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<title>Haaze.com / Leeta / Voted News</title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com</link>
<description>Test Web 2.0 Content Management System</description>
<pubDate>Mon, 25 Apr 2011 07:10:25 +0000</pubDate>
<language>en</language>
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<title><![CDATA[The original flying car, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, goes on sale]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=the-original-flying-car-chitty-chitty-bang-bang-goes-on-sale</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=the-original-flying-car-chitty-chitty-bang-bang-goes-on-sale</comments>
<pubDate>Mon, 25 Apr 2011 07:10:25 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>lamonter2011</dc:creator>
<category>Technology</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=the-original-flying-car-chitty-chitty-bang-bang-goes-on-sale</guid>
<description><![CDATA[This version of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang is completely road-worthy.(Credit:Profiles in History)The original flying, amphibiouscar, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, goes up for auction on May 15 in Los Angeles. It is expected to sell at between $1 million and $2 million.Although the dashboard looks vintage, a Ford V-6 and automatic transmission drive the car.(Credit:Profiles in History)Like a movie star, the Chitty Chitty Bang Bang going on sale didn't do its own stunts in its eponymous film. While other cars and models for the film flew and floated, this car merely drove, although the sellers point out it was built tough enough to handle dirt roads, cobblestone streets, and even a drive down a set of stairs.The car was built for the 1968 movie by Alan Mann Racing, which ran Ford's 1960s racing team in Europe. The car's engine is a Ford V-6, and the wooden passenger compartment was crafted by ship builders. Although it was also built with an automatic transmission, instruments and details were added to make it look like an original early 1900s touring car.The 1968 movie was a musical starring Dick Van Dyke, and co-written by Roald Dahl and Ken Hughes. It was based on a children's story by &quot;James Bond&quot; creator Ian Fleming.<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[Report: Apple testing A5 iPhones with game devs]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=report-apple-testing-a5-iphones-with-game-devs</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=report-apple-testing-a5-iphones-with-game-devs</comments>
<pubDate>Thu, 21 Apr 2011 07:10:12 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>minterziw36e</dc:creator>
<category>Mobile &amp; Electronics</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=report-apple-testing-a5-iphones-with-game-devs</guid>
<description><![CDATA[Apple&amp;39's A5 processor, currently found only in the iPad 2.(Credit:Apple)Select iOS application developers have been given versions of theiPhone with Apple's dual-core A5 processor, according to a new report.Citing an anonymous source, 9to5mac says Apple has given some prominent game developers prototype versions of the iPhone that pack the A5 processor to test their applications. These units are said to be otherwise identical to the current version of the iPhone 4, except for the faster internals.The A5 processor made its debut within theiPad 2. A successor to the A4 processor, which can be found in the first generation iPad and the iPhone 4, the A5 sports two cores while using the same power draw as the chip it is replacing. When he introduced the A5 as part of the iPad 2's specifications, Apple CEO Steve Jobs also noted that the chip boosted graphics performance by a factor of nine.That extra oomph could give game developers a noticeable boost in graphical power, since the iPhone 4 has a lower overall screen resolution than the iPad, meaning there are less pixels to push. That additional power could be spent on extra shaders, adding more processing effects to what's happening on-screen. Giving developers a heads-up on extra power is not an unusual habit for device makers, however Apple has a track record of giving advance notice to only a select few people, and of providing that information just weeks, or sometimes days, ahead of a public unveiling. But with multiple reports from major outlets pegging the release of the next iPhone to sometime near September, the A5 news would suggest Apple is changing its habits in regard to advance notice, perhaps to give developers a chance to produce content that would be exclusive to the platform and the hardware itself.One thing that could pour some cold water on this rumor is that teardowns of the A4 and A5 chips by Chipworks showed the A5 to be more than twice the size of the A4. The A5 that's in this alleged iPhone prototype would likely be made using a different manufacturing process, or use different packaging because of obvious space constraints.Other tidbits from 9to5mac's report say that the prototype hardware is being kept in a secured location within the companies and is running iOS 4. Shortly following the release of iOS 4.3, evidence was found within its source code that the operating system was able to support the A5 processor for an unnamed device within the iPhone family. That mystery device could very well be these alleged prototype units. <br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[Machines clear rubble as Japan ranks crisis with Chernobyl]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=machines-clear-rubble-as-japan-ranks-crisis-with-chernobyl</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=machines-clear-rubble-as-japan-ranks-crisis-with-chernobyl</comments>
<pubDate>Mon, 11 Apr 2011 07:10:15 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>deepika45</dc:creator>
<category>Technology</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=machines-clear-rubble-as-japan-ranks-crisis-with-chernobyl</guid>
<description><![CDATA[TEPCO workers remotely operate heavy machinery at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant. (Credit:TEPCO)TOKYO--Robots and remote-controlled heavy machinery finally got to work at the crisis-hit Fukushima nuclear plant in an effort to minimize human exposure to radiation as Japan raised the severity of the disaster from 5 to 7, putting it on par with the 1986 Chernobyl catastrophe. A month after the 9.0-magnitude March 11 earthquake, operator Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) deployed three remote-controlled excavators equipped with cameras to clear radioactive debris around the unit 3 reactor, according to a TEPCO spokeswoman. The unmanned machinery was donated by Shimizu and Kajima corporations. (Credit:TEPCO)The excavators were donated by two Japanese construction companies. Remote-operated power loaders sent to Japan by Qinetiq North America are still being evaluated before deployment to the plant. Meanwhile, TEPCO launched a Honeywell T-Hawk micro air vehicle to survey the plant from above. As seen in the video below, the MAV recorded footage of the reactors and turbine structures from about 500 feet up, showing extensive damage to the buildings from the tsunami and hydrogen blasts. TEPCO has also used two of Qinetiq's portable Talon robots--often used for ordnance disposal and reconnaissance--to take additional footage of the plant and the obstacles preventing the deployment of more machines. The bots have audio and video feeds as well as chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear, and explosive detection kits.Powerful aftershocks shook Tokyo and northeast Japan again on Monday and Tuesday, temporarily cutting power to the plant, but cooling operations are continuing. Meanwhile, Japan's Nuclear and Industry Safety Agency raised the severity of the crisis to 7, the highest on the International Nuclear Event Scale (INES). The Fukushima crisis had been ranked at 5 on the INES, the same level as the Three Mile Island accident. A rank of 7, or &quot;major accident,&quot; involves a &quot;major release of radioactive material with widespread health and environmental effects,&quot; according to an INES pamphlet. TEPCO says there are some 900 workers at the Fukushima Daiichi and Daini plants tackling the crisis, but none has exceeded the annual radiation dosage limit of 250 microsieverts. About 20 workers have reached the 100-microsievert level. Japan also expanded the 12-mile evacuation zone on Monday to include the communities of Katsurao, Namie, and Iitate, as well as parts of Kawamata and Minamisoma. The government has estimated that the radiation dose in part of Namie could exceed 300 millisieverts over a year. It's another sign that parts of Japan may be permanently abandoned as nuclear wastelands. <br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[Report: U.S. to issue terror alerts via Facebook, Twitter]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=report-u-s--to-issue-terror-alerts-via-facebook-twitter</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=report-u-s--to-issue-terror-alerts-via-facebook-twitter</comments>
<pubDate>Thu, 07 Apr 2011 07:10:58 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>kerngesund</dc:creator>
<category>Politics</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=report-u-s--to-issue-terror-alerts-via-facebook-twitter</guid>
<description><![CDATA[The Department of Homeland Security&amp;39's notoriously perplexing color-coded alert system.(Credit:Wikipedia)The Department of Homeland Security plans to replace its color-coded, five-level system of terrorism alerts with a new two-tiered approach later this month and will issue some public alerts via Facebook and Twitter, according to a report.The Associated Press said it had obtained a confidential, departmental document outlining the plan, which, though not yet finalized, should go into effect by April 27.According to the AP, the new plan will ditch the notoriously perplexing, green-to-red, low risk&amp;8211'to&amp;8211'severe risk system put in place in 2002 with a two-level system that labels threats as either &quot;elevated&quot; or &quot;imminent.&quot;The department is hoping to make the system more usable and accessible. And it seems to be responding, in part, to recommendations such as those made in a report issued in 2009 by the Homeland Security Advisory Council.At that time, hacker Jeff Moss, organizer of the Defcon hacking conference and a then-new appointee to the advisory council, told CNET's Elinor Mills that the council had suggested, among other things, that Homeland Security: reduce the number of threat levels'localize warnings and include more details (without jeopardizing law-enforcement efforts)'automatically lower a status level if no terrorist activity had occurred'and use various avenues, including social media, to spread the word.Moss said then: Let's say there's another [Hurricane] Katrina, a huge weather alert, or a terrorist attack, and you want to get the information out to everybody. Right now the only way to do that is to activate the whole emergency broadcast system or the emergency action system and have everybody's radio tell you--which they didn't even use during the World Trade Center attacks...I have one of those emergency weather radios because we get a lot of storms [in Seattle], and my radio is constantly going off telling me about specific storms. [But] it doesn't go off when there's a terrorist attacking my country I just turned it off and threw it away. It's useless.So what if you could have a feed coming from DHS and other government agencies, say, to Twitter or Facebook or MySpace or whatever And you subscribe to that channel or that feed End users would know it's still the official word' it hasn't been modified or changed. There has to be some official ways of distributing this alert information in many different ways. In criticizing the current style of alert, Moss asked, &quot;How does it give [civilians] any actionable information How should we change our behavior based on it&quot; And the AP report suggests that the department is trying to address such questions. The news agency said that in addition to cutting the number of levels from five to two, and tapping social media for alerts &quot;when appropriate,&quot; the department plans to make its warnings more specific and to issue them to more-specific audiences. If, for example, a plot was discovered to hide bombs inside backpacks at airports, instead of issuing a blanket alert, DHS would limit the warning to airports and ask travellers to be extra vigilant in reporting unattended baggage.The AP said the new &quot;elevated&quot; threat level &quot;would warn of a credible threat against the U.S. It probably would not specify timing or targets, but it could reveal terrorist trends that intelligence officials believe should be shared in order to prevent an attack.&quot; And it said the &quot;imminent&quot; level would be reserved for a &quot;credible, specific, and impending terrorist threat or an ongoing attack against the U.S.&quot;Related links &amp;149' Q&amp;A: Defcon's Jeff Moss on cybersecurity, government's role &amp;149' Pentagon, State Department OK social-network useBoth levels of alert would be called off if no terrorist activity ensued: the elevated level would expire after no more than 30 days, the imminent level after no more than 7. Both, however, could be extended if necessary.Any public warnings issued using Facebook, Twitter, or other such outlets would first be communicated to federal, state, and local officials. And some might not be issued to the public at all, if doing so would undermine efforts to head off any attacks, the AP reported.Again, though, the plan could be modified before its implementation. Homeland Security spokeswoman Amy Kudwa told the AP, &quot;The plan is not yet final, as we will continue to meet...with our partners to finalize a plan that meets everyone's needs.&quot;<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[Apple reportedly mulling retail store in Russia]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=apple-reportedly-mulling-retail-store-in-russia</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=apple-reportedly-mulling-retail-store-in-russia</comments>
