The Facebook vote and a nation-state in cyberspace

Facebook's global footprint. (Credit: Facebook)

The people have spoken -- just not enough of them to have an impact on Facebook's business or future.

First, there are the yeas versus the nays. In the voting on the giant social network's proposed policy changes, 589,141 users (87.5 percent) opposed the changes, and 79,731 were in support. But then there's the threshold: according to Facebook's voting laws, an enforceable verdict required participation by 30 percent (300 million) of Facebook's billion users. The total vote count of 668,872 was just 0.0668 percent of potential voters.

Now Facebook can ditch the voting structure and fully integrate its Instagram acquisitionBasically, Facebook users rendered their opinion on the measures on the table by notvoting, leaving the nearly 88 percent who voted against the changes feeling powerless. 

Marc Rotenberg, president of the Electronic Privacy Information Center, believes that Facebook should withdraw the proposed changes and stand by the majority, even if it's only a tiny percentage of potential voters.

But Facebook never expected to get 300 million out of a billion monthly Facebook users to weigh in. It's not a democracy or state with mandatory and binding elections every year to decide company policy. It's more like a local bar, where people go to gossip, market themselves and their brands, and share news and photos.

In fact, Facebook is a private enterprise that believes it has a public trust to connect people around the world and make our lives better. At the same time, it is designed to make money by targeting its billion members with ads guided by the data Facebook users pour into the company's servers., as it should.

The new, and soon-to-be ratified, Data Use Policy and Statement of Rights and Responsibilities includes provisions that allow Facebook to store Instagram's server logs and administrative records in a "way that is more efficient than maintaining totally separate storage systems." This change will also allow Facebook to target Instagram users with ads using the data stored on Facebook's servers, such as their hometowns and likes.

What's clear is that the vast majority of Facebook's inhabitants don't read the terms of service and don't feel compelled to exercise their right to vote. That behavior is common across the Web, unless a company does something that really ticks off a huge number of people, not just a vocal minority. The changes to Facebook's voting system and privacy policies didn't rise to a level that would spawn Super PACs or a massive voter turnout.

What happens when 3 billion or 5 billion people are all connected through a single entity that seeks to mirror in the digital world how people interact in the real world? How does Facebook interface with various governments as it wields more power? In the future, will Facebook users acquiesce to the company's artificially intelligent bots shaping their world? Or more near term, can Facebook be trusted to put its users' interest above all else?

Of course, no one is held captive by Facebook. People are free to leave, although it's not clear how they could take their precious data with them. In the meantime, Facebook's brain trust and algorithms will be looking for signs of unrest and revolt among its masses, and like any government with good intentions, ready to quell an uprising with reason and fairness.

(courtesy:cnet.com)

Sony scraps sales of Xperia tablet

(Credit: CBS Interactive )

Sony has stopped selling its Xperia Tablet S tablets after finding defects in the devices.

According to Reuters, sales were halted after gaps were discovered between the screen and case, making some of the tablets susceptible to water damage.

A Sony spokeswoman told Reuters that the hardware issues have been traced back to a "manufacturing flaw" at the Chinese plant where the tablet is made.

Sony has not decided when sales of the tablet will be resumed, the publication said.

The technology giant's latest tablet offering -- which shares its Xperia branding with Sony's smartphone line -- was launched commercially on September 7. The Android tablet was first sold in the U.S., closely followed by launches in Japan and Europe.

Sony has shipped approximately 100,000 Xperia tablets so far, with the slates selling for approximately $400. CNET's review of the Xperia Tablet S found issues with its Wi-Fi capabilities and the screen tending to flicker intermittently. However, the screen is sharp, it has the potential for storage expansion, and can be used as a universal remote.

Customers who have already purchased one of the units are eligible for free maintenance and check-ups, and Sony will fix any problems with the devices.

Sony had not responded to request for comment at the time of publication.

(courtesy:cnet.com)

Facebook hits 1 billion active user milestone...!

Mark Zuckerberg introducing Timeline at last fall's F8.

(Credit: Facebook )

Facebook has reached 1 billion people who are "actively" using the social network every month, the company announced today.

"If you're reading this: thank you for giving me and my little team the honor of serving you. Helping a billion people connect is amazing, humbling and by far the thing I am most proud of in my life," CEO Mark Zuckerberg said on Facebook's online newsroom.

The social network, which started in a dorm room in 2004, reached the historic milestone at 12:45 p.m. PT on September 14. This now puts one in seven people in the world on the social network.

Zuckerberg also announced the milestone on NBC's Today show. The milestone does not include bots or fake users but real people with accounts who log into the site every month, NBC reported.

