grief he gets for his comment, however, it seems he is now dating a woman who could easily take his mind off of it.

According to a People magazine report, Levine is now dating Danish model Nina Agdal. The publications cites an unnamed “source close to Levine” as saying the couple are dating casually, and that they are “just getting to know each other.”

Agdal is not the first model Levine has dated. From 2010 to 2012, Levine dated Victoria’s Secret model Anne Vyalitsyna. More recently, Levine was linked to Victoria’s Secret model Behati Prinsloo, who he reportedly broke up with in March.

(Image courtesy gashleygoh/Wikimedia Commons)