
<?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 / howtomakeawebsite / Published News</title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com</link>
<description>Test Web 2.0 Content Management System</description>
<pubDate>Tue, 22 Mar 2011 07:10:50 +0000</pubDate>
<language>en</language>
<item>
<title><![CDATA[Digital City 120: AT&T-Mobile' Nintendo 3DS postmortem' plus, telephone trivia]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=digital-city-120-att-mobile-nintendo-3ds-postmortem-plus-telephone-trivia</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=digital-city-120-att-mobile-nintendo-3ds-postmortem-plus-telephone-trivia</comments>
<pubDate>Tue, 22 Mar 2011 07:10:50 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>howtomakeawebsite</dc:creator>
<category>Technology</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=digital-city-120-att-mobile-nintendo-3ds-postmortem-plus-telephone-trivia</guid>
<description><![CDATA[<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
</item>

<item>
<title><![CDATA[My own private memory hole]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=my-own-private-memory-hole</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=my-own-private-memory-hole</comments>
<pubDate>Tue, 16 Nov 2010 08:10:22 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>howtomakeawebsite</dc:creator>
<category>Politics</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=my-own-private-memory-hole</guid>
<description><![CDATA[Editors' note: This is a guest column. See Larry Downes' bio below.In &quot;1984,&quot; George Orwell's classic dystopian novel, protagonist Winston Smith is a low-level bureaucrat in the Ministry of Truth. His job: to &quot;rectify&quot; old newspaper articles in which Big Brother's predictions or promises turned out to be false. Once the articles are rewritten, the original text--and the truth they represent--is dropped down a pneumatic tube known as a memory hole, &quot;to be devoured by the flames.&quot;The European Commission has recently proposed a real-life version of this fictional device, though this time with a twist. Twenty-five years after the events in Orwell's allegory took place, the Commission has announced plans to regulate what it calls an individual's &quot;right to be forgotten.&quot; The new memory hole would be under the control not of Big Brother but of individuals--of all the Winston Smiths of the world.But the citizens of Oceania--excuse me, the European Union--should be just as wary of this new approach to rewriting history. Erasing the truth is as dangerous as it is futile. And wrapping the effort in the flag of personal privacy only makes the effort appear naive or cynical. Or both.The right to be forgotten Under the new &quot;Comprehensive Approach on Personal Data Protection in the European Union&quot; (PDF), the Commission will undertake an extensive review of gaps in existing EU privacy law, proposing new legislation next year aimed at shoring up consumer rights and reducing conflicts in the privacy laws of EU member states.The report surprised many with plans for new laws aimed at &quot;clarifying the so-called 'right to be forgotten,'&quot; which the Commission awkwardly defines as &quot;the right of individuals to have their data no longer processed, and deleted when [the data] are no longer needed for legitimate purposes.&quot;There are, of course, legitimate privacy concerns associated with new technologies. But existing laws ensuring customer control over user-supplied data such as digital photos, tweets, or tax preparation files stored with an online service are very different than a right to be &quot;forgotten.&quot; For one thing, under the EU's landmark 1995 privacy directive, any information that refers to or identifies an individual is considered &quot;private&quot; data. So a right to be forgotten may give individuals the right to demand, as the Commission puts it, &quot;access, rectification, and deletion&quot; of any or all information that identifies the individual, regardless of how or by whom it was collected.The right to be forgotten may empower EU citizens to demand the suppression of any information that refers to them, including public records, newspaper reports, personal recollections, and other &quot;private&quot; information that wasn't supplied by the user in the first place. All of that information, under EU law, is &quot;their&quot; data.Information--private or otherwise--is not property Such a sweeping right could extend well beyond computer data. &quot;Clarifying&quot; the right to be forgotten could include the right to demand the destruction of paper records as well--even copies in the possession of other individuals.Taken to its logical extreme, a true right to be forgotten would prohibit me from repeating, even in conversation, any personal facts about you I happen to know. It might even require me to purge my mind of anything about you I remember--literally to forget you. Medical science doesn't currently support such a remedy, but that limitation hints at the bigger problem with empowering individuals to erase personal facts that have already entered the collective conscience of others. A right to be forgotten