
<?phpxml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<rss version="2.0" 
xmlns:content="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/content/"
xmlns:wfw="http://wellformedweb.org/CommentAPI/"
xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/"
>
<channel>
<title>Haaze.com / Cheery / Published News</title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com</link>
<description>Test Web 2.0 Content Management System</description>
<pubDate>Wed, 16 Mar 2011 07:12:09 +0000</pubDate>
<language>en</language>
<item>
<title><![CDATA[Zite adds Instapaper integration]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=zite-adds-instapaper-integration</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=zite-adds-instapaper-integration</comments>
<pubDate>Wed, 16 Mar 2011 07:12:09 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>Cheery</dc:creator>
<category>Gaming</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=zite-adds-instapaper-integration</guid>
<description><![CDATA[The popular iPad magazine Zite added Instapaper integration Wednesday.(Credit:Zite)If you build it, they will come. And in droves.In the world of top-notchiPad apps, that certainly seems to be the case, and this week the new iPad magazine Zite has been one of the hottest things around. In this space, evolutionary change comes fast. And to many, Zite is already being seen as the next step past what applications like Flipboard have been able to do. Flipboard became Apple's top iPad app of 2010 because it gives users a lovely presentation of personalized news based on their Twitter and Facebook accounts, as well as other custom-selected feeds.Zite (see video below), however, appears to have stolen Flipboard's thunder. The app is exploiting Flipboard's lack of dynamic learning and giving users constantly updated feeds based on what they've demonstrated they're interested in. The app keeps track of the kinds of stories users choose to read and incorporates that intelligence into its algorithm for what it serves up. As well, it aims to give you less of what you're not interested in. Zite: Personalized Magazine for iPad from zite.com on Vimeo.In the first five days since being released, Zite--produced by a small team in Vancouver, B.C., led by CEO Ali Davar--jumped to the No. 1 spot for free apps in Apple's App Store, and has already been downloaded 120,000 times.And now, the company says it has responded to its users' top request--adding Instapaper integration. As of 11:30 a.m. PT today, users will be able to access the feature, allowing them to automatically and easily save articles for later without having to leave the Zite app. &quot;The integration with Zite will place an Instapaper button on Zite recommended articles,&quot; Davar told CNET, &quot;enabling Zite users to more easily save these articles to Instapaper. The integration uses Instapaper's API.&quot;Zite is moving quickly with new additions to its app, and seems intent on listening to its fast-growing community of users. With more than 4,000 followers of its Twitter feed, it's tuned in to what the community wants. The question now, of course, is what will Flipboard and those who produce other iPad magazine apps do to respond.<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
</item>