<pubDate>Thu, 07 Apr 2011 07:10:22 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>Bakeruc</dc:creator>
<category>Mobile &amp; Electronics</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=apple-reportedly-mulling-retail-store-in-russia</guid>
<description><![CDATA[A rendering of what the inside of the Hotel Moskva will look like when reconstruction is completed.(Credit:Hotel Moskva)Apple might expand its retail stores into Russia, with a new location situated inside the reconstructed Hotel Moskva in the heart of Moscow.A report published yesterday by Apple retail store tracker ifoAppleStore cites anonymous sources who say that Apple's senior VP of retail, Ron Johnson, and Bob Bridger, who is the vice president of real estate, were in the area taking a look at the space, though had not yet finalized any paperwork. If opened, the location would be Apple's first retail store in Russia, filling the gap left with no direct online sales from the company, and would serve as an consumer-targeted alternative to the network of resellers and the authorized distributors.Notably, Russia received the second largest number ofiPad 2s from eBay during the two weeks of post-launch reseller activity the site released exclusively to CNET last week. Russia topped Canada at 500 imported iPad 2 units, more than doubling the 215 it had snapped up during the same time following the release of the first-generation device. That's certainly a good sign that there's a hungry group of customers looking to get their hands on new Apple gadgets. Last year Russian President Dmitry Medvedev visited Apple's campus as part of a tour of Silicon Valley, where he met with Apple CEO Steve Jobs. The purpose of the trip was to boost high-tech businesses in Russia, as well as to invite U.S.-based companies to plant roots there. Medvedev left that visit with an iPhone 4 as a gift from Jobs, which was later found to be locked to AT&amp;T's cellular network. <br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[EMC acquires NetWitness, combines with RSA]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=emc-acquires-netwitness-combines-with-rsa</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=emc-acquires-netwitness-combines-with-rsa</comments>
<pubDate>Mon, 04 Apr 2011 07:11:06 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>TakiraJanaka</dc:creator>
<category>Technology</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=emc-acquires-netwitness-combines-with-rsa</guid>
<description><![CDATA[EMC said today that it has acquired NetWitness, which provides network security software.The purchase, which won't impact EMC's revenue or earnings in 2011, was closed on April 1. NetWitness will be included in EMC's RSA unit.Terms of the deal weren't disclosed.With the acquisition, EMC will delve deeper into network security monitoring and analysis. NetWitness aims to spot everything from insider threats to target malware to data leakage.On the product front, NetWitness will become part of RSA's advanced security management lineup, which includes EnVision, RSA's Data Loss Prevention Suite and CyberCrime Intelligence service.The story &quot;EMC acquires NetWitness, combines with RSA&quot; was originally posted at ZDNet's Between the Lines.<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[Teacher accused of mocking 7-year-old on Facebook]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=teacher-accused-of-mocking-7-year-old-on-facebook</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=teacher-accused-of-mocking-7-year-old-on-facebook</comments>
<pubDate>Thu, 31 Mar 2011 07:10:45 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>bugterreskitchen</dc:creator>
<category>Marketing and advertising</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=teacher-accused-of-mocking-7-year-old-on-facebook</guid>
<description><![CDATA[Class, we need to go over this again: when you post things on Facebook, it is likely that they will go far beyond your few thousand friends.This reminder needs to be made right now. You see, the mother of 7-year-old Ukailya Lofton from Chicago has accused her daughter's teacher of taking a cell phone picture of her daughter's hair--in order to post it on Facebook. It seems she thought the hair was somewhat amusing.As the story was told to ABC7News Chicago, the mother, Lucinda Williams, said that her daughter wanted to have hair with Jolly Rancher candies hanging from her braids for Overton Elementary School's Picture Day. Kids want sweet things. Mothers indulge them.But on that day, she says a computer teacher took a photograph of her daughter's hair and posted it on Facebook.&quot;She took a picture of me and then she said my boyfriend can't believe this,&quot; little Ukailya told ABC News.When she heard about this, Williams says she went to the teacher's Facebook page and reportedly copied some of the comments on the picture of her daughter.Among them, allegedly, was: &quot;If you are going to make your child look ridiculous, the least you can do is have them matching.&quot; Another comment allegedly declared that writer's contact lens popped out when she saw the picture.The Chicago public schools district issued a statement that read: &quot;The district is currently investigating the matter to determine if any policies have been violated. If policies have in fact been violated, the district will move on disciplinary action.&quot;Williams says she met with the school principal and the teacher, who allegedly said that she had removed the page but equally allegedly refused to apologize to the child.And now, the word &quot;allegedly&quot; may be put to the test. Williams reportedly says she is planning a lawsuit.Soon, perhaps, every school will have its own Facebook monitor.<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[In the lab, designing the ultimate biofuel bug]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=in-the-lab-designing-the-ultimate-biofuel-bug</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=in-the-lab-designing-the-ultimate-biofuel-bug</comments>
<pubDate>Fri, 25 Mar 2011 07:10:37 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>chdresource</dc:creator>
<category>Eco</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=in-the-lab-designing-the-ultimate-biofuel-bug</guid>
<description><![CDATA[CAMBRIDGE, Mass.--To reinvent the fuel business, engineers at biofuel start-up Joule Unlimited tinker with tiny life forms all day.The four-year-old start-up is on the front lines of a branch of biotechnology that taps into the wealth of knowledge from genome sequencing and powerful computer tools to start from scratch and ask: if you wanted the ideal fuel, how would you make it The answer they've come up with is a diesel secreted by a genetically engineered microbe in flat plastic bioreactors. The only inputs for its &quot;biofactory&quot; organism are sunlight, pumped-in carbon dioxide, and some nutrients. Building a microscopic biofuel factory (photos)  Joule Unlimited has a long way to go before it's a commercial home run. But a look at its business strategy and labs here demonstrate the possibilities of biotechnology in reshaping the liquid fuels industry. After disappointing progress in making ethanol from agriculture wastes or grasses, much of the public attention has turned to plug-in electric vehicles to make transportation greener. But replacing petrofuels and chemicals with plant-based sources is still very much part of the picture. Joule Unlimited was co-founded by venture capitalists at Flagship Ventures who took a &quot;blue sky&quot; approach to making biofuels at scale after investing in two other biofuels start-ups also using techniques from synthetic biology--Mascoma and LS9.Rather than use algae or shuffle the genes of industrial workhorses, such as e.coli bacteria, Joule is doing metabolic engineering of cyanobacteria or blue-green algae, which is thought to have evolved 2.9 billion years ago and is the granddaddy of all water-splitting photosynthetic organisms.During a meeting at the company's offices, in what Cambridge calls &quot;Life Sciences Square,&quot; Joule Unlimited's senior vice president of biological services (and the company's first employee), Dan Robertson, shows me a thick Department of Energy report that identifies a number of barriers to making fuel with algae.The bio-engineers at Joule set out to address all of those barriers, Robertson said. Instead of growing biomass and then extracting the fuel from it, Joule and others want to make fuels secreted directly from micro-organisms. Instead of feeding sugar--typically from sugar cane--to e.coli and then fermenting the solution to brew alcohol-based fuel, Joule has designed a system of continuous fuel production. Algae wasn't pursued because so much water needs to be removed and it's harder to engineer.&quot;In one place, the light is being absorbed and the carbon dioxide taken up where you can get carbon molecules to ultimately make your product,&quot; Robertson explained. The cyanobacteria in bioreactors produce hydrocarbons, which are siphoned off from the green-colored water solution. There's no feedstock to procure and ship or even biomass to gather and then process. The company is running a pilot facility in Texas, where it is trucking in carbon dioxide for testing purposes. For future sites, it intends to get CO2 from an industrial partner. Emissions from a coal-fired power plant could be fed to the cyanobacteria after normal scrubbing of mercury and arsenic, Robertson said.Bug controlBreeding specific organisms, such as e.coli, for specific purposes has been going on for decades. But advances in biotech are allowing biologists to manipulate organisms with far finer control and speed.In Joule's case, biologists are optimizing the metabolism of cyanobacteria for their purposes. Instead of taking food and sunlight to make more of themselves, the natural pathways of Joule's genetically modified organisms have been altered to produce alkanes, a hydrocarbon to be mixed with diesel fuel. They have even been programmed with a &quot;carbon switch&quot; to shift their metabolisms from making more of themselves to making fuel. Joule envisions starting up production of its microbes in its bioreactors and, once they reach a certain density in water, operators will add ingredients to get the organism's metabolism to start pumping out alkanes.&quot;You essentially co-opt the carbon that would be used for something else (to make fuel) and make the organism feel that it's OK,&quot; said Robertson. &quot;It's all very controlling.&quot;In the lab, engineers re-create real-world conditions to isolate different strains by tweaking carbon dioxide, sunlight, and nitrogen levels. For example, one specialized machine allows an engineer to simulate the sunlight conditions for a whole day, representing different seasons and changing temperatures. With each test, engineers get closer to the optimal gene combinations for different conditions. Since the bioreactors would be placed in different locations, the company has settled on somewhere between 10 and 20 strains, after constructing some 4,000 strains, according to Robertson.Biologists spend more of their time designing tests or isolating DNA on gene databases, rather than actually performing lab tests, Robertson said. &quot;Because so much genome sequencing has already taken place, there's an immense database available arranged by the chemistry that they do,&quot; he said. &quot;There are lots of tools at our disposal, so we can rapidly test things.&quot;Long road to pipelinesJoule Unlimited is just one of many companies in the race for a better biofuel technology. The Department of Energy's ARPA-E agency is funding many research efforts in &quot;electrofuels,&quot; which make fuels directly from electricity, sunlight, and water. There are dozens of other companies pursuing completely different approaches, such as thermochemical processes. Analysts at Lux Research call synthetic biology is the &quot;flashiest&quot; technology vying for the lead. Joule Unlimited has high potential, but it still has to prove that it can move from a small-scale operation to commercial scale, Lux Research said. Specifically, it lacks partners and it will require a lot of capital and land to reach cost parity with today's petrofuels, it said in a recent report.The company's next step is to build a 10-acre demonstration plant located at an industrial facility, such as a power plant or waste water facility, which it expects to do by mid-2012. Then it plans to start construction of a facility larger than 1,000 acres at the end of 2013 that would be able to make 12,000 gallons of fuel per acre per year. When fully scaled up, it would make 15 million gallons a year of fuel.The cyanobacteria need nutrients, including nitrogen and trace amounts of minerals, to be fed into its bioreactors. And to be commercially successful, its bioreactors need to be engineered for low operational costs and maximum production. Next door to its labs, engineers are designing the actual hardware for growing the fuel, another key part to whether the company will be able to scale up.Although Joule's employees clearly see the power of metabolic engineering, they are very cognizant of concerns over genetically modified organisms, said Robertson. Its bioreactors will run for six to eight weeks' then the solution is flushed out, the actual organisms are burned, the bioreactors are sterilized, and a fresh medium is put in, he said.Even with Joule's impressive technical achievement and three patents, it still has a ways to go before it will make a dent in reducing fossil fuel use and pollution. But if the biotechnology techniques it and others are pursuing bear fruit, the face of fuels in the future may well be a petri dish, rather than an oil well. Updated at 1:15 p.m. PT with corrections. The bioreactors will be made from plastic, not glass, and Joule's demo facility is using trucked-in CO2.<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[IBM buys Tririga software in 'smart building' play]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=ibm-buys-tririga-software-in-smart-building-play</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=ibm-buys-tririga-software-in-smart-building-play</comments>