begins by assuming that privacy is a kind of hidden possession of the individual, one that the &quot;original&quot; owner can later reclaim, even if it's been lost, sold, traded, or stolen--indeed, even if the individual never had it in the first place.That's a fatal assumption. Information, personal or otherwise, is not property, at least not in the same way that a house, a barrel of oil, or a cup of coffee are property. It's not physical, something only one person at a time possesses, or which gets used up or worn out over time. Information is instead a virtual good, which can exist simultaneously in the minds of everyone. Laws can and do provide limited control over information use (fraud) or its translation into physical copies (copyright). But there's no practical way to enforce a ban on its existence. All the tapes and disks can be erased, the books burned, and the archives destroyed. But the information will still exist, at least for anyone who happens to remember ever knowing it. The costs and benefits of information exchange Even limiting a legal &quot;right to be forgotten&quot; to information supplied directly by the user could have a disastrous effect on digital life. That's because the Internet economy uses information, including personal information, as its main source of fuel. So when a user enters identifying information into an online ordering service, or uses a social network to exchange and store messages, photos, and videos, an economic exchange takes place, trading value for value. Amazon.com is cheaper than a physical retailer, in part because customers do their own data entry. Google, Facebook, and Twitter are all free because we let the companies' computers scan our interactions with others to offer personalized advertising. Other providers may use the information I enter to build databases of aggregated user behaviors, leading to better, more useful future products and services. Sometimes the individual is compensated, sometimes not. But once the omelet is made, the eggs can't be unscrambled. Releasing personal information into the world, in other words, may impose a cost on the individual, but the benefit to everyone else outweighs it. The sum is very often greater than the parts. If users have the right to be forgotten, what happens to service agreements and informal arrangements that trade information for value Does a user attempting to erase facts have to pay back the value they received If not, imagine what becomes of services that are subsidized, in whole or in part, on personal information. What value is there to facts that can be &quot;rectified&quot; at the whim of the individual Like it or not (realistically both), we are leading an increasingly visible existence. Our always-limited ability to compartmentalize our lives is fading. But the benefits of more easily and safely interacting with others that comes from that transparency more than compensates. That, in any case, is the delicate balance that a right to be forgotten challenges.Of course, the rising anxiety over privacy is understandable. Technology is rapidly changing the nature of human relationships, blurring the private-public line faster than many of us are comfortable with. Anxiety, predictably, leads to calls for legislative solutions. But here, as with so many disruptive technological advancements, the unintended consequences of regulating too soon could be fatal.This is not to say there is no room for improvement or no role for government. We can certainly do a better job of making clear the economics of information exchanges with our public, private, and individual interactions. Governments can provide mechanisms for enforcing agreements that limit the use or publication of that information for different purposes. But we can't turn back the clock. And we certainly can't rewrite history.This doesn't mean that the EU isn't going to try. But if the Commission really wants to protect its citizens from information tyranny, let's hope that it doesn't try. A memory hole is a bad idea, no matter who is using it.<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
</item>

<item>
<title><![CDATA[Hands-On: Google Voice for iPhone still slightly underbaked]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=hands-on-google-voice-for-iphone-still-slightly-underbaked</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=hands-on-google-voice-for-iphone-still-slightly-underbaked</comments>
<pubDate>Tue, 16 Nov 2010 08:10:04 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>howtomakeawebsite</dc:creator>
<category>Mobile &amp; Electronics</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=hands-on-google-voice-for-iphone-still-slightly-underbaked</guid>