<item>
<title><![CDATA[FBI to announce new Net-wiretapping push]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=fbi-to-announce-new-net-wiretapping-push</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=fbi-to-announce-new-net-wiretapping-push</comments>
<pubDate>Wed, 16 Feb 2011 08:10:41 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>Cheery</dc:creator>
<category>Technology</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=fbi-to-announce-new-net-wiretapping-push</guid>
<description><![CDATA[The FBI is expected to reveal tomorrow that because of the rise of Web-based e-mail and social networks, it's &quot;increasingly unable&quot; to conduct certain types of surveillance that would be possible on cellular and traditional telephones.FBI general counsel Valerie Caproni will outline what the bureau is calling the &quot;Going Dark&quot; problem, meaning that police can be thwarted when conducting court-authorized eavesdropping because Internet companies aren't required to build in back doors in advance, or because technology doesn't permit it.Any solution, according to a copy of Caproni's prepared comments obtained by CNET, should include a way for police armed with wiretap orders to conduct surveillance of &quot;Web-based e-mail, social networking sites, and peer-to-peer communications technology.&quot;The last example, which was floated last fall, is likely to be the most contentious. When an encrypted voice application like Phil Zimmermann's Zfone is used, the entire conversation is scrambled from end to end. It's like handing a letter directly to its recipient--bypassing workers at the neighborhood post office, who could be required to forward a copy to the FBI.Forcing companies like Zfone and Skype, which also uses encryption for peer-to-peer calls, to build in back doors for police access was rejected in the 1990s and would mark a dramatic departure from current practice. And anyone hoping to foil the FBI could download encrypted VoIP software from European firms like Lichtenstein-based Secfone, which sells it for Android phones.Caproni's remarks don't, however, include a specific proposal. &quot;Most our interception challenges could be solved using existing technologies,&quot; she says, &quot;that can be deployed without re-designing the Internet and without exposing the provider's system to outside malicious activity.&quot; In addition, she says, &quot;the Going Dark problem does not require fundamental changes in encryption technology.&quot;The FBI's announcement comes amid two countervailing trends: a coalition of advocacy groups and technology companies including AT&amp;T and Google is pressing to rewrite federal law to include additional privacy protections for cloud computing and mobile devices. Meanwhile, the Justice Department and some conservative Republicans have proposed that Internet service providers (and perhaps Web companies as well) be required to keep records of what their customers are doing, a concept called data retention.Yesterday some members of that same coalition--the American Library Association, the Center for Democracy and Technology, NetCoalition (Google, Yahoo, and CNET are members), and TechFreedom--released an open letter expressing concerns about the FBI's push to broaden wiretapping laws. At the very least, the letter says, the bureau must &quot;identify the particular services or technologies most in need of additional surveillance capability&quot; and demonstrate that alternatives to new laws won't work.The FBI is couching its arguments in broad terms, saying it's only trying to preserve the ability to conduct wiretaps as technology advances. &quot;Any solution to the Going Dark problem should ensure&quot; that once a judge has approved a wiretap request, Caproni is expected to tell a House of Representatives committee tomorrow, &quot;the government is technologically able to execute that court order in a timely fashion.&quot;Today's capabilitiesElectronic Frontier Foundation attorney Kevin Bankston said this evening that the FBI already can intercept messages on social-networking sites and Web-based e-mail services with existing law. (This was the purpose of the FBI surveillance system known as Carnivore, later renamed DCS1000.)&quot;Facebook messages and Gmail messages travel in plain text over those same broadband wires for which the FBI demanded wiretapping capability just a few years ago,&quot; Bankston said. &quot;Why has that new capability not been sufficient&quot;Congress should investigate exactly how the FBI has used its existing interception capabilities, he said, before contemplating &quot;adding to that capability and forcing online communications service providers to redesign their systems to introduce new security vulnerabilities to facilitate government wiretapping.&quot;Under a 1994 federal law called the Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act, or CALEA, telecommunications carriers are required to build in back doors into their networks to assist police with authorized interception of conversations and &quot;call-identifying information.&quot; As CNET was the first to report in 2003, representatives of the FBI's Electronic Surveillance Technology Section in Chantilly, Va., began quietly lobbying the FCC to force broadband providers to provide more-efficient, standardized surveillance facilities. The Federal Communications Commission approved that requirement a year later, sweeping in Internet phone companies that tie into the existing telecommunications system. It was upheld in 2006 by a federal appeals court.But the FCC never granted the FBI's request to rewrite CALEA to cover instant messaging and VoIP programs that are not &quot;managed&quot;--meaning peer-to-peer programs like Apple's Facetime, iChat/AIM, Gmail's video chat, andXbox Live's in-game chat that do not use the public telephone network. In the last few years, according to Caproni's prepared remarks, investigations have been hindered because of the lack of built-in back doors. Examples she cites include a two-year Drug Enforcement Administration investigation into cocaine importation that was thwarted because an unnamed communications provider lacked intercept ability, and a 2009 child pornography prosecution where neither the (unnamed) social networking site nor the (unnamed) communication provider could intercept the communications.&quot;On a regular basis, the government is unable to obtain communications and related data, even when authorized by a court to do so,&quot; Caproni's statement says. It adds, however, that the Obama administration does not have an official position on whether any legislative changes are necessary.If Congress does nothing, law enforcement still has options. Police can obtain a special warrant allowing them to sneak into someone's house or office, install keystroke-logging software, and record passphrases. The Drug Enforcement Agency adopted this technique in a case where suspects used PGP and the encrypted Web e-mail service Hushmail.com. And the FBI did the same thing in an investigation of an alleged PGP-using mobster named Nicodemo Scarfo.Another option is to send the suspect spyware, which documents obtained by CNET through the Freedom of Information Act in 2009 showed the FBI has done in cases involving extortionists, database-deleting hackers, child molesters, and hitmen. The FBI's spyware is called CIPAV, for Computer and Internet Protocol Address Verifier. Update 12:00 a.m. PT Thursday: I should have noted that the EFF obtained some relevant documents via FOIA a few weeks ago that they posted on Wednesday, just in time for the House hearing. Among the high points: the FBI's Operational Technology Division says that the Going Dark program is one of the FBI's &quot;top initiatives.&quot; There's a five-pronged Going Dark program that includes extending existing laws and seeking new federal funding to bolster lawful intercept capabilities. Going Dark has been an FBI initiative since at least 2006 and has involved writing checks to consultants at RAND Corporation and Booz, Allen and Hamilton to come up with solutions.<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
</item>

<item>
<title><![CDATA[Storage system sales show a rebound]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=storage-system-sales-show-a-rebound</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=storage-system-sales-show-a-rebound</comments>
<pubDate>Tue, 07 Dec 2010 08:10:42 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>Cheery</dc:creator>
<category>Business &amp; Finance</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=storage-system-sales-show-a-rebound</guid>
<description><![CDATA[Sales of disk storage systems jumped in the third quarter, according to figures released by research firms IDC and Gartner.Worldwide revenue for external disk storage systems grew 19 percent year over year to a quarterly total of just less than $5.2 billion, IDC said Friday. Gartner put the total for external controller-based disk storage sales at $4.6 billion--a rise of 16 percent--in its report Friday. The third quarter of 2009 saw a decline in storage system sales, giving some bounce to the size of this year's revenue increases. Even so, the rises do reflect a burst of investment by companies in storage, the research firms said.&quot;Users are still making up for their reduced storage spending in 2009 as the third quarter recorded the fourth-highest revenues in a single quarter for external disk storage systems,&quot; Liz Conner, a senior storage analyst at IDC, said in a statement.Read more of &quot;Storage system sales show a rebound&quot; at ZDNet UK.<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
</item>