If Facebook were a country, it would be the third largest in the world, behind China with 1.34 billion people and India with 1.2 billion.

According to Facebook, the site has seen:

• 1.13 trillion "likes"
• 140.3 billion friend connections
• 219 billion photos uploaded (265 billion in all if deleted photos are counted)
• 17 billion location check-ins
• 62.6 million songs played 22 billion times since September 2011

The median age of users is 22 years old, Facebook said. When the social network hit 500 million users in July 2010, the median age was 23. People who joined in July 2010 now have an average of 305 friends.

The company also has more than 600 million mobile users -- up by 48 million from 552 million in June -- a key metric for those in developing nations who may not have stable access to a fixed-line Internet connection.

(courtesy:cnet.com)

Google Wallet for content: Google's latest plan to nickel-and-dime us on the Web

Google is trying to figure out what’s keeping people from paying for premium Web content. Is it because micropayments are, at the moment, not very convenient or secure, or is it because people just don’t want to pay for online content?

The search engine giant is experimenting with a new business initiative called Google Wallet for content. Google Wallet for content will let people pay for premium content -- that is, pay for access to web articles -- using the Google Wallet mobile payment system.

Google Wallet is primarily a smartphone app that uses NFC (near-field communication) technology to let users turn their smartphones into credit cards. NFC-enabled phones allow users to tap their phones on NFC-enabled card readers in order to pay for a purchase. Google Wallet lets users store credit cards, debit cards, loyalty cards, and gift cards on their phone or in their Google account. But it’s not just an NFC smartphone app -- if you’ve ever purchased anything from Google Play (the Android app store), then you also have a Google Wallet account.

Google says the service is an “experiment” to see whether people are willing to pay for individual articles and web pages “if the buying process is sufficiently easy.” In other words, Google suspects that the reason people are wary of paying for online content is because it’s not very easy -- after all, nobody wants to sign up for a new service and hand over their credit card number for a $1 (or less) article.

Thousands of users with NFC-enabled phones already have their information stored in Google Wallet, which means that they won’t have to sign up for a new service to purchase Google Wallet for content articles.

“Users love free content, and so we expect that advertising will remain the most effective monetization model for most content on the Web,” Google said in a blog post. “However we know that there is more great content that creators could bring to the Web if they had an effective way to sell individual articles that users can find with search.”

Here’s how the new service works: Businesses that want to sell premium content through Google Wallet for content will have to sign up via a web page. They’ll then be able to sell individual articles and web pages to users.

Users will see a long preview of the article, usually the first several paragraphs (although it sounds like businesses will be allowed to determine how much of the content they want to display). The rest of the text in the article/web page will be grayed out, so people will still be able to see, roughly, how much content they’re paying for.

People can purchase individual articles and web pages for between $0.25 and $0.99 each. (I’m sure Google will get a portion of that payment but the company hasn’t disclosed its fee.) Once an article/web page is purchased, the user will have access to the content forever because even if the page is taken down, Google will offer an archived version. Google also offers an “Instant Refund,” whereby users will be able to get a refund within 30 minutes if they regret the purchase. Google will monitor refund requests to ensure users aren’t abusing the system to get free content.

Google says several top content creators have already signed on with the project, including Pearson-owned tech publisher Peachpit, illustrated reference book publisher DK Publishing, and Oxford University Press. Google says websites GigaOm and Motley Fool also plan to sell content using Google Wallet for content. Businesses using Google Wallet will be able to place ads on their protected pages, so they’ll still make money off of impressions even if people decide not to purchase the articles.

Will people pay for premium content?

Paying for Google Wallet content is a quick process, which is exactly what Google wants to ensure a seamless web-viewing experience. If your Google Wallet account is properly set up (that is, if you have a saved credit card and if you’ve agreed to their updated Terms of Service), it’s a one-click thing -- there isn’t even a confirmation screen when you click to purchase an article. So basically, Google has made this just about as easy as can be.

But the question remains: Are people willing to pay for premium content, especially when they’re used to getting online content for free?

My gut feeling is that no, people don’t really want to pay for content, premium or not, on the Internet. However, some articles -- such as this in-depth Oxford Reference article on Arctic Sea-Ice -- might just be obscure enough that desperate thesis writers will be willing to shell out a dollar or two.

Plus, it’s important to remember that this is premium content, which means that, without Google Wallet, it would likely be hidden behind a paywall anyway. A subscription to Oxford Reference, which houses that $0.99 Arctic Sea-Ice article, costs $125 per year or $15 per month. Of course, you presumably get access to much more than 125 articles per year (or 15 articles per month), so depending on the situation you may just want to subscribe instead of purchasing articles à la carte.