<description><![CDATA[A Google Voice for iPhone app finally clears Apple&amp;39's gauntlet.(Credit:Screenshot by Jessica Dolcourt/CNET)When Google announced Google Voice for iPhone earlier today, we wasted no time putting the VoIP telephony app through its paces. Google Voice for iPhone (download) delivers much of what we expect from a native Google Voice app. In an absolute sense, it's a terrific app because it brings much-needed native Google Voice management to theiPhone. However, considering it took a year and a half of idle time and an FCC investigation to gain Apple's approval, we're also wondering why the Google Voice engineering team couldn't have designed a more seamless integration with the iPhone. The contacts list is split in two--prioritized numbers and recent calls are in this pane' the complete contacts list is in the next.(Credit:Screenshot by Jessica Dolcourt/CNET)Setup and layoutThankfully, setup is hurdle-free. First, log into the app with your Google credentials. Then, select the mobile number from a list of numbers you may have associated as forwarding numbers for your Google Voice account. (If you haven't yet associated any, go to your Google Voice account and add the number in the Voice Settings menu.)The Google Voice app itself appears straightforward. Four screens display a menu, a dialer, your contact list, and the application settings. Fittingly, the menu is the base camp for sorting and managing your voice mail by inbox, texts, and various other filters. The inbox displays your list of voice mails and text messages. From here, you can view a voice mail transcription or play back your contact's recorded message. Tap their name to call, text, add to quick dial, or show the contact's details. Pull the entire page down with your finger to manually refresh the list.You'll be able to reach out to contacts from the dialer and the contacts list, either by searching for a contact's name or by entering a number. The dialer helpfully lets you choose to call or text a number. An icon in the Dialer that looks like it should pop up your contact search list will in fact add a new contact to your address book, if you press it after dialing a number. The Contacts list has an interesting feature that's unique to the iPhone version of Google Voice' it's called Quick Dial. Google has made it easier to prioritize your favorite contacts by letting you assign some to Quick Dial--these buddies surface to the top of a list, just above another list of recently used numbers. You can tap over to another screen to select from your full list of contacts.(Credit:Screenshot by Jessica Dolcourt/CNET)What we like about Google Voice for iPhoneApart from the most fundamental benefit of being able to natively manage the Google Voice universe from the iPhone, the app brings some localized features that make using it a joy. The aforementioned quick-dial contacts are easy to assign and remove, and they do a good job surfacing frequently used buddies. Push notifications are also key' they appear when you receive a new voice mail or text, and when you miss a call. Handy buttons help you take the appropriate action to reply, view, or close the message. Google Voice isn't integrated into the iPhone's operating system as it is on Android, so it doesn't let you choose to automatically dial out on the iPhone with your Google Voice number. However, dialing out through the app is easy enough, and there are some nice visual menu treatments that make it obvious when you've sent a message. These nice touches add a layer of sophistication to the experience.What still needs workUnfortunately, there are still large and small potholes, and we'll likely discover more inconsistencies as we continue to use the app. The most jarring issue is that texts between two Google Voice on iPhone users duplicated each Google voice text in the iPhone's text app. Instead of receiving three text alerts for three sent text messages, we received a total of six alerts and messages. You can switch this off in the Settings menu of your Google Voice settings online, but it's unintuitive for new or casual users.Equally obnoxiously, Google Voice users we knew sometimes texted us using numbers we didn't recognize. Google Voice uses local numbers to route calls quicker, and those are the numbers we intermittently saw in text messages, rather than the caller or texter's single Google Voice number.Google Voice for iPhone: A photo tour We also noticed that the notifications shortcut to view a missed call takes you to the Menu, not to the the missed call screen as we'd expect. In addition, Google Voice only works in portrait mode. Google Voice gets more right than it does wrong overall, but the iPhone app is still more flawed than it should be after years of the voice team's development work on Google Voice for Android. Google Voice is a confusing enough service as is to the casual observer, Google needs to ensure that its native apps remove every question mark.Article updated at 4:17PM PT and 5:40PM PT with corrections and clarifications.<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
</item>

<item>
<title><![CDATA[New Facebook for BlackBerry takes on Places]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=new-facebook-for-blackberry-takes-on-places</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=new-facebook-for-blackberry-takes-on-places</comments>
<pubDate>Wed, 10 Nov 2010 08:10:08 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>howtomakeawebsite</dc:creator>
<category>Mobile &amp; Electronics</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=new-facebook-for-blackberry-takes-on-places</guid>