<item>
<title><![CDATA[George Bush to field questions on Facebook Live]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=george-bush-to-field-questions-on-facebook-live</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=george-bush-to-field-questions-on-facebook-live</comments>
<pubDate>Mon, 29 Nov 2010 08:10:06 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>Cheery</dc:creator>
<category>Mobile &amp; Electronics</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=george-bush-to-field-questions-on-facebook-live</guid>
<description><![CDATA[Former President George W. Bush will be making his way to Facebook Live today.(Credit:Screenshot by Don Reisinger/CNET)If you want to ask President George W. Bush a question, you'll have your chance.Starting at 2 p.m. PT today, the former U.S. leader will be talking about his new book, &quot;Decision Points,&quot; and fielding questions from Facebook users.The event is shaping up to be a big one. Facebook's announcement yesterday of the event has been &quot;liked&quot; by over 7,000 people. The post also has over 2,600 comments, as of this writing. A similar announcement on the George W. Bush Facebook page has over 288 comments and more than 2,000 &quot;likes.&quot; The former president's page has been &quot;liked&quot; by over 611,000 Facebook users.Facebook Live, which is powered by online-streaming service Livestream, was launched earlier this year, basically as the company's PR channel. The &quot;official live video streaming channel&quot; on the social network, Facebook Live typically streams interviews with employees, information on new features available to Facebook users, and video footage of events at the social network's headquarters. However, this event is arguably the most notable since Bush will become the first U.S. president to appear on Facebook Live.<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
</item>

<item>
<title><![CDATA[What's up, Zuck Cartoon to feature Facebook CEO]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=whats-up-zuck-cartoon-to-feature-facebook-ceo</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=whats-up-zuck-cartoon-to-feature-facebook-ceo</comments>
<pubDate>Sat, 20 Nov 2010 08:10:11 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>Cheery</dc:creator>
<category>Marketing and advertising</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=whats-up-zuck-cartoon-to-feature-facebook-ceo</guid>
<description><![CDATA[He's already made a cameo appearance on The Simpsons, but this time Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg gets his very own animated film.The cover of the Bluewater comic &amp;34'Mark Zuckerberg: Creator of Facebook.&amp;34'(Credit:Bluewater Productions)Comic book company Bluewater Productions, which announced a Zuckerberg bio comic back in September, said this week that New York-based film-production company Hayden 5 Media had optioned the comic to use as the basis for an animated movie.In its press release, Bluewater quoted Milos Silber, executive producer at Hayden 5.&quot;We saw a great opportunity to retell the story of Mark Zuckerberg post 'Social Network' in a brighter, animated form that could be enjoyed and understood by a broader audience,&quot; Silber said.&quot;We're just aware of the profound impact of Facebook, and with over 500 million users, we're bound to have an audience. One that is more willing to watch a shortened, visually captivating summary of this short epic online, or on their favorite network.&quot;Bluewater said the film, &quot;Mark Zuckerberg and The Found,&quot; will use live action footage and rotoscoping to create a look like that of &quot;A Scanner Darkly.&quot;Bluewater publishes a variety of comics, including superhero titles and three different series of biography titles: &quot;Fame,&quot; &quot;Female Force,&quot; and &quot;Political Power.&quot; Those profiled have included Lady Gaga, David Beckham, and Michelle Obama.Hayden 5's online portfolio includes commercials for Doritos, Converse, and Diet Coke.It's not clear where, exactly, the film will be shown, if Hayden will attempt to sell it to a TV network or elsewhere, or if it's meant to serve as an ad for Hayden 5 for the comic book itself.(It's also not clear if Bluewater or Hayden 5 is aware that the trailer for &quot;A Scanner Darkly&quot; prominently features the line &quot;Everything you do will be recorded&quot;--an apt phrase, perhaps, for a film about a CEO who's taken his share of heat over privacy concerns.)The comic book--&quot;Mark Zuckerberg: Creator of Facebook&quot;--is set to appear in late December.<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
</item>