<pubDate>Tue, 22 Mar 2011 07:11:08 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>manziter4</dc:creator>
<category>Eco</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=ibm-buys-tririga-software-in-smart-building-play</guid>
<description><![CDATA[IBM already manages computers with software. Now it wants to manage buildings. The computing giant today said it intends to acquire Las Vegas-based Tririga for an undisclosed amount, giving IBM software for managing a portfolio of buildings, including projects to improve building efficiency and lower carbon emissions.IBM said it is part of its strategy to give corporations better ways to manage their facilities and equipment. Tririga's applications will be part of IBM's Tivoli division of management software.&quot;Having one view of building operations worldwide will be a powerful tool to help organizations control and optimize their second-largest corporate expense--property,&quot; said Florence Hudson, energy and environment executive at IBM said in a statement. Tririga's software is aimed at facility managers, giving them a way to monitor buildings to improve their utilization or to manage maintenance. One application from the company is geared at improving efficiency and monitoring environmental factors, such as recycling rates and energy consumption. With it, a building manager can prioritize energy efficiency projects, such as changing out heating and cooling equipment, and monitor the results.Tririga is one of many companies moving into corporate building efficiency and environmental monitoring through software. Research company Verdantix named Tririga as one of the carbon and energy management software leaders, along with CA Technologies, Hara, and SAP.IBM's acquisition of Tririga follows its strategy of acquiring software companies and integrating their products to offer a broader set of products to corporations. It expands on IBM's &quot;smarter buildings&quot; campaign to apply technology, including sensors and analytical software, to improve efficiency and productivity. <br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[Mozilla mirroring Chrome's fast, phased releases]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=mozilla-mirroring-chromes-fast-phased-releases</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=mozilla-mirroring-chromes-fast-phased-releases</comments>
<pubDate>Fri, 18 Mar 2011 07:10:22 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>resbimmarlk</dc:creator>
<category>Mobile &amp; Electronics</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=mozilla-mirroring-chromes-fast-phased-releases</guid>
<description><![CDATA[Mozilla plans an orderly shift from raw new code to a polished final version of Firefox every 16 weeks.(Credit:Rob Sayre/Mozilla)A faster, regular release schedule isn't the only idea Mozilla is adopting from Google's browser. The organization also is embracing a plan to giveFirefox a similar spectrum of test and stable versions to try to bring new features to market swiftly.The general idea is to issue new versions of Firefox with varying levels of maturity, with the more mature versions geared for larger audiences, according to a draft document published by Mozilla programmer Rob Sayre.The goal of the overall effort is to inject more competitiveness into a browser that deserves credit for reinvigorating a market left stagnant by the dominance of Microsoft's Internet Explorer. Firefox still is the No. 2 browser in worldwide usage, but now Google's Chrome has attracted many technophilic early adopters, and the brand-new IE9 gives Microsoft a competitive browser again.The biggest risk coming with the new Firefox release philosophy is leaving behind the slower-moving users. Firefox has gained mainstream acceptance, but the fast-moving, auto-updating philosophy of software development can be at odds with, for example, conservative IT departments.Mozilla plans a cascade of gradually maturing releases over a 16-week cycle.(Credit:Rob Sayre/Mozilla)Chrome comes in four or five flavors, depending on how you're counting. The most raw &quot;nightly&quot; version is built, well, nightly, to include the latest patches. The developer release is more settled down but still designed as a proving ground for new features. The beta release is where final testing takes place, and the stable release is for the mainstream market. In between the nightly and developer releases is the &quot;Canary&quot; version, but it's only for Windows, and it's updated irregularly. For example, it doesn't yet have the new Chrome logo that's in the developer release.Mozilla is moving toward a similar model, but it uses different terms and doesn't have Canary. The draft document lays out placeholder version names of &quot;mozilla-central (or 'nightly'), firefox-experimental, firefox-beta, and Firefox.&quot; Like Google, Mozilla calls the release mechanisms channels.For now, Mozilla has just nightly builds, a sequence of beta and release-candidate releases, then the final version. The newest, Firefox 4, is due March 22, and under the faster schedule, versions 5, 6, and 7 are also due this year.Here's how Mozilla describes the process to produce a new Firefox every 16 weeks:Firefox uses a schedule-driven process, where releases take place at regular intervals. That means each release happens regardless of whether a given feature is ready, and releases are not delayed to wait for a feature to stabilize. The goal of the process is to provide regular improvements to users without disrupting longer term work...The nightly channel gets new features as soon as they are ready, but it has the lowest stability of the four channels. The UI might change each day, and Web sites might not work at times. The firefox-experimental channel gets new features at regular intervals, but some of them might be disabled if it looks like they need more work. The beta channel receives only new features that are slated for the next Firefox releaseThe change comes with several consequences. One big consequence of the new schedule is to security. Firefox users would need to embrace the constant updates, because old versions of Firefox won't be maintained..&quot;This proposal makes security updates occur along with Firefox releases, meaning we'll no longer be maintaining old branches,&quot; the document said. &quot;Having security branches for each major update is untenable if we release as often as we aim to.&quot;Another consequence is a move closer to the auto-update ethos that Chrome embodies. &quot;This proposal also requires changes to our software update behavior to make them happen more automatically in the background and interrupt the user less often. Otherwise, we will disrupt fx-beta users too much,&quot; the document said. &quot;There will also need to be an option for users to completely disable automatic updates, so that they can manage their own upgrade process.&quot;Mozilla plans to draw 500,000 experimental users and 1.5 million beta users from the existing beta-tester community.The schedule is designed to produce a new Firefox version every 16 weeks, but because the beta channel feeds in more frequently, releases could theoretically come more rapidly. &quot;Under this system, there is a choice to ship a general Firefox release at week 16 and every six weeks thereafter. That doesn't mean a release will happen every six weeks, but the option will be available,&quot; the document said.Critical security fixes also could arrive independently of the regular schedule.<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[Phishers use HTML attachments to evade browser blacklists]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=phishers-use-html-attachments-to-evade-browser-blacklists</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=phishers-use-html-attachments-to-evade-browser-blacklists</comments>
<pubDate>Wed, 16 Mar 2011 07:12:03 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>Kavita01</dc:creator>
<category>Technology</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=phishers-use-html-attachments-to-evade-browser-blacklists</guid>
<description><![CDATA[Shown is an example of a phishing attack that encourages the recipient to download the HTML attachment and provide information. Note the poor grammar, &amp;34'required informations,&amp;34' which should be a red flag.(Credit:M86)To get around phishing blacklists in browsers, scammers are luring people by using HTML attachments instead of URLs, a security firm is warning. Chrome andFirefox are good at detecting phishing sites and warning Web surfers via a browser notice when they are about to visit a site that looks dangerous. So good, in fact, that scammers are resorting to a new tactic to lure victims into their traps via e-mails--attaching HTML files that are stored locally when they are opened, according to an M86 blog post yesterday.  After the user fills in a form with the information the scammers want to steal and clicks &quot;submit,&quot; the HTML form sends the data through a POST request to a PHP (Hypertext Preprocessor) script hosted on a legitimate Web server that has been compromised. (POST is used when a computer is sending data over the Internet to a Web server.) Because few PHP URLs are reported as abuse, this action does not trigger a warning from the browser, M86 said.  &quot;Months-old phishing campaigns remain undetected, so it seems this tactic is quite effective,&quot; the blog post says. &quot;Logically, however, the browser should be able to detect a URL when the browser sends the POST request.&quot; The phishing URLs alone without the HTML form are hard to verify because the PHP script runs in the server and no visible HTML is displayed after clicking the submit button, other than redirecting to a page belonging to the company the scammer was pretending to be, the post says. To protect against this, people should avoid opening HTML attachments if the e-mail seems suspicious and not provide any information in forms. Financial institutions do not send such attachments to customers.  While many people will click on a link in an e-mail that looks like it comes from their bank, fewer are likely to open the HTML attachment.  Mozilla representatives did not provide comment on the report today. Meanwhile, a Google spokesperson provided this comment: &quot;Google has a number of defenses against phishing sites to help protect our users. For example, Gmail checks HTML attachments for phishing sites and displays a warning to users when one is detected. We always encourage users to be cautious when handling unexpected attachments and when providing personal information requested by email.&quot;<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[Microsoft, the do-gooder, makes the ethics grade]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=microsoft-the-do-gooder-makes-the-ethics-grade</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=microsoft-the-do-gooder-makes-the-ethics-grade</comments>
<pubDate>Wed, 16 Mar 2011 07:11:38 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>bioexperiences</dc:creator>
<category>Mobile &amp; Electronics</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=microsoft-the-do-gooder-makes-the-ethics-grade</guid>
<description><![CDATA[What a difference a decade makes Ten years ago, Microsoft was fighting a U.S. district judge's ruling to break the company apart for violating federal antitrust laws. Now, a New York think tank has named it one of the world's 110 most ethical companies.The Ethisphere Institute released its annual list of corporate good guys based on &quot;real and sustained ethical leadership within their industries.&quot; The 2011 list, which makes no attempt to rank the companies, includes some well-known do-gooders such as outdoor apparel maker Patagonia and the Whole Foods Market grocery chain. From techdom, Ethisphere includes Adobe Systems, Salesforce.com, and eBay, among others.The Ethisphere Institute, which produces an annual list of the world&amp;39's most ethical companies, has created its &amp;34'WME Index&amp;34' that shows the publicly traded companies among 2011 World's Most Ethical Company honorees outperformed the S&amp;amp'P 500 since 2007. (Click image for larger version.)(Credit:Ethisphere Institute)As longtime Microsoft watcher Todd Bishop notes, it's an honor that would have been hard to imagine a decade ago. Back then, Microsoft was arguing before a federal appeals court to overturn U.S. District Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson's ruling that the company should be split in two, an argument Microsoft eventually won. Jackson wanted Microsoft cleaved to further prevent it from leveraging its PC operating system hegemony into new markets at the expense of rivals.Much has changed in the intervening decade. Microsoft is still the dominant purveyor of PC operating systems. But the power derived from that business is much less, as Web services replace packaged software. The modus operandi may have changed at Microsoft over the years. But so too have the circumstances.To be fair, Microsoft has improved its corporate governance guidelines since its eventual settlement with the Justice Department over the antitrust suit. And as far as do-gooding goes, the software company has long been a model corporate philanthropist.For its part, Ethisphere says it chose Microsoft and the other companies on the list based on four categories--ethics and compliance' reputation, leadership and innovation' governance' and corporate citizenship and responsibility. The fact that regulators haven't bothered Microsoft for years surely helped, just as it likely hindered Google, which is facing an investigation by the European Union. In fact, Google did not make this year's Ethisphere list even though it had in the past.<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[Groupon all shy about its new TV ad]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=groupon-all-shy-about-its-new-tv-ad</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=groupon-all-shy-about-its-new-tv-ad</comments>