I’m not going to lie; I don’t really see this new Google Wallet endeavor working out in any real way. Certainly there will be people who desperately want to read one or two articles -- enough to pay for them -- but for the most part I think people will fall into one of two categories: people who want to read multiple articles from one source, and who will ultimately end up purchasing a subscription; and people who sort of wanted to read an article, but who are perfectly willing to go elsewhere in search of free content.

(courtesy:pcworld.com)

Apple's Tim Cook gifts new iPhone 5 to Mark Zuckerberg

Mark Zuckerberg talks with Matt Lauer of "The Today Show."

(Credit: Facebook )

Having nearly a billion friends has its perks, especially when one of them is Tim Cook sending you a free iPhone 5.

The Apple CEO sent Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg one of Apple's new handsets gratis, the Facebook chief executive told Matt Lauer of "The Today Show' in an interview. "It's a wonderful device," Zuckerberg told Lauer during an interview scheduled to run Thursday, steering the conversation more toward Facebook's mobile presence.

 iPhone is a great platform. There are more people who use Facebook on Android -- because Android is just -- more people use it, at this point. And the thing that I think a lot of people don't think about is that there are actually more people in the world using Facebook on mobile Web, right, so not using the apps on iOS or Android, but actually just going to a browser on a phone. There are more people doing that than the iPhone and all of Android phones combined, right? So it's actually a pretty diverse ecosystem.

This type of gesture is normally reserved for important business partners or public figures, so it's really no surprise that Zuckerberg would be a recipient. The two companies have become much more friendly with tighter integration between Facebook and Apple's iOS and OS X.

But they weren't always so cordial. In 2010, Zuckerberg reportedly dissed the iPhone on his Facebook page, saying that he needed four charges to keep it charged "and a landline so I can actually make calls." The post quickly vanished, and perhaps he will be happier with the new handset, which has a larger battery with greater capacity.

Zuckerberg also revealed that -- shocker -- he's not much of a clothes horse.

"I wear the same thing every day, right? I mean, it's literally, if you could see my closet," he said, adding that he has "about 20" of the same gray T-shirt.

(courtesy:cnet.com)

Samsung Galaxy S3 sales hot despite iPhone 5

(Credit: Localytics)

Samsung's Galaxy S3 isn't being thwarted by little things like the iPhone 5 or jury verdicts.

Since August 1, sales of the S3 have seen average weekly growth of 9 percent, following by big spikes after the Apple lawsuit verdict and the iPhone 5 announcement, according to mobile-app analytics firm Localytics.

Sales of new S3 phones jumped 16 percent from August 21 to August 27. On August 24, a jury in California found Samsung guilty of patent infringement, awarding Apple more than $1 billion in damages.

The focus on Samsung and the notion that its phones were similar in some ways to the iPhone may have contributed to the sales bump, suggests Localytics. Many users may also have feared a ban on Samsung products in light of the jury verdict, causing them to rush out to buy a device before it was too late.

The second spike was seen from September 11 to September 17, when sales climbed by 15 percent. On September 12, Apple announced the iPhone 5 at a launch event.

The prior week, sales growth for the Galaxy S3 was flat, according to Localytics. Consumers eyeing a new smartphone were likely waiting to hear more about the iPhone 5 before deciding which phone to buy.

Even without the spikes, the S3's average weekly growth rate of 9 percent has stayed firm, which means Samsung is seeing heavy demand regardless of the iPhone 5.

Localytics sells software to app developers that can measure the use of their apps. To compile its data for this report, the firm analyzed the number of Galaxy S3 phones running apps that tap into its analytics. It then determined the weekly growth in new S3 handsets around the world.

(courtesy:cnet.com)

Apple may need an iPhone 6 sooner rather than later

Will iPhones and iPad be available in more shapes and sizes?

(Credit: Apple/CNET )

For Apple, the hits keep coming. The company launches a new iPhone and 5 million people snag one over the weekend. An iPad Mini, expected to debut later this month, could get into the hands of 10 million users before the end of the year. And this is despite the fact that competitors offer a far broader array of smartphones and tablets, with a price, size and feature set to match the needs of almost any discerning customer.

The extraordinary popularity, and profitability, of Apple's products is in part based on the quality, consistency and simplicity of the offering. Apple avoids the pitfalls of the paradox of choice, a theory by psychologist Barry Schwartz that suggests too much choice makes it difficult to choose at all. No need to choose between Apple model 7844PQC, 6533PHX or the 5055PDQ or decide what operating system you should buy.

You want an iPhone 5? It comes in one size and two colors, with a few options for storage and networking. If you already know how to use an iPhone, this new version won't challenge your skills. How about a tablet? Apple has a model with a 9.7-inch screen and your choice of connectivity options.