<item>
<title><![CDATA[Apple retires Xserve in favor of Mac Pro Server]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=apple-retires-xserve-in-favor-of-mac-pro-server</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=apple-retires-xserve-in-favor-of-mac-pro-server</comments>
<pubDate>Fri, 05 Nov 2010 07:10:52 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>Cheery</dc:creator>
<category>Mobile &amp; Electronics</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=apple-retires-xserve-in-favor-of-mac-pro-server</guid>
<description><![CDATA[The Xserve gets axed January 31.(Credit:Apple)After January 31, you will no longer be able to buy an Xserve, the Apple server meant for large businesses, the company said via a note posted on its site today.Apple says it will however continue to support the hardware, including warranties and customer service.Close watchers of the company shouldn't be too surprised about the sudden axing of the Xserve. Apple hadn't updated the hardware since April 2009, which is a long time between updates for a company that keeps its hardware on a 9-month to a year update cycle.In its place, Apple is offering a substitute. The Mac Pro will now come in a server edition, starting at $2,999. It comes with a 2.8 gigahertz quad-core Intel Xeon processor, but can be configured with up to two 2.93 gigahertz six-core Xeon processors, and up to 32GB of memory. It also has four hard drive bays, and will come with Mac OS X ServerSnow Leopard. Apple has made moves recently that show it is positioning itself to grow its small share of enterprise computing. According to IDC, Apple had 3.6 percent of all commercial computer sales during the third quarter of this year.Apple has been pushing theiPhone andiPad as enterprise devices, and recently signed up contractor Unisys to sell its hardware to large companies and government agencies. <br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
</item>

<item>
<title><![CDATA[An end to bad, cranky drivers]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=an-end-to-bad-cranky-drivers</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=an-end-to-bad-cranky-drivers</comments>
<pubDate>Thu, 04 Nov 2010 07:10:26 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>Cheery</dc:creator>
<category>Social</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=an-end-to-bad-cranky-drivers</guid>
<description><![CDATA[Ford Motor&amp;39's Active Park Assist determines angles, then at driver&amp;39's prompt steers a car into its space while driver controls the gas pedal, braking, and shifting.(Credit:Ford Motor)While city drivers may see parallel parking as just another urban sport, for many people it's a &quot;highly avoided and stress-inducing&quot; situation that raises the heart rate.That's according to a nine-month study of driver habits recently completed by Ford Motor, the New England University Transportation Center (NEUTC), and the Center for Transportation and Logistics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.Not surprisingly, results released Thursday found that parallel parking while using a park-assist system (instead of having to guess your bumper distance based on your limited view) greatly reduces the stress of parallel parking in drivers.Experiments on drivers were conducted using a 2010 Lincoln MKS specially outfitted with tools to monitor what researchers call driver state.Driver state is a combination of both behavior in using acar and the involuntary physical responses exhibited by a driver. It can include things like monitoring an individual's driving style with regard to lane-changing frequency, speed, braking, acceleration, and distance maintained from the next car, as well as their heart rate, blood pressure, brain wave activity, where the driver looks, pupil dilation, and skin conductance.The experiment specifically used Ford's Active Park Assist, a system that uses sensors on the car to determine its position in relation to a space and then, at the driver's prompt, steers the car into a parallel parking space while the driver maintains control over the shifting, gas, and brake.When parallel parking with Ford's Active Park Assist, drivers on average had heart rates with 12 fewer beats per minute compared to their heart rate when parking without using the technology.Ford&amp;39's Cross-Traffic Alert system warns drivers in reverse of oncoming traffic.(Credit:Ford Motor)The experiment also found that even just thinking about having to parallel park makes drivers stressed.The NEUTC study found drivers had a mean heart rate of 75.9 beats per minute when they anticipated parallel parking manually compared to about 72.5 beats per minute when they anticipated parking with park-assisting technology.When it comes to backing up, drivers were also less likely to accidentally back out in front of an oncoming car in a parking lot when using a warning system.Only 71 percent of drivers managed to yield to oncoming traffic when backing out of a space with obstructed views, but 100 percent of the drivers in the experiment were able to do it when using Ford's Cross-Traffic Alert, a radar-based blind spot monitoring system. In addition to warning when a car is close to approaching one's blind spot while in drive, Cross-Traffic Alert also detects distant oncoming traffic while in reverse in order to help drivers avoid backing out and being hit by an oncoming car.This particular set of experiments consisted of 42 men and women ranging in age from their 20s to 60s who were instructed on how to use the assistant devices prior to testing.The study its part of an ongoing project in conjunction with MIT's AgeLab to &quot;understand the correlation between stressors and driving performance,&quot; with the end goal of developing automotive technology that improves driver skills while reducing stress.While the study was sponsored by Ford and tested its products exclusively, the U.S. automaker is certainly not the only brand applying sensors and automated parking aids to its vehicles. It seems arguable that the results of the study might be similar using other brands of automated parking and blind spot technology. Automated parking technology can be found on models from Audi, Lexus, Toyota, and Volkswagen, and several more automakers offer camera systems for monitoring one's car and surroundings while parallel parking or backing up.<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
</item>