<pubDate>Mon, 07 Mar 2011 08:11:12 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>wilburgaal</dc:creator>
<category>Marketing and advertising</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=groupon-all-shy-about-its-new-tv-ad</guid>
<description><![CDATA[I was watching &quot;American Idol&quot; the other night (yes, alright, alright), when something resembling an ad for Groupon appeared.It was a simple little thing. There was a calendar, a voiceover telling me about all the different kinds of deals the company offers, and little bits of animation appeared on the calendar, as the deals were described. Oh, and the calendar had some strange days of the week like &quot;Frankenday&quot; and &quot;Grund.&quot;&quot;Oh,&quot; I thought. &quot;After all the controversy surrounding its rather fine ads making fun of American charity, Groupon's decided to eat a little vanilla.&quot;So I thought I'd embed it for you, just in case you weren't in love with Jennifer Lopez, Steven Tyler, or nice boys singing old hits and wearing H&amp;M.Here's the strange thing: I couldn't find this ad on YouTube. I couldn't even find it on Groupon's own blog. This all seemed rather odd. It seemed strange that a rather odd company--one that celebrates its rather oddness--would send an ad out into the jungle of &quot;American Idol,&quot; while not seeming too proud of it.(Credit:Screenshot: Chris Matyszczyk/CNET)I know that the Timothy Hutton &quot;Tibet&quot; ad stirred a few slightly sad people into angry speech, but Groupon's apparent shyness still seemed unbecoming. So I contacted Groupon and a very nice spokeswoman, Julie Mossler, told me that this was &quot;a new spot to fill ad time left vacant when we pulled the Super Bowl ads.&quot;But why can't we find it anywhere other than during Ryan Seacrest's bathroom breaks Mossler explained: &quot;Since it's just a short-term campaign, it didn't make sense to publicize it.&quot;But, but, it always makes sense to publicize something that's, well, out there in the most popular show in America, isn't itOr is Groupon worried that this ad, hurriedly made with little cartoons of various deals, makes the company seem rather similar to LivingSocial, which has advertised heavily of late. LivingSocial's ads feature, well, the different kinds of deals it has.Mossler stood up boldly for her company's work. &quot;I think there are plenty of touches in the ad [for example, the imaginary names for days of the week] that show that we have more personality than just another deal site.&quot; she told me.Then why not put it on your blog and on YouTube I can offer you this link to see the ad--and it really is a perfectly nice, innocuous piece of communication.But, given that I'm still unable to locate an embeddable copy (I have posted a screenshot above), I've slipped in a new LivingSocial spot below, and hopefully you will be able to compare and contrast. I do hope that Groupon doesn't lose its bold, pioneering spirit, and that it truly will find a way to differentiate itself from the plethora of competitors that are now desperate to prey on America's great weakness--the appeal of the deal. <br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[The iPad 2 makes its debut]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=the-ipad-2-makes-its-debut</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=the-ipad-2-makes-its-debut</comments>
<pubDate>Wed, 02 Mar 2011 08:10:37 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>rayhonagnn</dc:creator>
<category>Mobile &amp; Electronics</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=the-ipad-2-makes-its-debut</guid>
<description><![CDATA[The Apple iPad 2.(Credit:James Martin/CNET)The wait is over for eager Apple fans wanting the next-generation iPad. At an invite-only event in San Francisco today, the company took the wraps off theiPad 2.Apple CEO Steve Jobs, who is taking a leave of absence from the company, returned to unveil the new product, which is expected to be a hot seller.As anticipated, the newtablet has two cameras and is faster with dual-core processors. They just about double CPU performance and make the graphics speed 9 times faster, while using the same power as the processor from the first iPad. The iPad 2 is thinner than the older model. It went from 13.4mm in thickness on the old iPad to 8.8mm in thickness on the new one. And it works not only on AT&amp;T's 3G network, but also Verizon Wireless' 3G network. In terms of the technical specifications, the device is 9.5 inches high, 7.3 inches wide, and 0.34 inches deep. And it weighs just 1.33 pounds. It comes in three storage sizes for both the Wi-Fi and Wi-Fi +3G models: 16GB, 32GB, 64GB. And the rear camera is 720p and the front camera is &quot;VGA-quality&quot; suitable for video and still photography.The new tablet will go on sale in the U.S. on March 11 and will start at $499. The original iPad, which went on sale last April, is now $399 for the 16GB Wi-Fi only version of the product. The 3G version of the 16GB iPad is $529. Apple will begin shipping the iPad 2 internationally to 26 countries starting March 25.<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[Report: Steve Jobs came close to knighthood]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=report-steve-jobs-came-close-to-knighthood</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=report-steve-jobs-came-close-to-knighthood</comments>
<pubDate>Tue, 01 Mar 2011 08:10:50 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>ivelislviv</dc:creator>
<category>Mobile &amp; Electronics</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=report-steve-jobs-came-close-to-knighthood</guid>
<description><![CDATA[If nothing else, waiters and store clerks will still refer to Steve Jobs as &amp;34'sir.&amp;34'(Credit:CBS Interactive)Apple CEO Steve Jobs was close to gaining knighthood in the U.K., only to see the opportunity derailed at the last minute, The Telegraph reported today.Citing an unnamed, former Labor Party member of Parliament, the Telegraph said that Jobs had made his way through the final stages of knighthood in 2009. His chances of becoming knighted were nicked, however, when he turned down an invitation to speak before the Labor Party. Gordon Brown, who was the U.K.'s prime minister at the time, viewed the response unfavorably and personally blocked Jobs' path to knighthood, the Telegraph's source said.According to the Parliament member, Jobs' name was brought up for knighthood for Apple's ability &quot;to create stunning consumer products because it has always taken design as the key component of everything it has produced.&quot; The Parliament member added that &quot;no other CEO has consistently shown such commitment.&quot;Jobs, who apparently knew of the knighthood proceedings in 2009, according to the Telegraph's source, wouldn't have been the first tech exec to be knighted. In 2005, Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates earned honorary knighthood from Queen Elizabeth II.Becoming a Knight Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is considered one of the highest honors bestowed upon an individual. Those who receive the rank can use the title &quot;Sir&quot; or &quot;Dame.&quot;But alas, Sir Steve Jobs just wasn't in the cards.The U.K. Prime Minister's office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[Add social context to your e-mail in-box]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=add-social-context-to-your-e-mail-in-box</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=add-social-context-to-your-e-mail-in-box</comments>
<pubDate>Tue, 01 Mar 2011 08:10:05 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>jusirbim1</dc:creator>
<category>Mobile &amp; Electronics</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=add-social-context-to-your-e-mail-in-box</guid>
<description><![CDATA[Xobni puts a ton of social info in an Outlook sidebar.(Credit:Screenshot by Rafe Needleman/CNET)It's important to know who you're talking to. But in our e-mail in-boxes, we're deluged with messages from people we don't know, companies we're not familiar with. Even messages from our friends and coworkers could be better handled if we had social or business context with the message.  To see what I mean, try at least one of the these three good tools: Xobni, Rapportive, and a new kid on the block, WhoSent.It. These tools all give you dossiers on the people e-mailing you by using data gleaned from around the Web, including Facebook profiles, Twitter postings, and, for business users, data from apps like Salesforce.com.  Of these apps, Xobni is for Outlook users. Rapportive works nicely with Gmail and Google Apps. WhoSent.It has a clever twist that makes it work with anything. If you're an Outlook user, get Xobni. Like the other apps, it pulls personal data from Facebook, Twitter, and Linked in, and company data from Hoovers. Xobni also gives you relevant data from within your own e-mail archive: It gives you links to e-mails you've exchanged with the sender, and also shows you which other people the sender communicates with (taken from multi-addressed to: and cc: fields). Xobni's sidebar data panel looks great and is the front-end for a ton of additional info, though on a crowded notebook's screen it can be a little intrusive.Rapportive replaces Gmail&amp;39's ads with a useful info pane.(Credit:Screenshot by Rafe Needleman/CNET)Rapportive works with Gmail and its corporate cousin, Google Apps. Primarily it grabs data from the usual suspects of social sources: Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. Users can also connect Rapportive to less universally used lookup tools, like Klout, Lanyrd, and Crunchbase. Rapportive's benefit is its easy setup--it's a browser plug-in--and, thanks to its cloud architecture, its minimal drag on the user's computer. It's a no-brainer if you use Gmail, although in my tests it did fail to pick up social profiles from some people I know I'm connected to.  Rahul Vohra, CEO of Rapportive, told me a Xobni-like history section will be added to his service soon.  Then there's the new app, WhoSent.It. Very much a work in progress, this dossier utility works with any e-mail system through a clever routing hack: When you want to look someone up in the free version, you forward the message from them to who@whosent.it. The service reads the e-mail, and you get a dossier page back with details on the person. Alternatively, enterprise users can route all their incoming e-mails through WhoSent.It, to get the dossiers appended to messages.WhoSent.It sends you an e-mail dossier when you forward it messages. It still needs some development.(Credit:Screenshot by Rafe Needleman/CNET)WhoSent.It does need to grow up a bit before I can recommend it, but hopefully this will happen soon. It doesn't return much information, even when you connect it to your Facebook account, and in my testing it also got some info oddly wrong (my father is not female). But WhoSent.It is launching with the capability to pull data from Salesforce.com and Jigsaw, which is useful to businesses. And it's the only service you can start using immediately from a smartphone, if you need a quick bit of info on someone and you're not near your desktop.  The CEOs of all of the dossier apps told me they're big into mobile. At the moment, WhoSent.It works with any platform, so it's probably the best bet for getting info on a contact when you're not at your desk--and you're not an Outlook and BlackBerry user, since Xobni has a BlackBerry app (review). Rapportive's Vohra says mobile support is in the pipeline for that app.  There are free versions of each of these services, with up-sells for premium features. Either Rapportive or Xobni will instantly give you social context that your e-mail in-box is currently lacking. And WhoSent.It has potential--watch for it to improve.<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[Robo-runners complete marathon in photo finish]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=robo-runners-complete-marathon-in-photo-finish</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=robo-runners-complete-marathon-in-photo-finish</comments>
<pubDate>Mon, 28 Feb 2011 08:10:37 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>poroshenkoivan</dc:creator>
<category>Technology</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=robo-runners-complete-marathon-in-photo-finish</guid>