Apple doesn't try to offer the most feature-rich or advanced mobile devices available. The way Apple chief designer Sir Jony Ive tells it, "Our goals are very simple -- to design and make better products. If we can't make something that is better, we won't do it."

Bigger than a 4-inch screen is not better for a smartphone. Apple has decided you should be able to operate your phone with one hand, and will only offer you a 4-inch iPhone 5 screen, or its 3.5-inch antecedents, the iPhone 4S and 4. Better is an iPhone 5 that is 18 percent thinner, 20 percent lighter, up to twice as fast and slightly longer than its predecessor, a flawed Maps app notwithstanding.

"Most of our competitors are interested in doing something different, or want to appear new -- I think those are completely the wrong goals. A product has to be genuinely better. This requires real discipline, and that's what drives us -- a sincere, genuine appetite to do something that is better," Ive said in an interview with the London Evening Standard.

Whereas Apple offers limited choice, competitors are in the multiple choice business. They offer many more price points and feature options, including a variety of screen sizes, operating systems, cameras, networks and chips. And, they are doing more than just something different or new.

Motorola, for example, recently introduced three new Android phones, including a $99 unit with a 4.3-inch edge-to-edge display, a model with a 4.7-inch HD screen size and one with up to 32 hours of battery life. Samsung says it has sold 20 million of its Android-based Galaxy S3, with a 4.8-inch HD Super AMOLED display at 1,280x720-pixel resolution, in its first 100 days on the market. 

Pictured from left to right, Motorola Droid Razr M, Razr HD and Razr Maxx HD.

(Credit: CNET/Motorola )

There is a payoff in offering a broader selection of mobile devices for Apple's competitors. Google's Android platform dominates the market, with more than 60 percent share, compared to less than 20 for Apple. As RIM's BlackBerry and Nokia's Symbian platforms decline, Microsoft is putting its prodigious marketing muscle behind its Windows 8 platform as an alternative to Apple's iOS and Android. Nokia, Samsung, HTC, Huawei and other will deliver Windows 8 smartphones and tablets following the Oct. 26 launch.

Microsoft's upcoming Surface tablet

(Credit: Microsoft )

While the purveyors of choice are largely competing against each other, Apple has been extracting the majority of the profit for mobile devices and apps, making it the most financially valuable company in the world. 

Apple prides itself on inventing the future, as it did when it introduced the iPhone and iPad, and famously shuns focus groups in designing its products. "It's unfair to ask people who don't have a sense of the opportunities of tomorrow from the context of today to design," Ive stated.

As the market for mobile devices matures, however, Apple's devotion to its "less is more" and "we know better" product strategy can be counterproductive. 

Apple's current smartphone revolves around one-handed usage, and the company will milk the iPhone 5 for profit and market share and hope for a perfectly timed replacement that repeats that formula within a year. But the popularity of larger screens has to be a factor that impacts how long Apple can ride the iPhone 5. If the majority of smartphones sold in 2013 have larger than 4-inch screens, Apple isn't going to miss the market opportunity by sticking too long with its one-handed phone design. 

An iPhone 6 can be "genuinely better," as Ive demands, and available in more than one screen size without making customer choice a maze of options or its supply chain and financial engine less efficient. 

Apple's competition is catching up (Credit: Pew Research Center)

It's likely that the Microsoft Surface and the parade of "convertible" or hybrid tablets coming out for Windows 8 is being closely watched by Apple, despite Tim Cook's statement, "You can converge a toaster and a refrigerator, but those things are probably not going be pleasing to the user." 

If those hybrids start to gain momentum, Cook may reconsider the idea of perfecting an "iPadbook" that combines the best of the Macbook Air and iPad.

There are signs that Apple is more than ready to adapt and follow the pack with the rumored introduction of an 7.85-inch iPad Mini later this month. Apple's has good reason to deliver a holiday iPad Mini, given that its hold on the tablet market has slipped from a market share of over 80 percent to a still impressive 52 percent in the last year, according a Pew Research Center survey.  An iPad Mini would allow the company to soak up some of the demand created by Google, Amazon and Barnes & Noble for smaller, cheaper tablets. 

The majority of the two billion people online are not members of the smartphone or tablet tribe. Apple and its competitors have a massive opportunity ahead to develop products for an increasingly mobile and digital population. Apple isn't assuming that its brand, design sensibilities and nearly 400 stores are sufficient to insulate it from dynamic market changes. The expected iPad Mini is a sign that Apple is beginning to think different, and an iPhone 6 cannot be too far behind. 

(courtesy:cnet.com)