<item>
<title><![CDATA[Dating site for 'uglies' heralds first engagement]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=dating-site-for-uglies-heralds-first-engagement</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=dating-site-for-uglies-heralds-first-engagement</comments>
<pubDate>Sat, 30 Oct 2010 07:10:07 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>Cheery</dc:creator>
<category>Marketing and advertising</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=dating-site-for-uglies-heralds-first-engagement</guid>
<description><![CDATA[Have you lost hopeAre you sick of slogging away on sites such as Match.com and eHarmony.com to find the partner of your dreams Or at least the partner who will put up with your dead lizard collection, your back hair, and your difficult morning breathThen perhaps it is time to be honest with yourself. Perhaps it is time to look in the mirror and decide that you should be at the Ugly Bug Ball. Or, more accurately, on it.The Ugly Bug Ball is a dating site for those who are aesthetically challenged. That is the creators' description, not mine. Though I am surprised that this site doesn't already include at least 95 percent of society. &quot;We deal in reality&quot;, the site says. So for those who wonder whether a site for the more Shreky (and, who knows, techy) has no chance of success, might I reveal that the Ugly Bug Ball has just announced its first engagementThe Telegraph tells me that Tom Clifford and Janine Walker, two of the Ugly Bug Ball's members, are to be betrothed.Some of the people who have signed up for the site.(Credit:Screenshot: Chris Matyszczyk/CNET)If you are cynical enough to imagine that it has taken some time for them to become used to their unique features, then you are to be uniquely pitied. For it was only in August that Clifford, 36, wrote to Walker that he had &quot;a face that makes children cry.&quot; (Personally, I feel he was using a technique known as &quot;underpromise and overdeliver.&quot;)Walker, 31, offered the Telegraph a moving tribute to Clifford and to their relationship: &quot;I appreciate that Tom isn't Brad Pitt, but then I'm no Angelina Jolie either.&quot;The Ugly Bug Ball is so pleased to herald the site's first engagement that it has offered the beautiful, happy couple a honeymoon-- in an Ugly Bug caravan in Wales. However, perhaps the most surprising, human, and moving aspect of this site resides in the sort of people who believe they qualify as ugly. While I wouldn't dream of offering a desperate cliche about beauty being in the eye of the beholder, it seems clear that there is some extremely peculiar beholding going on in the world. Vogue has a lot to answer for. As does the National Enquirer.It might make some wonder how it is that certain people behold themselves as beautiful. Yes, they're the folks who put stunning pictures of themselves up on Match.com and eHarmony in the hope that no one will notice that, in real life, they bear rather more resemblance to, well, character actors.The Ugly Bug Ball surely represents something more real and, simultaneously, refined. One can only wish Clifford and Walker lasting happiness. For richer, for poorer. In sickness and in health. In the heat of the night and in the cold light of morning.<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
</item>

<item>
<title><![CDATA[Google spent $1.6B on 40 companies in 9 months]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=google-spent-1-6b-on-40-companies-in-9-months</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=google-spent-1-6b-on-40-companies-in-9-months</comments>
<pubDate>Fri, 29 Oct 2010 07:10:05 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>Cheery</dc:creator>
<category>Mobile &amp; Electronics</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=google-spent-1-6b-on-40-companies-in-9-months</guid>
<description><![CDATA[Google's 2010 acquisition-spending spree has so far involved 40 companies and a total of $1.6 billion, the company revealed today. It's been a busy year for the men and women of Google's mergers-and-acquisitions team, closing an average of 4.4 deals a month, according to Google's quarterly report filed with the U.s. Securities and Exchange Commission on Friday. The top three deals involved AdMob, at a final price of $681 million, Slide, at a final price of $179 million, and On2 Technologies, at a final price of $123 million. But Google also completed 37 other deals by the end of September, spending a total of $626 million on those smaller deals. Google CEO Eric Schmidt wasn't kidding when he said Google was planning to open its checkbook in 2010. This haul doesn't even include the travel software company ITA, which Google proposed acquiring for $700 million in July. That deal is expected to face a great deal of antitrust scrutiny from the U.S. government, and Google said in its filing that it doesn't expect the transaction to close until the first half of 2011. With $33 billion in cash to close the third quarter, it's not like Google sweated the payments on any of these deals. And given the resurgence of the online-advertising market that fuels Google's profits, don't expect Google to take its foot off the gas anytime soon.<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
</item>

<item>
<title><![CDATA[Samsung Mesmerize on sale at U.S. Cellular]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=samsung-mesmerize-on-sale-at-u-s--cellular</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=samsung-mesmerize-on-sale-at-u-s--cellular</comments>
<pubDate>Wed, 27 Oct 2010 07:10:11 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>Cheery</dc:creator>
<category>Technology</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=samsung-mesmerize-on-sale-at-u-s--cellular</guid>
<description><![CDATA[Samsung Mesmerize(Credit:U.S. Cellular)U.S. Cellular bolstered its Android lineup today when it announced its new Mesmerize smartphone. Part of the Galaxy S series, the Mesmerize joins the Samsung Acclaim and HTC Desire in the carrier's growing Android repertoire.The hardware on the Mesmerize is nearly identical to that found on the other Galaxy S series handsets with its 4-inch Super AMOLED display Although the phone comes with Android 2.1 out of the box, U.S. Cellular claims customers will be able to upgrade to 2.2 &quot;Froyo&quot; later this year. Features inlcude a 1GHz Hummingbird processor, a 5-megapixel camera with HD video capture, and Samsung's Media Hub video store. Looking forward, the Chicago-based carrier promises two more Android phones in the LG Apex and LG Optimus U. Not much is known about the Apex, but I venture to guess the Optimus U will be very similar to the Optimus T from T-Mobile and the Optimus S from Sprint.The Mesmerize runs $199 after $80 mail-in rebate and two-year service agreement and can be purchased immediately. For more on the Mesmerize, check out our hand on video and photo gallery fromCTIA earlier this month.<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
</item>