<description><![CDATA[Race winner Robovie PC wears his heart on his sleeve, so to speak. (Credit:Vstone)The word's first bipedal robot marathon wrapped up in Osaka, Japan, over the weekend with a 15-inch droid taking home the prize after a near photo finish. Dramatic finish: Robovie-PC breaks the tape. (Credit:Vstone)Team Vstone's Robovie-PC won the Robomarafull race in 54 hours, 57 minutes, and 50 seconds, with Robot Center Team's Robovie-PC Lite nipping at his heels and crossing the finish line just a second behind. The other three robo-runners, including two from Osaka Institute of Technology, had dropped out of the 26.2-mile endurance contest, which was organized by robot maker Vstone and the Osaka government. Winner Robovie-PC is a high-end kit robot with 20 moving joints and weighing about 5 pounds. It ran the race autonomously by following colored tape on the track. Powered by a 1.6GHz Intel Atom Z530 microprocessor, it has a head camera and urethane sponge foam on its exterior to protect it from falls. Vstone sells the Robovie-PC kit starting at about $4,890. Check out some highlights from the marathon in the vid below. <br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[Soros joins private equity heavy in clean energy fund]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=soros-joins-private-equity-heavy-in-clean-energy-fund</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=soros-joins-private-equity-heavy-in-clean-energy-fund</comments>
<pubDate>Thu, 24 Feb 2011 08:11:08 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>robinjackson</dc:creator>
<category>Eco</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=soros-joins-private-equity-heavy-in-clean-energy-fund</guid>
<description><![CDATA[There have been hundreds of green technology start-ups funded by venture capitalists but a new fund with an impressive pedigree is looking to scale up clean energy technologies.Private equity company Silver Lake today said that it has joined with George Soros' Soros Fund Management to create Lake Kraftwerk, a fund designed for late-stage investments in energy technology companies.Former Foundation Capital venture capitalist Adam Grosser will head the fund. Cathy Zoi, which recently resigned as acting under secretary of Energy at the Department of Energy and assistant secretary for energy efficiency and renewable energy, is part of the investment team. Silver Lake Kraftwerk will focus on companies involved in energy efficiency, waste and emissions reduction, renewable energy, and better use of natural resources. The point is to provide &quot;growth capital&quot; for companies that already have developed technology and a proven business model, Grosser said in an interview today. It will stay away from traditional project finance, the type of investments used to finance building new factories. Specific areas that Silver Lake Kraftwerk expects to invest in are in the grid, such as sensors or software for more efficient operation, Grosser said. Efficient LED lighting, low-carbon content building materials, and alternative solar technologies are also of interest as well as remediation methods for the coal and oil industries, he said.There have been billions of dollars of venture capital invested in the clean tech category in the past decade but there have only been a handful of companies which have successfully gone public and remain profitable, in part because energy businesses are typically require lots of capital to get to large scale. Investors often say there's a funding gap between the money that's needed to develop products and get first customers and capital to expand. Grosser said that Silver Lake Kratwerk aims to be the &quot;last money&quot; in before a company is self sustaining. <br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[Report: Apple remains king of app-store market]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=report-apple-remains-king-of-app-store-market</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=report-apple-remains-king-of-app-store-market</comments>
<pubDate>Tue, 15 Feb 2011 08:10:44 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>zennylopez</dc:creator>
<category>Technology</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=report-apple-remains-king-of-app-store-market</guid>
<description><![CDATA[Though more online stores have been crowding the mobile app market, Apple remains by far the app-store leader, according to data out today from IHS, which recently acquired technology researcher iSuppli.For 2010, Apple took in $1.78 billion in worldwide sales from its App Store, a leap of 132 percent from $769 million in 2009. And while it lost market share to some of its mobile rivals, Apple still captured 82.7 percent of the app store market last year, down from 92.8 percent the prior year.One factor that boosted Apple's mobile app sales in 2010 was the debut of theiPad. AlthoughiPhone users still outnumber those who own Apple's populartablet, iPad apps on average cost more than those designed for the iPhone, contributing a healthy percentage of sales. By 2014, about 50 percent of Apple's App Store sales in the U.S. will come from the iPad, compared to just under 20 percent last year, forecasts IHS. &quot;In terms of mobile application stores, Apple remains far ahead of the competition, with the other stores so far unable to replicate Apple's success in generating revenue from users,&quot; Jack Kent, an IHS mobile media analyst, said in a statement. &quot;Apple, in contrast, has been able to maintain advantage by leveraging its tightly controlled ecosystem--combining compelling hardware and content with the capability to offer consumers a trusted, integrated, and simple billing service via iTunes.&quot; Despite Apple's dominance, other app stores were able to make a dent in the market last year. Though still in fourth place behind Research In Motion's BlackBerry App World and Nokia's Ovi Store, Google's Android Market saw the greatest surge in revenue growth. Sales for the Android Market rose 861.5 percent last year, giving Google a 4.7 percent cut of the market, up from just 1.3 percent in 2009. In third place, the Ovi Store also witnessed strong sales growth, with revenue increasing by 719.4 percent to give it a 4.9 percent share of the mobile app market. BlackBerry App World hung onto its Number 2 spot with revenue rising by 360.3 percent last year, boosting its market share to 7.7 percent from 4.3 percent in 2009. (Credit:IHS) Overall sales in the mobile app store market climbed by 160.2 percent last year to reach $2.2 billion, up from $828 million in 2009. Games proved to be the most popular type of app, responsible for 52.2 percent of all mobile app store sales in 2010. Looking forward, IHS expects the global market for mobile apps to rise by another 81.5 percent this year, reaching $3.9 billion in total sales. The Android Market and other rival stores are likely to further slice away at Apple's leading share, but the iPhone maker will still take home at least half of all sales generated from the app store market through 2014. <br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA['Colbert Report,' 'Daily Show' return to Hulu]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=colbert-report-daily-show-return-to-hulu</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=colbert-report-daily-show-return-to-hulu</comments>
<pubDate>Wed, 02 Feb 2011 08:11:02 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>Rixbralia</dc:creator>
<category>Marketing and advertising</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=colbert-report-daily-show-return-to-hulu</guid>
<description><![CDATA[Some of the most popular shows from MTV and Comedy Central are returning to Hulu. Viacom and Hulu have come to an agreement that will enable Hulu's ad supported service to stream clips and full-length episodes of &quot;The Daily Show with Jon Stewart&quot; and &quot;The Colbert Report.&quot; The shows will be made available today, the companies said.Viacom will make available to Hulu Plus subscribers a selection of current programs, like &quot;Jersey Shore,&quot; &quot;Tosh.0,&quot; &quot;Teen Mom 2,&quot; &quot;Manswers,&quot; &quot;Let's Stay Together,&quot; and &quot;Hot in Cleveland&quot; 21 days after they air. Viacom content availability on Hulu Plus will vary on a show-by-show basis.Additionally, TV shows from Comedy Central, MTV, BET, VH1, Spike TV, and TV Land will be made available to Hulu Plus subscribers, Hulu said in a statement announcing the deal. The agreement also gives Hulu Plus subscribers access to programs in Viacom's archives, including &quot;The Chappelle Show,&quot; &quot;Reno 911&quot;, Beavis &amp; Butthead,&quot; and &quot;Real World.&quot;Viacom's shows return to Hulu nearly a year after being pulled from the video service. When the pull-out occurred, last March, Viacom executives indicated that Hulu wasn't generating enough revenue but also didn't rule out a return. The news comes at a time when Hulu is dogged by reports that the service's owners: Disney, NBC Universal, and News Corp. can't agree on what direction to take the company. ABC and News Corp. have considered pulling some of their content from Hulu's free service, according to a recent report in The Wall Street Journal.Some at Hulu's parent companies believe that by making TV shows available on Hulu, they are drawing viewers away from TV broadcasts of the shows--a much more lucrative revenue stream than that provided by Web advertising, the Journal reported.         Greg Sandoval     Full Profile E-mail Greg Sandoval   E-mail Greg Sandoval If you have a question or comment for Greg Sandoval, you can submit it here. However, because our editors and writers receive hundreds of requests, we cannot tell you when you may receive a response.   Submit your question or comment here: 0 of 1500 characters       Greg Sandoval covers media and digital entertainment for CNET News. He is a former reporter for The Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times.  <br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[Angry Birds gets the Kinect hack treatment]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=angry-birds-gets-the-kinect-hack-treatment</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=angry-birds-gets-the-kinect-hack-treatment</comments>
<pubDate>Wed, 26 Jan 2011 08:10:39 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>Nena01</dc:creator>
<category>Technology</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=angry-birds-gets-the-kinect-hack-treatment</guid>
<description><![CDATA[Two things in gaming right now that are exciting even to non-hard-core gamers are Angry Birds and Microsoft's Kinect. They both allow for addictive gameplay without a lot of investment and knowledge of things like &quot;fragging&quot; and &quot;spawn camping.&quot; And now a hacker by the name of Joel Griffin Dodd has combined the two with a hacking tool he helped develop called KinEmote.It uses a controller, so it's not quite the fully immersive experience one can imagine being developed for the Kinect system, but it's a start.And Kinect hacking is still in its infancy, as is KinEmote. It's easy to envision a version in the near future that would let you manually pull back your birds to send them at those evil, smug pigs. That certainly sounds gratifying.<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[Apple shares slip on word of Jobs' leave]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=apple-shares-slip-on-word-of-jobs-leave</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=apple-shares-slip-on-word-of-jobs-leave</comments>
<pubDate>Tue, 18 Jan 2011 08:10:24 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>Mary-Cherry8</dc:creator>
<category>Mobile &amp; Electronics</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=apple-shares-slip-on-word-of-jobs-leave</guid>
<description><![CDATA[Apple shares slide on news of Steve Jobs&amp;39' medical leave of absence.(Credit:Screenshot by Don Reisinger/CNET)Apple's shares are trading lower this morning as investors start to come to grips with the news of Steve Jobs taking his second medical leave of absence in two years.An hour and a half into morning activity on the Nasdaq exchange, Apple shares were down approximately $13 to just over $335 per share, representing a nearly 4 percent slide.Apple released word of Jobs' medical leave early yesterday on the federal holiday honoring Martin Luther King Jr., meaning that the stock market was closed. That extra day to process the news likely softened the reaction on Wall Street over worries about how Apple will fare in the day-to-day absence of its CEO, a pancreatic cancer survivor.The reaction also may be tempered by expectation of more favorable news later today when Apple is scheduled to announce its fiscal first-quarter earnings, which includes the holiday sales period. Financial analysts are expecting a strong showing, with average forecast for revenue coming in at $24.38 billion and earnings per share at $5.38.Apple gave no date for Jobs' return, but said that Jobs would continue to have a say in strategic decisions. In his absence, day-to-day operations will be handled by Chief Operating Officer Tim Cook, who also filled in during Jobs' 2009 medical leave. <br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[U.S. patent awards surge in 2010' IBM still tops]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=u-s--patent-awards-surge-in-2010-ibm-still-tops</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=u-s--patent-awards-surge-in-2010-ibm-still-tops</comments>
<pubDate>Sun, 09 Jan 2011 08:10:48 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>clememeeml</dc:creator>
<category>Politics</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=u-s--patent-awards-surge-in-2010-ibm-still-tops</guid>