<description><![CDATA[Facebook for BlackBerry on OS 6.(Credit:RIM/BlackBerry)Just last week, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg stood before a crowd of journalists (including us) and announced an update of Facebook Places for theiPhone, and the arrival of Facebook Places for Android. Facebook Places, the social network's business listing service, has also just come to BlackBerry.Facebook Places joins Facebook&amp;39's BlackBerry app.(Credit:RIM/BlackBerry)Facebook 1.9 for BlackBerry has placed Facebook Places as a selection in its navigation strip. Select it, and you're able to check in to a location--like a coffee shop or a concert hall--tag friends, and add an uncharted Place to the listings. There's the full range of management options as well, so you're able to view Places, comment, and view a listing's location on BlackBerry Maps. BlackBerry's internal GPS receiver powers the app's location element.In addition to Places, Facebook and BlackBerry-maker RIM have also enhanced search, letting you now search for contacts and pages within the app. Software tweaks also plump up the number of items you can view in the news feed and friend list, and the app makes it easier to access your profile, Search, and Messaging from the navigation toolbar.The new Facebook app also plays well with the Universal Search functionality baked into BlackBerry OS 6.BlackBerry's version of Facebook has arguably been the weakest Facebook implementation for a mobile platform. The addition of Places certainly helps, as do the navigation tweaks. However, the app still trails Android and especially iPhone in features and functionality.RIM will roll out updates over the next day, but you can also manually download Facebook for BlackBerry 1.9 free from the App World app on your BlackBerry.<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
</item>

<item>
<title><![CDATA[Will trucks and buses beat cars in the electric race]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=will-trucks-and-buses-beat-cars-in-the-electric-race</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=will-trucks-and-buses-beat-cars-in-the-electric-race</comments>
<pubDate>Mon, 30 Nov -001 00:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>howtomakeawebsite</dc:creator>
<category>Latest News</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=will-trucks-and-buses-beat-cars-in-the-electric-race</guid>
<description><![CDATA[This post is brought to you by IBM. As always, VentureBeat is adamant about maintaining editorial objectivity. IBM had no involvement in the content of this or other posts. For more information on how IBM can help create a Smarter Planet, go here.Right now, six companies are vying to win a contract that would provide 100 electric vehicles to the government&amp;'s General Administration services 214,000-strong fleet. One of them is Ford' the other, a relative newcomer called Smith Electric. But the government isn&amp;'t looking for electric sedans to chauffeur VIPs or parade around at White House events &amp;8212' rather, it wants electric versions of the humble, plain old delivery truck.With all the electric cars poised for release in the coming months, ita4a4s easy to think of 2011 as the year these cars hit the road en masse. But in fact, therea4a4s already electric vehicles trucking about a4&quot; electric trucks to be exact, and theya4a4ve already been put to use by companies like Coca-Cola and FedEx.Commercial vehicles like delivery trucks, buses and vans are a good target for cutting fuel costs and are already making a dent in President Obama&amp;'s goal of 1 million electric vehicles on U.S. roads by 2015. Precise numbers are hard to pin down, but they use a &amp;''tremendous&amp;'' amount of fuel in the U.S., said David Hurst, analyst at Pike Research. For corporations, that fuel expense is a bottom-line cost they&amp;'d like to control like any other. And there are other inherent characteristics of the market that grease the wheels for quicker adoption.Right now, most electric cars have about a 100-mile range, worrisome for the average American who has a 30-minute commute and wants to run a few errands on his way home. But the beauty of electrifying a delivery truck is that therea4a4s a set route, and trucks will almost always charge at home base &amp;8212' unlike with consumer cars, where startups and utilities are scrambling to build out charging stations along freeways and in parking lots.a4AThe performance, infrastructure and availability issues that plague electric car and light-truck models dona4a4t cross over to their commercial counterparts,a4 said Bryan Hansel, CEO of Smith Electric, which makes all-electric commercial vehicles like trucks. He estimated that most urban-based commercial trucks have a daily route of 30 miles or less.Smith is delivering 176 battery-powered delivery trucks to Frito-Lay, and the snacking giant estimates it will save half a million gallons of gasoline a year by electrifying its massive North American fleet. Butlike the commercial electric vehicle market, therea4a4s a backlog for electric trucks too. Hansel says its trucks are back-ordered until the second quarter of next year.Still, interested buyers of electric trucks have the same qualms as those looking to buy a Nissan Leaf or Chevy Volt. Prospective customers always ask