<item>
<title><![CDATA[Kids want iPhones, iPads over toys for holidays]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=kids-want-iphones-ipads-over-toys-for-holidays</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=kids-want-iphones-ipads-over-toys-for-holidays</comments>
<pubDate>Mon, 25 Oct 2010 18:22:05 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>Cheery</dc:creator>
<category>Mobile &amp; Electronics</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=kids-want-iphones-ipads-over-toys-for-holidays</guid>
<description><![CDATA[&amp;quot'Santa heard my call for an iPod!&amp;quot'(Credit:somegeekintn/flickr)Santa might as well make his elves redundant: kids would rather Steve Jobs fill their stockings with expensive Apple gear. TheiPhone 4,iPod Touch andiPad were the three most wanted gifts among children aged 5 to 16, according to the Duracell Toy Report, the Telegraph reports. Nearly 4 in 10 children questioned wanted something from the Apple cave of wonders this year. Read more of &quot;Kids want iPhones and iPads rather than toys for Christmas&quot; at Crave UK.  <br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
</item>

<item>
<title><![CDATA[Uber, Not UberCab, Launches Android&nbsp'App]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=uber-not-ubercab-launches-androidnbspapp</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=uber-not-ubercab-launches-androidnbspapp</comments>
<pubDate>Mon, 30 Nov -001 00:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>Cheery</dc:creator>
<category>Latest News</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=uber-not-ubercab-launches-androidnbspapp</guid>
<description><![CDATA[From the company formerly known as UberCab, comes the Uber Android app. On Wedesnday, the on-demand car service unveiled the Android version of its increasingly popular (and controversial) iPhone app.The Android app features the same basic functionality: you can request service, set your pick-up location, track the driver, pay for your ride, and rate and share your experience. However, the startup did take advantage of the Android environment by tweaking some UI elements, according to Uber&amp;'s CEO Ryan Graves.For example, as explained on the company&amp;'s blog post, when you are ordering a car you can set the pick up location by moving &amp;''the map under the stationary pin and [using] the entire map to set your location accurately. The information panels on the Android app have a clean transparency that allows you to focus on the map, and where youa4a4re headed.&amp;''The Uber team started testing the Android app roughly three weeks ago, but likely got distracted by an unexpected cease and desist order from the SF Metro Transit Authority &amp;amp' the Public Utilities Commission of California, delivered on October 20th. Among the concerns, which you can read here, the order claimed that UberCab was marketing itself as a taxi service (by using the term &amp;''cab&amp;'') and did not have the proper permits and licenses to be conducting business in the manner that it was. Since the order, UberCab has officially dropped the cab (even its website url is now uberapp.com) and the service is working with authorities to stay in business. &amp;''Regarding our legal situation, we&amp;'re working cooperatively with both agencies to ensure compliance and make sure that Uber continues to grow and serve our users,&amp;'' Graves says. &amp;''Uber is fully operational today.&amp;'' CrunchBase InformationRyan GravesInformation provided by CrunchBaseCrunchBase InformationUberInformation provided by CrunchBase<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
</item>