<description><![CDATA[The number of U.S. patents awarded jumped significantly from 2009 to 2010 among the 10 companies that got the most.(Credit:IFI Claims)There's plenty of criticism of the U.S. patent system for granting intellectual property protections for ideas that aren't original enough, but that hasn't stopped the corporate patent frenzy.The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office granted 219,614 patents in 2010, a 31 percent increase over 2009, according to statistics from IFI Claims, a division of Fairview Research that tracks patent grants.As usual, IBM topped the list--this time with 5,896 patents, a 20 percent increase over 2009. Among those, Big Blue pointed to patents for monitoring and reporting earthquakes based on data from computer hard-drive accelerometers, for using short-range wireless communication among vehicles to provide traffic information, and for optoelectronic devices with light detectors for silicon photonics chips that communicate using light rather than electrical signals.Next on the Top 10 list are Samsung Electronics, with 4,551 patents' Microsoft, with 3,094' Canon, with 2,552' Panasonic, with 2,482' Toshiba, with 2,246' Sony, with 2,150' Intel, with 1,653' LG Electronics, with 1,490' and Hewlett-Packard, with 1,480.Patents have become a major battleground in competitive markets. Right now, mobile phone technology is at the center of a thicket of patent litigation that includes, among others, Motorola, Nokia, Microsoft, Apple, HTC, Oracle, Google, Samsung, Research In Motion, Sony Ericsson, Kodak, and LG Electronics.So it's no surprise technology companies try to hoard as many patents as possible to deter patent lawsuits from rivals or to come out stronger in the cross-licensing deals that often settle such suits along with payments from one company to another.This balance-of-power approach doesn't work when it comes to fighting lawsuits from intellectual-property companies' they typically lack actual products on the market, so a company that has been sued can't rely on countersuing for infringement of its own patents.In the race to grab patents, just about anything is fair game. IBM has applied for a patent for a computerized patent-management system.The application itself embodies all the complexities of today's patent and intellectual-property (IP) landscape. One claimed invention in the patent is:A method of analyzing a component business model including a plurality of components, each of said plurality of components including at least one capability, said method including, for each of said plurality of components: determining whether an organization has said at least one capability from said plurality of components, said plurality of components being grouped into a strategic planning computer module for formulating business strategies for creating and managing inventions and IP rights, said strategic planning module including at least one electronic database having data for formulating said business strategies, an invent computer module for managing creation of said inventions based on said business strategies, an IP creation computer module for determining value of said inventions and creating an IP portfolio, said creating of said IP portfolio including creating said IP rights based on said determining of said value and said business strategies, an IP administration computer module for managing said IP rights based on said business strategies including extension, maintenance and retirement of said IP rights, measuring performance of said business strategies, creating and modifying budgets, and setting guidelines for IP counsel, a defend computer module for defending against infringements and invalidations of said IP rights based on said business strategies and monitoring market and competitor actions to develop risk management plans, an influence computer module including a standards influencing unit, a legal and regulatory influencing unit, and a policy influencing unit, and a capitalize computer module for identifying potential licensees and potential assignees of said IP rights, and managing licensing negotiations, cross-licensing negotiations, and assignment negotiations based on said business strategies' determining whether said organization needs said at least one capability' determining an ability of said organization to deliver said at least one capability' and generating a road map to enable said organization to at least one of create and improve said at least one capability. Yes, if you could read that at all, you read it right: IBM is trying to patent computer technology to capitalize on patent portfolio, defend against patent-infringement attacks, and influence patent policy. Perhaps if the company is granted this sort of meta-patent, IBM will actually have something it can use to countersue an intellectual-property firm.<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[Hollywood's 'UltraViolet' aims to replace the DVD]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=hollywoods-ultraviolet-aims-to-replace-the-dvd</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=hollywoods-ultraviolet-aims-to-replace-the-dvd</comments>
<pubDate>Wed, 05 Jan 2011 08:10:39 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>pnosufterjik</dc:creator>
<category>Marketing and advertising</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=hollywoods-ultraviolet-aims-to-replace-the-dvd</guid>
<description><![CDATA[A group of stakeholders in the entertainment industry are poised to make a important sales pitch to consumers concerning the way they buy and watch movies and TV shows. Warner Bros. Entertainment, Netflix, Microsoft, Hewlett-Packard, and Best Buy are among the members of a consortium called the Digital Entertainment Content Ecosystem, or DECE, which has come up with a set of standards and specifications designed to make approved digital content playable on certified devices. DECE calls the technology UltraViolet. &quot;The DVD was the most successful consumer product launch ever in history...it was an open platform, meaning their was one standard, every manufacturer made it, all the content on the planet was available for it. We don't see that model currently.--Barry McCarthy, former Netflix CFODECE announced this evening at the 2011 CES in Las Vegas that it expects companies that have licensed UltraViolet to begin rolling out products and services beginning this summer. DECE said it expects UltraViolet will appear in the United Kingdom and Canada later in the year. If you believe that the DVD and physical media are in their twilight years, then UltraViolet's backers appear to be laying the groundwork for the next home-video format. The pitch from UltraViolet's supporters goes something like this: users could acquire what are essentially lifetime rights to movies and shows. The rights to certain content could be easily transferred from one service provider to another if the owner chooses to switch or if one the services closes down. Owners wouldn't fear to lose or break their video fare because all the material would live in the cloud and be accessible via Web-connected TVs, handhelds, computers, and set-top boxes. DECE said families who use UltraViolet &quot;will be able to create an account for up to six members who can access the household's UltraViolet movies, TV and other entertainment...consumers will also be able to register up to 12 devices&quot; so UltraViolet content can be easily downloaded to those devices or shared between them.&quot; But here's the rub: the content will be swaddled in digital rights management software, designed to prevent unauthorized copying. While DECE played up the number of accounts and devices UltraViolet users will have access to, critics will likely scoff. Expect many from the tech sector to accuse UltraViolet's makers of trying to lock up consumers' content--again. Naysayers have argued that the Internet helped consumers seize away control of media by enabling them to share digital films, music, books, and other media as many times as they want and play it on whatever devices they want. Michael Robertson, the longtime technology entrepreneur who founded pioneering music service MP3.com and has worked with digital lockers for nearly a decade, is among UltraViolet's doubters. &quot;I think the era of trying to cram formats and standards down the throats of consumers is over,&quot; Robertson said. &quot;When we live in a world where users are one click way from BitTorrent and from obtaining a high-quality film copy that can be played on any device, I don't see UltraViolet, with its restrictions and limitations, winning consumers back. Consumers just have too much power.&quot; Mitch Singer, Sony Pictures&amp;39' chief technology officer(Credit:Sony Pictures Entertainment)Mitch Singer, chief technology officer at Sony Pictures, a DECE member, says there is no conspiracy to snatch away control from consumers. He said UltraViolet is a way to make digital movies and TV shows more appealing by making them as simple to view, store, and transfer as the DVD. He notes that history has shown the lack of open standards only hurts consumers.  &quot;If every brick-and-mortar retailer would have had their own [DVD] format that wouldn't have made any sense at all,&quot; Singer said. &quot;But digital rolled out exactly that way. It rolled out in a series of fragmented silos.&quot; That was far from being unprecedented. Singer said plenty of innovative products debuted this way, but that quickly changed. &quot;Xerox fax machines in the early days could only fax documents if the machine on the other side was Xerox,&quot; Singer said. &quot;ATM machines would only give money to cardholders who belonged to the same network...but over time if you want to see any substantial growth you have to open it up.&quot; Barry McCarthy, Netflix's CFO the past decade until leaving the company last month, predicted two years ago there would be a need to create standards for the Web distribution of movies and he suggested the plan would be modeled after the DVD. &quot;The DVD was the most successful consumer product launch ever in history measured in terms of growth in the number of units in U.S. homes,&quot; McCarthy told the Unofficial Stanford Blog in 2008. &quot;It was five years to 50 percent household penetration and it was an open platform, meaning their was one standard, every manufacturer made it...all the content on the planet was available for it. We don't see that model currently [in Web distribution of movies]. Apple has a device...but it only talks to the Apple Web site. It doesn't talk to Amazon. It doesn't talk to the Netflix site...And if there's a Netflix device that we make or someone makes for us that runs the Netflix application that gets you to a Netflix Web site, it's only going to talk to our Website. In a perfect world, there would be open platforms.&quot; Robertson said UltraViolet looks very much like PlaysForSure, the DRM certification program that Microsoft tried to establish for devices and content services in 2004. It failed to take off. Josh Martin was one of those who were critical of PlaysForSure but the mobile and video analyst for research group Strategy Analytics argues UltraViolet is a superior strategy.&quot;I think the era of trying to cram formats and standards down the throats of consumers is over.&quot; --Michael Robertson, entrepreneurMartin said UltraViolet could work because the key players appear to have learned from past mistakes.Martin wrote in October that under UltraViolet's plan, content &quot;is not locked to a specific device but to a user (or a family of users).&quot; He said that this means users can transfer content to a wide array of devices and that makes UltraViolet content more flexible than the DVD. The most important difference between Ultraviolet and PlaysForSure, according to Martin, is that UltraViolet supports various DRM schemes and either &quot;changes the DRM 'wrapper' when a file is transferred between devices,&quot; Martin wrote, &quot;or allows a user to download a new file that is suitable for that specific device (i.e. you wouldn't want to transfer a 1080p file to your phone). This increases utility while reducing end user complexity.&quot;The other big knock on UltraViolet is that Apple and Disney haven't signed on. How can a standards agreement be any good if consumers aren't able to watch movies from one of the most important film studios or play content obtained from iTunesSinger, said UltraViolet movies and TV shows will be available on theiPad andiPhone because those devices are compatible with an app created by Netflix, an UltraViolet partner. But Singer concedes video purchased from iTunes currently won't play on UltraViolet devices. About the absence of Disney, Martin said &quot;In order for consumers to believe in this technology, all major content owners must be on board and as of today they are not.&quot;<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[This week in Crave: The hangover edition]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=this-week-in-crave-the-hangover-edition</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=this-week-in-crave-the-hangover-edition</comments>
<pubDate>Sat, 01 Jan 2011 08:10:04 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>AfishaOnlink</dc:creator>
<category>Technology</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=this-week-in-crave-the-hangover-edition</guid>