about range and battery life, says Mark Aubry, Navistar&amp;'s head of sales for the company&amp;'s eStar electric truck. Navistar has pledged to deliver 400 electric trucks this year.Delivery trucks are ideal. The cars have one point of origin, with a4Acity-style routes, lots of starts and stops, and [they] dona4a4t use the freeway.a4AThat&amp;'s really the best possible customer that&amp;'s out there,a4 Aubry said. Navistar recently delivered four electric trucks to FedEx. And last month UPSordered 130 hybrid delivery trucks produced by Eaton, adding to its fleet of 250 hybrids and estimating the purchase will save 66,000 gallons of gas a year.As in the consumer market, demand will likely outpace supply in electric trucks for some time to come. While businesses can make a sustainability statement with the trucks, Pike analyst Hurst says that right now, it takes a few years for a buyer to see a cost benefit.a4AIn fact, ita4a4s a cost penalty right now. With the battery, everything is still more expensive and fuel is still cheap,a4 Hurst said. a4ABut fuel costs aren&amp;'t going to go down, whereas battery costs and cost of these trucks will start to come down.a4Smith CEO Hansel says the companya4a4s customers can expect a return on investment from fuel and maintenance savings in three to four years, though Hurst estimates the industrya4a4s ROI is closer to 5 to 10 years.The federal government offers a $12,000 purchase incentive for trucks and buses, similar to the $7,500 tax credit offered for consumer electric cars.The segment is rife with competition and varied approaches. Electric Vehicles International makes an electric yard truck, which essentially moves containers around a port.Ford itself is getting into the game, with an electric commercial fleet van called the Transit Connect, which was developed with technology by Azure Dynamics. Ita4a4s also working with Eaton to develop hybrid medium-sized trucks a4&quot; and Eaton itself makes diesel hybrid school buses and trucks. And last summer, Proterra sold three electric buses to a transit agency in California.Glacier Bay approaches the trucking emissions problem from another angle. It estimates that idling trucks &amp;8212' those 18-wheelers you see at rest stops &amp;8212' waste up to 2,000 gallons of gas a year. The trucks idle when drivers pull over to sleep but leave on the air conditioner or heater. The company&amp;'s ClimaCab fix attaches something like a thermostat in the car which senses and automatically adjusts the temperature, drawing from a retrofited battery &amp;8212' which then gets charged back up when the car is driven the next day. Customers can save $4,000 to $5,000 a year, CEO Derek Kaufman said.Fuel-cell startup Oorja also set it sights on the commercial market from the get-go, CEO Sanjiv Malhotra said. It makes packs that can replace batteries in battery-powered forklifts use in distribution centers and can provide payback on investment within the first 12 to 18 months of use, Malhotra said. Oorja has signed up buyers in Nissan, McDonalds and U.S. Foods.Part of the issue with adoption for commercial owners is cost, since the trucks are still priced higher than their diesel-powered counterparts. Navistar&amp;'s Aubry says the company is looking solve that by offering leases and separating ownership of the battery from ownership of the car &amp;8212' that way businesses can equate the battery cost to fuel costs in their balance books.It&amp;'s a similar thing to what charging infrastructure startup Better Place does with battery leasing agreements. The company also has some experience dealing with fleet, having run an electric taxis pilot in Tokyo and ramping up to institute a similar program in San Francisco. The last step to electrifying fleets of trucks, says Better Place&amp;'s head of North America Jason Wolf, is instituting software programs that can gather data and intelligently manageitinerariesand charging needs of several cars.&amp;''If you&amp;'ve got a very smart network and smart cars, there&amp;'s no issue there,&amp;'' said Wolf. &amp;''The car will know where it needs to go.&amp;''Next Story: Office How quaint: Google announces Docs connectivity with Microsoft Office Previous Story: Yardsellr raises $5 million to reinvent e-commerce (and enable my dog-sweater habit)PrintEmailTwitterFacebookGoogle BuzzLinkedIn      DiggStumbleUponRedditDeliciousGoogleMore&amp;8230'          Tags: electric cars, electric trucks, electric vehicles, eStar, fleets, Ford Transit ConnectCompanies: AT&amp;amp'T, Azure Dynamics, Better Place, Coca-Cola, Eaton, FexEx, ford, Frito Lay, Glacier Bay, Mcdonald&amp;'s, Navistar, Nissan, Oorja, Pike Research, Proterra, Smith Electric, Staples, U.S. Foods, UPSPeople: Bryan Hansel, David Hurst, Jason Wolf, Mark Aubry, Sanjiv Malhotra          Tags: electric cars, electric trucks, electric vehicles, eStar, fleets, Ford Transit ConnectCompanies: AT&amp;amp'T, Azure Dynamics, Better Place, Coca-Cola, Eaton, FexEx, ford, Frito Lay, Glacier Bay, Mcdonald&amp;'s, Navistar, Nissan, Oorja, Pike Research, Proterra, Smith Electric, Staples, U.S. Foods, UPSPeople: Bryan Hansel, David Hurst, Jason Wolf, Mark Aubry, Sanjiv MalhotraIris Kuo is the VentureBeat's lead GreenBeat writer. She has reported for The Wall Street Journal in Hong Kong, Houston Chronicle, the McClatchy Washington Bureau and Dallas public radio. Iris attended the University of Texas at Dallas and lives in Houston. Follow Iris on Twitter @thestatuskuo (and yes, that's how you  pronounce her last name).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[The Tech Bubble Is Now On&nbsp'Twitter]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=the-tech-bubble-is-now-onnbsptwitter</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=the-tech-bubble-is-now-onnbsptwitter</comments>