<item>
<title><![CDATA[Google rumored to be delaying its big social initiative until the spring]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=google-rumored-to-be-delaying-its-big-social-initiative-until-the-spring</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=google-rumored-to-be-delaying-its-big-social-initiative-until-the-spring</comments>
<pubDate>Mon, 30 Nov -001 00:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>Cheery</dc:creator>
<category>Latest News</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=google-rumored-to-be-delaying-its-big-social-initiative-until-the-spring</guid>
<description><![CDATA[We&amp;'ve been eagerly awaiting the day when Google challenges Facebook in social networking, if only because it will be a big fight and will bring competition to the social networking market.But Google has postponed that initiative until the spring of 2011, according to a story by Mashable. The tech news blog reported that Google&amp;'s social project, dubbed Google Me at one point, could debut in March or April.Earlier rumors suggested Google would mount its challenge to Facebook in October. The project is reportedly being led by Vic Gundotra, a vice president of engineering and one of the leaders of Google&amp;'s mobile offensive. Google also bought a number of social companies, including virtual currency vendor Social Gold (Jambeel) and social app maker Slide, which was headed by serial entrepreneur Max Levchin. And it acquired Anstro. Google declined to comment to Mashable.Google did say that it is focused on incorporating social elements across Google. Information was once plentiful about the project. Sources told us that Google planned to do a social layer on top of its various properties. But Mashable says there is disagreement within Google about the design, purpose and execution of the project.It&amp;'s a fair bet that Google realizes it has to do something about Facebook, which is a big threat to Google&amp;'s domination of the web. Facebook has since responded by doing its own &amp;''lockdown&amp;'' for 60 days. Facebook came out of that all-hands effort with features such as Facebook Messages, Facebook Places and Facebook Groups. The ball is in Google&amp;'s court, but it looks like Google is still being anti-social.Next Story: Return of the Celtic Tiger: Can renewables refuel the Irish economy Previous Story: Mobile app sales on iPhone and Android soared during Black Friday weekendPrintEmailTwitterFacebookGoogle BuzzLinkedIn      DiggStumbleUponRedditDeliciousGoogleMore&amp;8230'          Tags: Google MeCompanies: Facebook, GooglePeople: Vic Gundotra          Tags: Google MeCompanies: Facebook, GooglePeople: Vic GundotraDean is lead writer for GamesBeat at VentureBeat. He covers video games, security, chips and a variety of other subjects. Dean previously worked at the San Jose Mercury News, the Wall Street Journal, the Red Herring, the Los Angeles Times, the Orange County Register and the Dallas Times Herald. He is the author of two books, Opening the Xbox and the Xbox 360 Uncloaked. Follow him on Twitter at @deantak, and follow VentureBeat on Twitter at @venturebeat.VentureBeat has new weekly email newsletters.  Stay on top of the news, and don't miss a beat.<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
</item>

<item>
<title><![CDATA[Thank You Sir (AOL), May We Have Another&nbsp'(Link)]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=thank-you-sir-aol-may-we-have-anothernbsplink</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=thank-you-sir-aol-may-we-have-anothernbsplink</comments>
<pubDate>Mon, 30 Nov -001 00:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>Cheery</dc:creator>
<category>Latest News</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=thank-you-sir-aol-may-we-have-anothernbsplink</guid>
<description><![CDATA[When AOL bought us a month ago, we were promised a lot of things: autonomy, resources, inappropriately long corporate meetings, and fame. So far, AOL has come through on the first three. But fame, by which I mean homepage love on aol.com, had thus far eluded us. But today that changed. Boy did it ever.Yesterday, we got word from our corporate overlords that they were likely to test a link to one of our stories on their homepage in the near future. Today, when scanning our referrer logs, we noticed something interesting. A massively huge tidal wave of traffic from aol.com.Just how huge was this wave of traffic Let&amp;'s put it this way: so far today, AOL is not only the number one referrer to TechCrunch, it&amp;'s tripling the number two: Twitter. That&amp;'s just from one little link to one story on a rotating tile on the homepage. It&amp;'s fairly amazing.I point this out for two reasons. One, to boast about this awesome power we nowa4spossess. Two, it&amp;'s a great reminder of the power of the big boys a4&quot; even the ones you don&amp;'t really think about anymore. Both AOL and Yahoo still have two of the most trafficked homepages on the web. While they may have fallen out of favor with the tech elite, the so-called &amp;''normals&amp;'' seem to love them. I have to assume these are also the same people that click on web ads.So, in all seriousness, I&amp;'ll now nicely ask AOL: thank you sir, may we have another[image: Universal Pictures]CrunchBase InformationAOLTechCrunchInformation provided by CrunchBase<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
</item>

<item>
<title><![CDATA[AppMakr Raises $1 Million To Help You Build Custom iPhone&nbsp'Apps]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=appmakr-raises-1-million-to-help-you-build-custom-iphonenbspapps</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=appmakr-raises-1-million-to-help-you-build-custom-iphonenbspapps</comments>
<pubDate>Mon, 30 Nov -001 00:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>Cheery</dc:creator>
<category>Latest News</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=appmakr-raises-1-million-to-help-you-build-custom-iphonenbspapps</guid>
<description><![CDATA[AppMakr, a service that makes it easy to generate your own custom, native iPhone application, has closed a $1 million seed round. The round includes angel investors and VCs:  Mitch Kapor (founder of Lotus), Bill Lee, Rich Chen, Charles River Ventures (George Zachary &amp;amp' Bill Tai), Brian McClendon (angel, VP of Engineering at Google), Kima Ventures (Jeremie Berrebi &amp;amp' Xavier Niel), Warren Hellman (previously at Lehman Bros), Ben Narasin (TriplePoint Ventures), Pietro Dova, Sean Glass (Top Floor), Transmedia Capital (Chris Redlitz &amp;amp' Peter Boboff, of Kicklabs incubator).We&amp;'ve written about AppMakr a few times in the past a4&quot; the startup launched in early 2010, allowing users to put together an iPhone application with a surprisingly small amount of work involved. COO Daniel Odio says that applications built using AppMakr now represent around 1% of the apps on the App Store a4&quot;a4sor around 3,000 applications.Earlier this year, AppMakr and the rest of the services in this space faced a new obstacle: Apple itself.  As the huge number of submissions to the App Store continued to grow, Steve Jobs and company decided to start cracking down on so-called &amp;8216'Cookie Cutter&amp;' applications that were excessively generic and didn&amp;'t offer much more than a glorified RSS reader.AppMakr dealt with this by establishing an &amp;''App Quality Index&amp;''. When you build your application, AppMakr will analyze the likelihood that it will be rejected by the App Store review team based on the thousands of AppMakr apps that have been submitted in the past (it analyzes things like the number of tab options your app has and how much content they include). If thea4slikelihooda4sof being accepted is too low, AppMakr will tell you to improve the app before you can submit it to Apple. Odio says this has been a collaborative process with Apple, and that it&amp;'s worked well so far.One reason why AppMakr has gained such a following is its price tag: it&amp;'s free. When it launched in January it had a flat fee-based model, buta4sthe company has now gone fremium, where you can build basic applications free of charge with a variety of premium upgrades available. These premium upgrades include push notifications and the ability to convert your Ning Community into an iPhone app, and there are more features in the pipeline.AppMakr is actually part of PointAbout, a consulting firm that builds custom iPhone apps for major brands like Disney. PointAbout has around 28 employees in total, but the majority of them work in the consulting arma4sa4&quot;a4sthe AppMakr team is around eight people.Another popular startup in this space is Mobile Roadie.One other thing to note: Odio says that the VentureHacks AngelList played a very helpful role in AppMakr&amp;'s fund-raising process. He conducted the interview below with AngelList founder Naval Ravikant:CrunchBase InformationAppMakrInformation provided by CrunchBase<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
</item>