<description><![CDATA[Happy New Year! If you rang in 2011 with a bang, you may be wandering about in an alcoholic stupor with a throbbing head. I have no doubt that science will eventually produce the perfect hangover cure. Meanwhile, I could use this sleep mask right about now. Anyway, if partying has kept you too busy to keep up with the latest on Crave, here's what you missed from a light but interesting final week of 2010. &amp;149' Will Verizon be the next iPhone carrierHow about a hangover mask(Credit:Video screenshot by Tim Hornyak/CNET)&amp;149' The Kindle becomes Amazon's biggest bestseller, and the Nook does the same for Barnes &amp; Noble. &amp;149' More robot teachers invade Korean schools. &amp;149' RIM says its PlayBook battery can match those of rival tablets. &amp;149' Skype foriPhone gets two-way video chat. &amp;149' Ford will add start-stop technology to its conventionalcars. &amp;149' Should Apple buy Netflix&amp;149' Rumor has it the iPhone 2 will come in three versions and have a USB port. While you're busy working on resolutions for the new year, we're prepping for CES next week. Bookmark this page now to keep up with all news related to the annual gadget blowout.<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[Apple, overseas firms lead in value creation]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=apple-overseas-firms-lead-in-value-creation</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=apple-overseas-firms-lead-in-value-creation</comments>
<pubDate>Mon, 27 Dec 2010 08:10:15 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>dieterwinkel</dc:creator>
<category>Business &amp; Finance</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=apple-overseas-firms-lead-in-value-creation</guid>
<description><![CDATA[Tech, media, and telecom companies in emerging markets and those considered &quot;digital innovators&quot; are among the world's tops in providing value to their investors, according to a new study from the Boston Consulting Group.Out today, the report &quot;Swimming Against the Tide: How Technology, Media, and Telecommunications Companies Can Prosper in the New Economic Reality&quot; found that seven of the top 10 telecom performers, five of the top 10 media performers, and four of the top 10 technology performers are in India, Taiwan, Mexico, China, and other emerging markets. But global companies tuned into the digital revolution, such as Apple and Google, are also tops in rewarding their investors.Covering the period from 2005 through 2009, the report examined the total shareholder return (TSR) of 126 different companies throughout the world. Of these, 81 percent were found in emerging economies, adding up to 64 percent of the overall total, according to Boston Consulting.The top media performers included Tencent Holdings, Naspers, and Net Servicos de Comunicacao. Tops in telecom were America Movil, China Mobile, and Bharti Airtel. And the best performers in the technology sector were Apple, MediaTek, and Infosys Technologies.(Credit:Boston Consulting Group)&quot;Emerging-market companies are spreading their wings to play larger roles on a global stage,&quot; David Dean, a senior partner at Boston Consulting and co-author of the study, said in a statement. &quot;Many of these countries have moved beyond being primarily a source of cheap labor to become important centers of technical innovation.&quot;Overall, the tech, media, and telecom sectors posted mediocre performance, according to the consultancy. Where the sample of 712 companies in all industries yielded a 6.6 percent average annual TSR, the technology sector came closest (6.2 percent), followed by telecom (5.3 percent), and media companies (2.5 percent). The Boston Consulting Group based total shareholder return on six different factors: revenue growth, changes in profit margins, the valuation multiple (the value of the business), cash dividends, share repurchases, and debt repayments. Among these, revenue growth typically added up to 70 percent or 80 percent of the overall shareholder value among most companies, according to the report.<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[Film theaters fight premium video-on-demand]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=film-theaters-fight-premium-video-on-demand</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=film-theaters-fight-premium-video-on-demand</comments>
<pubDate>Thu, 23 Dec 2010 08:10:32 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>ahmadmmaam</dc:creator>
<category>Marketing and advertising</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=film-theaters-fight-premium-video-on-demand</guid>
<description><![CDATA[Theater owners don't want digital distributors breaking into their windows.The big film studios may begin to pipe movies to consumers' homes via premium video-on-demand services (PVOD) at the same time the films are up on the big screen, thereby crashing the theatrical window. A &quot;window&quot; is the term used to describe the period of time a film distributor--such as a theater, cable company, or traditional TV broadcaster--has access to a particular movie. The large theater chains are signaling right back that they won't sit still for it, according to a story in today's Los Angeles Times. The theaters are lobbying the studios, prominent filmmakers, and Wall Street to scrap the plan. Their message is that forcing the theaters to compete with home delivery is only going to damage one of the studios' most lucrative sources of revenue--one of the few they still have that isn't ailing. Theater owners say Hollywood is casting about for ways to defeat piracy, and make up for plummeting DVD sales and rentals. According to Patrick Corcoran, a spokesman for the National Association of Theater Owners, the studios' PVOD plans aren't going to help solve the problems. &quot;We understand that the studios have a problem in the home market,&quot; Corcoran said. &quot;It's down, like, 13 percent when you look at DVD sales and rentals. We understand they need to fix that, and we're all for them experimenting. What we're not for is their importing those problems into the theatrical window.&quot; Price and piracyEarly reports about the studios' PVOD plans say the price to consumers would be at least $30 per movie, and subscribers would get access about a month after it hit theaters. On average, movie theaters have exclusive access to films for three months, Corcoran said. PVOD would be made available in high definition and would be distributed by cable pay-TV services. Corcoran says history has proven that the prices the studios charge for home viewing will always tumble. He said they did for VHS and DVD, as well as for cable video-on-demand movies, which began at about $15 but are now in the $5 range. He also noted that the studios predicted that PVOD would be a safer way to distribute movies and help prevent piracy. He doubts that is the case any longer. Last spring, the Federal Communications Commission authorized Hollywood studios to block analog video signals from coming out of cable and satellite set-top boxes during the broadcasts of newly released movies. The studios designed this to prevent copying and to secure the release of new movies into homes. &quot;Technological locks can always be defeated by technological crow bars,&quot; Corcoran said. &quot;[The anticopying protection software on HD movies] has already been cracked.&quot;Below: Movie theaters saw a record-breaking $10.6 billion in revenue in 2009, and if they get any help from films opening this Christmas, such as &quot;True Grit,&quot; they expect to take in about the same this year.<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[Microsoft launches 'Lab' for emerging HTML5 specs]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=microsoft-launches-lab-for-emerging-html5-specs</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=microsoft-launches-lab-for-emerging-html5-specs</comments>
<pubDate>Tue, 21 Dec 2010 08:10:17 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>zhouwei156</dc:creator>
<category>Mobile &amp; Electronics</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=microsoft-launches-lab-for-emerging-html5-specs</guid>
<description><![CDATA[Microsoft wants to give Web developers a way to get their feet wet with emerging HTML5 technologies. Today the company is launching HTML5 Labs, a standalone site that will include demo code for two cutting-edge HTML5 technologies that aren't quite finished: Web Sockets and IndexedDB. Developers who want to try to build sites with either specification will be given code that Microsoft plans to keep updated as each one progresses on its way to becoming a stable part of the standard.In a phone interview with CNET last week, Jean Paoli, general manager of Microsoft's Interoperability Strategy Team said that the labs site was born out of the need for developers to experiment and use new types of code long before something is ready to market. But more than anything, people were just asking for it.&quot;We are receiving a lot of questions from people wondering when will HTML5 be ready,&quot; Paoli said. &quot;Our response is that HTML5 is ready to be used today using Internet Explorer 9. So you can use whatever is stable from HTML5 in IE9. And for anything experimental, you can play and try things using the prototype.&quot; Paoli said the prototypes should by no means be used on production sites. The reasoning behind this (besides the prototype moniker) is that these standards simply aren't yet finished, so a site you make with a prototype one week has a good chance of being completely broken as soon as there's an update.&quot;Sometimes it takes six months, one year, one year and a half, two years in order to have what's called a stable standard,&quot; Paoli explained. &quot;So today browser vendors have to make a choice of appearing to support emerging standards...and providing developers with a production-ready platform to support the stable standards.&quot; The problem this creates, Paoli said, is that trying to build those not-quite-yet-ready standards into browsers is that things can become unstable or suddenly insecure--as has recently become the case with Web Sockets, one of the two included draft technologies that make up HTML5 Labs' initial offerings.&quot;For the portions of HTML5 that are not stable, we believe we are going to produce prototypes, we're going to produce code, we're going to produce software that is not meant to be used to create your Web site,&quot; Paoli said. &quot;We're going to ship this prototype code on the HTML5 Labs site, and this code is going to be timed, or it's going to be in debug mode, or it's going to be in this stage where we're saying 'this code is going to change a lot, don't use it in your Web site!'&quot;This release technique isn't just for developers looking to make their sites work with Internet Explorer 9, Microsoft's HTML5-friendly browser that's currently in beta. Instead, it's efforts like HTML5 Labs, and individual testing pages from other browser makers that will push things forward. &quot;It's important to have this prototype out there because it helps people who are in the standards body--who are trying to design the best standard for this particular technology--to actually play and experiment with software that actually implements this piece of paper they're trying to design,&quot; Paoli said.In other words, you can spend all the time you want talking about how these specifications should work, but you still have to give it a test run every once and a while. And as an end result, the standards you're working to make stable might get there faster. &quot;This will take care of those unstable specifications such as Web Sockets that are extremely important for the Internet but are not finalized for wide consumption,&quot; Paoli explained. HTML5 Labs goes live today with these two standards in progress, with others to follow throughout next year. &quot;We are going to be updating this site with multiple prototypes during the year,&quot; Paoli said. &quot;We don't know which ones yet, but we're working on defining and understanding what are the other unstable standard specifications we need to work on to be able to advance the conversation.&quot; <br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[Google search results warn of compromised sites]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=google-search-results-warn-of-compromised-sites</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=google-search-results-warn-of-compromised-sites</comments>
<pubDate>Fri, 17 Dec 2010 08:10:44 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>sufreter365</dc:creator>
<category>Technology</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=google-search-results-warn-of-compromised-sites</guid>
<description><![CDATA[Google&amp;39's new warning in search results lets you click on the warning label to get more information about the risk associated with the site, or ignore the warning and click the result to go straight to the site.(Credit:Google)Google has been warning Web surfers about sites that appear to be hosting malware in search results for years. Now, the company is adding a warning in search results when the site appears to be compromised but may not be actually downloading malware to visitors' computers. Starting today, Google search users should start seeing a new hyperlink warning that says &quot;This site may be compromised,&quot; adjacent to some results if Google's system has detected something on the site that would indicate that it has been hacked or otherwise compromised. Clicking on the warning link leads to a Help Center article with more information.  &quot;If a site has been hacked, it typically means that a third party has taken control of the site without the owner's permission,&quot; the article says. &quot;Hackers may change the content of a page, add new links on a page, or add new pages to the site. The intent can include phishing (tricking users into sharing personal and credit card information) or spamming (violating search engine quality guidelines to rank pages more highly than they should rank).&quot;Web surfers can also just click on the result to go directly to the site.  Google first started putting warnings next to results in late 2006, but focused on sites that were hosting or actively serving malware. Those warnings say &quot;This site may harm your computer,&quot; and clicking on the result itself takes you to another page that provides more information.  The new warning is designed to focus on Web sites that may not be actively infecting computers, but that may be compromised and conducting other types of attacks, such as spam or phishing.  Along with warning Web searchers, Google tries to notify Web masters when they detect that their site may be compromised via messages in the Google Webmaster tools console, Google said. &quot;Of course, we also understand that Webmasters may be concerned that these notices are impacting their traffic from search,&quot; Google says in a post on the Webmaster Central blog today. &quot;Rest assured, once the problem has been fixed, the warning label will be automatically removed from our search results, usually in a matter of days. You can also request a review of your site to accelerate removal of the notice.&quot;<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[Latest Ask.com revamp all about answers]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=latest-ask-com-revamp-all-about-answers</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=latest-ask-com-revamp-all-about-answers</comments>