<pubDate>Mon, 30 Nov -001 00:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>howtomakeawebsite</dc:creator>
<category>Latest News</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=the-tech-bubble-is-now-onnbsptwitter</guid>
<description><![CDATA[While it seems as though every other post we&amp;'ve written lately can be taken as evidence that Silicon Valley is currently in a very optimistic phase, Mike&amp;'s &amp;''Facebook Now Worth $50 Billion In Secondarya4sTrading&amp;'' pretty much took the cake, until this one.Perhaps a better marker of the &amp;''good times&amp;'' tipping point than the rumored Groupon acquisition (AND the subsequent Groupon for Groupon spoof), the highly contested Tech Bubble of 2010 now has its own Twitter address at @the_tech_bubble. And judging by the timing of its first tweet, it looks like the astronomical Facebook valuation post inspired the account. In fact I&amp;'m not entirely convinced Arrington isn&amp;'t somehow behind this.While there were plenty of snarky blogs during the early Web 2.0 era including uncov and Dead 2.0, I&amp;'ve never seen aa4sbubble with it&amp;'s own Twitter account. Perhaps the account itself explained it best, &amp;''Of course I have a twitter account. Twitter wouldn&amp;'t exist without me.&amp;''Hmmm. I see what you did just there.CrunchBase InformationTwitterInformation provided by CrunchBase<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
</item>

<item>
<title><![CDATA[CrowdFlower taps the power of the crowd to get more accurate business listings (exclusive)]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=crowdflower-taps-the-power-of-the-crowd-to-get-more-accurate-business-listings-exclusive</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=crowdflower-taps-the-power-of-the-crowd-to-get-more-accurate-business-listings-exclusive</comments>
<pubDate>Mon, 30 Nov -001 00:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>howtomakeawebsite</dc:creator>
<category>Latest News</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=crowdflower-taps-the-power-of-the-crowd-to-get-more-accurate-business-listings-exclusive</guid>
<description><![CDATA[CrowdFlower is one of many Web 2.0 businesses that taps the power of the crowd to get work done. Today, the company is formally releasing its Business Listing Verification service that allows companies to get accurate business contact data that has been recently verified.This kind of service is important in economy where there is constant change in the locations or contact information for businesses. I could benefit from it myself' I once sent 10 people to a restaurant that didn&amp;'t exist at the location where a location-based service told me it was. In more serious matters, the consequences of having the wrong information can be grave, such as having inaccurate information for a hospital location.The service uses web-based labor pools to verify attributes such as business name, address, phone number, and web address. The paid work force operates much like Amazon&amp;'s Mechanical Turk, which pays people for fulfilling small jobs on the web. By getting a human to verify information, the data becomes much more accurate, said Lukas Biewald, chief executive of CrowdFlower, in an interview. Basically, it hires farms out tasks on the web and pays people to verify the information. It calls this &amp;''labor on demand.&amp;''&amp;''We built CrowdFlower to sell crowdsourcing to the enterprise,&amp;'' Biewald (pictured) said.CrowdFlower also provides redundant verification and it has other ways to make sure that its workers aren&amp;'t just verifying every request without actually checking them. It does so by asking laborers to verify contacts that it already knows are accurate or inaccurate. The laborers who come up with the best results are allowed to keep working, while those who provide inaccurate help are bypassed.The problem is that a lot of lists being sold by various directory services are old and inaccurate. CrowdFlower has set up a system where humans can apply their own judgment and figure out quickly if a listing is accurate or not. With CrowdFlower, Biewald says that web-based workers can generally verify data with a phone call or through some other means. That way, the laborers can find out if a restaurant has shut down or a business has moved to another address. In the U.S., some 552,600 new firms opened for business in 2009 and 660,900 firms closed. That means the overall annual turnover among businesses was 10 percent.The cost of doing the verification runs anywhere from 10 cents to $2 per listing. CrowdFlower charges a small markup and it says