<item>
<title><![CDATA[Jelli Takes Its Interactive Radio Stations&nbsp'Mobile]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=jelli-takes-its-interactive-radio-stationsnbspmobile</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=jelli-takes-its-interactive-radio-stationsnbspmobile</comments>
<pubDate>Mon, 30 Nov -001 00:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>Cheery</dc:creator>
<category>Latest News</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=jelli-takes-its-interactive-radio-stationsnbspmobile</guid>
<description><![CDATA[Jelli, a startup that&amp;'s a mix between Pandora and Digg (with old-school terrestrial radio stations thrown in), has gone mobile: the company has just launched a native iPhone application.a4sNow, this wouldn&amp;'t be especially interesting news (who doesn&amp;'t have an iPhone app these days), but it fills in one major gap in Jelli&amp;'s functionality. Because while the service has been around for a while, there&amp;'s never been a good way to use Jelli on the go  a4&quot; and, as the folks over at Pandora can tell you, that mobile experience is key when it comes to streaming music. You can download the new iPhone app right here.For those that haven&amp;'t used it, Jelli gives users the ability to listen to a4&quot; and help control a4&quot; crowdsourced radio stations. Users get to choose from a library of songs available on a given station (if you&amp;'re listening to a pop station you probably aren&amp;'t going to see Metallica as an option, but there will be hundreds of other choices). Songs are displayed in a list based on the order they&amp;'re going to play, but users can quickly adjust the order by voting (Digg-style) or employing special powerups.Every day users are given a handful of &amp;8216'rockets&amp;' and &amp;8216'bombs&amp;': use a Rocket on a song that&amp;'s toward the bottom of the playlist and it will shoot toward the top' use a bomb and you&amp;'ll knock off a song that was going to play soon. These sound effects are actually part of the radio broadcast (if enough people don&amp;'t like a song you&amp;'ll hear it &amp;''explode&amp;'' mid-stream and the next song will start playing).The service was initially online-only, but it&amp;'s now branching out to strike deals with terrestrial radio stations, which still have 239 million listeners a week in the United States (you may not listen to &amp;8216'old school&amp;' radio any more, but plenty of people still do). a4sThe company is up to over 20 station partnerships, with more in the works.Now, Jelli doesn&amp;'t take over these radio stations entirely a4&quot; instead, it offers them a server box that they hook up to their radio tower for a few hours (or more) per day. That server box is linked to the web, which lets listeners vote on which songs they want to hear next. For the radio station, the whole thing is pretty hands off, which is one reason why it&amp;'s appealing.Obviously it&amp;'s been possible to listen to these terrestrial radio stations without Jelli&amp;'s iPhone app (you could just hit the FM button in your car) but until now you&amp;'d only be able to interact with Jelli&amp;'s voting system via a computer. And that presents a problem, because people primarily listen to radio while they&amp;'re on the go.a4sThe iPhone app fixes this' it lets users vote up songs that they want to listen to, both for terrestrial stations that are usinga4sJellia4sand online-only streaming radio stations that run 24/7.Jelli still has a long road ahead, both of dealing with existing radio stations, and, eventually, launching standalone Jelli broadcasts of its own (it&amp;'s talking about having terrestrial, 24/7 Jelli stations one day). The company has raised a total of $7 million, including a $5 million round earlier this year. CrunchBase InformationJelliInformation provided by CrunchBase<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
</item>

</channel>
</rss>