it consistently delivers an average accuracy of 95 percent.CrowdFlower can tap 11 different labor pools with more than 500,000 people from 150 countries. To encourage more workers to participate, Biewald said his company is considering rewards such as gamification, or making the experience of doing the work more game-like.Customers who could benefit from this service include providers of business lists, online map makers, Global Positioning System (GPS) product makers, and owners of sales databases. The company began testing the service a while ago and in October, it verified more than 8 million listings.San Francisco-based CrowdFlower was founded in 2007 with the aim of applying statistically backed, quality-controlled crowdsourcing for businesses. The founders include Biewald and Chris Van Pelt, who both worked at search engine Powerset. CrowdFlower has 49 employees. Rivals include outsourcing companies and services such as Amazon&amp;'s Mechanical Turk. CrowdFlower raised $5 million in January from Trinity Ventures, Bessemer Venture Partners, Freestyle Capital, K9 Ventures, and Quest Venture Partners.Previous Story: Does anyone want to tell Yahoo that AOL wants to merge with itPrintEmailTwitterFacebookGoogle BuzzLinkedIn      DiggStumbleUponRedditDeliciousGoogleMore&amp;8230'          Tags: Business Listing Verification, crowdsourcingCompanies: Amazon, Bessemer Venture Partners, Crowdflower, Freestyle Capital, K9 Ventures, Quest Venture Partners, Trinity VenturesPeople: Chris Van Pelt, Lukas Biewald          Tags: Business Listing Verification, crowdsourcingCompanies: Amazon, Bessemer Venture Partners, Crowdflower, Freestyle Capital, K9 Ventures, Quest Venture Partners, Trinity VenturesPeople: Chris Van Pelt, Lukas BiewaldDean 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[After big layoffs, can Yahoo find its focus]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=after-big-layoffs-can-yahoo-find-its-focus</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=after-big-layoffs-can-yahoo-find-its-focus</comments>
<pubDate>Mon, 30 Nov -001 00:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>howtomakeawebsite</dc:creator>
<category>Latest News</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=after-big-layoffs-can-yahoo-find-its-focus</guid>
<description><![CDATA[Yahoo confirmed today that it has laid off around 600 employees, totaling 4 percent of its global workforce.The New York Times first reported that layoffs were coming yesterday, and even before the company had made an official announcement, TechCrunch published unhappy accounts from anonymous employees.Now Yahoo is sending out the following statement:Todaya4a4s personnel changes are part of our ongoing strategy to best position Yahoo! for revenue growth and margin expansion and to support our strategy to deliver differentiated products to the marketplace. Wea4a4ll continue to hire on a global basis to support our key priorities.Yahoo! is grateful for the important contributions made by the employees affected by this reduction.  We are offering severance packages and outplacement services to these employees.This seems like the latest move from chief executive Carol Bartz (who joined Yahoo at the beginning of 2009) to slim down the company. That approach has improved the companya4a4s finances, but ita4a4s yielding diminishing returns, with slowing revenue growth in its most recent earnings and the majority of profit coming from the sale of jobs site HotJobs. Traffic to its most popular service, Yahoo Mail, has been declining.Yahoo has been fighting back against that image recently, with the launch of revamped Mail and the promise that wea4a4ll see more innovations soon. Bartz said Yahooa4a4s executives understand the companya4a4s core identity is built around a4Acontent, communications, media, technology, innovationa4 (which covers an awful lot).It&amp;'s probably a little unfair to expect Yahoo to have a single, snappy answer when asked about its focus. Most publicly-traded tech companies have their fingers in lots of pies. But when the company itself is talking about a new focus on &amp;''key priorities&amp;'', it&amp;'d be nice if it could do a better job of communicating what those priorities are. After all, I dona4a4t think Bartz can keep cutting forever.Next Story: Why Best Buy should double down on mobile and entertainment Previous Story: Comcast to fend off Google TV with&amp;8230' somethingPrintEmailTwitterFacebookGoogle BuzzLinkedIn      DiggStumbleUponRedditDeliciousGoogleMore&amp;8230'          Tags: layoffsCompanies: YahooPeople: Carol Bartz          Tags: layoffsCompanies: YahooPeople: Carol BartzAnthony is VentureBeat's assistant editor, as well as its reporter on media, advertising, and social networks. Before joining VentureBeat in 2008, Anthony worked at the Hollister Free Lance, where he won awards from the California Newspaper Publishers Association for breaking news coverage and writing. He attended Stanford University and now lives in San Francisco. Reach him at anthony@venturebeat.com. (All story pitches should also be sent to tips@venturebeat.com) You can also follow Anthony on Twitter.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>

</channel>
</rss>