<pubDate>Mon, 13 Dec 2010 08:10:10 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>larelimtae</dc:creator>
<category>Mobile &amp; Electronics</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=latest-ask-com-revamp-all-about-answers</guid>
<description><![CDATA[The interface for Ask.com&amp;39's new answers page, rolling out slowly to its users. (click for larger image).(Credit:Ask.com)OAKLAND, Calif.--It's fairly rare in 2010 to walk into a technology company where the first thing presented to visitors is a whiteboard covered in multicolor Post-It notes. But that's exactly what lies just beyond the receptionist's desk at Ask.com, the venerable yet beleaguered Internet company in the middle of yet another strategy shift. The sticky notes are actually part of the company's product-development workflow, giving everyone a visual representation of the number of balls in the air at any given time, not just those logged into the project management software. Doug Leeds, president of Ask.com, wants visitors to understand that just because Ask.com is closing its search department doesn't mean it has given up on technology research altogether. Last month, Ask.com announced that it would bow to the inevitable and end its work on back-end search technology, closing offices in China, New Jersey, and Massachusetts and laying off 130, leaving 270 behind. The idea now is simple: when your Web search company is named Ask, perhaps it makes the most sense to focus completely on the notion of information delivered through questions and answers, Leeds said in an interview with CNET last week. Ask.com has been working on this strategy for years, but is now placing greater emphasis on building community-generated answers supplemented by search results. There's little question that Google has locked up the traditional search market, although Microsoft engineers might grumble with that assertion. So others attempting to make a business out of matching queries with results--which allows for targeted advertising--are turning to a mix of curated answers to queries posed in the form of questions rather than keywords. Quora, the darling of the Google-and-start-up-obsessed Web crowd, is gaining traction in this space with its informed community and simple presentation. Answers.com has been around a little longer and has a much bigger audience than Quora, Yahoo has also worked on this type of service for a long time (with decidedly mixed results), and the current ascendant power on the Web--Facebook--has also rolled out a Q&amp;A service. Over the last year, Ask has increased both the number of queries phrased as a question (24 percent to 46 percent) as well as the number of times it is able to provide a definitive answer to a question at the top of the results page (30 percent to 58 percent). When Ask doesn't have a definitive answer it provides a traditional list of search results that it used to generate itself, but has now turned to an unspecified &quot;third party&quot; to provide those results without its own back-end search engineering team.Doug Leeds, president of Ask.com U.S., in his office overlooking Oakland&amp;39's harbor.(Credit:Tom Krazit/CNET) Leeds wouldn't comment on who was providing those results, but there are only so many people left these days doing the dirty work in the search business. It seems increasingly apparent that Google has quietly stepped into that role since Ask's announcement last month: a Google representative would only say &quot;We cannot comment on our partnership with Ask. Ask has been a longstanding partner of ours and we look forward to continue working with them in the future.&quot; Google has long provided search ads on Ask.com, but not search results themselves: maps on Ask are provided by Microsoft's Bing. The theme behind the new Q&amp;A strategy is to tap into search frustration, a common theme presented by would-be Google killers over the past several years. &quot;Often times people have been to another search engine&quot; before coming to Ask.com, Leeds said. &quot;They just want to ask a question. Our job is to answer it right away at the top of the page.&quot; Google has itself moved more in this direction, providing answers to simple questions like the weather, math problems, and flight-tracking information above search results. However, Ask thinks it will have an advantage by focusing its engineers on developing algorithms that crawl the Web for definitive answers as a supplement to answers provided by humans. Leeds believed Ask.com was spending too much time trying to rank answers--a very challenging search science problem--as opposed to figuring which answer most accurately addressed the query and providing a list of search results in cases where it couldn't find an answer that met that threshold. Slowly but surely, Ask is expanding a community of users (currently about 20 percent of the site's visitors are invited to sign up) who will to provide answers to questions about subject matters in which they are interested. &quot;If you're asking a question, you either want a good answer or no answer at all,&quot; Leeds said. &quot;We can't do better just by crawling the Web: too many questions that have answers that have never been published on the Web before.&quot; Ask.com is not only hoping that it can attract more users with this approach, but that those users will stick around to do more searches on its site once their question is answered, resulting in more clicks on its ads. For example, once you've had a question answered about the best digital camera to buy for around $1,500, you'll still need to figure out where to find that camera and you might want a second opinion. For the moment, the information seekers of the world seem pretty content to just plug away at Google, but if the Q&amp;A notion takes off Ask.com believes it is in a good spot. Of course, its startup competitors don't have quite the same amount of corporate distractions that Ask.com has faced as part of conglomerate IAC, which recently saw Chairman and CEO Barry Diller step down from the CEO spot, and doesn't appear necessarily committed to keeping Ask.com around for the long haul, judging by comments that Diller and more recently IAC Chief Financial Officer Tom McInerney have made. Leeds acknowledged the turmoil but said that Ask.com is focused on its turnaround. &quot;If we were to wake up tomorrow and find out we're part of another company, it wouldn't change my job at all,&quot; he said. Ask.com has a bit of a Yahoo problem, in that it is widely used in the grand scheme of things (90 million unique users in the U.S. in October, sixth on Comscore's list just behind good old AOL) but doesn't get the Silicon Valley adoration that is bestowed upon shiny new things, Leeds believes. It probably doesn't help that the company is located in Oakland, which isn't quite as disheveled as it is often portrayed to be but is definitely a long way--both in distance and in consideration--from the average tech industry worker in Silicon Valley or San Francisco. There's a certain amount of sense in Ask.com's strategy to quit fighting a battle it simply couldn't win, something Yahoo still hasn't quite realized. However, it is running out of time and patience to prove that it can get ahead of a shift in information consumption on the Web and build a viable business at the same time.Millions in advertising didn't boost Ask.com's standing in the search market. It's an open question whether definitive answers will make any difference.<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[YouTube ups upload limit for well-behaved users]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=youtube-ups-upload-limit-for-well-behaved-users</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=youtube-ups-upload-limit-for-well-behaved-users</comments>
<pubDate>Fri, 10 Dec 2010 08:11:46 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>udanikaspencerb</dc:creator>
<category>Mobile &amp; Electronics</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=youtube-ups-upload-limit-for-well-behaved-users</guid>
<description><![CDATA[(Credit:Screenshot by Josh Lowensohn/CNET)YouTube is rewarding users who do what it asks of them.The company announced in a blog post yesterday that it has lifted the 15-minute limit on video uploads for &quot;selected users&quot; who have &quot;a history of complying with the YouTube Community Guidelines and our copyright rules.&quot; It seems that those who have violated its terms in the past are still limited to 15 minutes.YouTube didn't explicitly say for sure that well-behaved users will have an unlimited amount of time for their uploads, but it did say that if users upload &quot;original content, it's fair game, regardless of length,&quot; indicating that there will be no limit on those users.YouTube cited its Video ID and Audio ID service, which identifies copyrighted content uploaded to the site by someone other than the copyright holder, as the main reason for eliminating the 15-minute limit on some users.YouTube's Video ID and Audio ID service works by asking rights holders to provide the online video site with reference material that it then uses to compare to uploaded content. The service also allows those copyright owners to determine, prior to the infringement, how they want to handle it. They can choose to &quot;make money from them, get stats on them, or block them from YouTube altogether,&quot; YouTube says on its site.YouTube first implemented time limits on video uploads in 2006 after facing pressure from copyright holders. At the time, the company set the limit to 10 minutes per video. That limit didn't change until earlier this year when the company announced that it upped the time limit to 15 minutes.<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[NASA Ames to host world's largest airship]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=nasa-ames-to-host-worlds-largest-airship</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=nasa-ames-to-host-worlds-largest-airship</comments>
<pubDate>Wed, 08 Dec 2010 08:10:38 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>cash21</dc:creator>
<category>Gaming</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=nasa-ames-to-host-worlds-largest-airship</guid>
<description><![CDATA[This is a 125-foot Bullet Class 580 airship. The airship that will be housed at the NASA Ames Research Center in Mountain View, Calif., will be 235 feet long.(Credit:E-Green Technologies)If you like big and green, NASA's Ames Research Center will soon have something for you: the world's largest and greenest airship.The space agency announced today that the Mountain View, Calif., research center's Moffett Field will soon play host to a mammoth 265-foot-long and 65-foot-diameter airship from Kellyton, Ala.'s E-Green Technologies. The Bullet Class 580 will be developed and tested at Ames in 24,000 square feet of Ames' famous Hangar 2. The new airship, which has a planned first flight date of early 2011, is expected to run on algae-based biofuel, and fly at speeds of up to 75 miles an hour at altitudes of up to 20,000 feet. Ames and Moffett Field are becoming a hotbed for airships. Already, the facility is the home of Airship Ventures, and its own giant zeppelin. And, of course, Moffett Field has a storied history of hosting airships, stretching back to 1933, when the U.S. Navy's Zeppelin ZRS-5 785-foot-long zeppelin resided there. The U.S. Navy Zeppelin ZRS-5, also known as the Macon, which was berthed at Moffett Field starting in 1933.(Credit:NASA)The E-Green Technologies Bullet Class 580 is expected to fly with &quot;a joint NASA Langley Research Center and Old Dominion University payload, the Radar Oxygen Barometric Sensor Project, a remote sensing instrument for measuring barometric pressure at sea level--an important meteorological measurement in the prediction and forecasting of tropical storms and hurricanes.&quot;<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[Analyst: Kinect sales already higher than Move]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=analyst-kinect-sales-already-higher-than-move</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=analyst-kinect-sales-already-higher-than-move</comments>
<pubDate>Thu, 02 Dec 2010 08:10:20 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>Sarah02</dc:creator>
<category>Mobile &amp; Electronics</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=analyst-kinect-sales-already-higher-than-move</guid>
<description><![CDATA[The Kinect is now outselling the PlayStation Move, analyst Michael Pachter says.(Credit:Microsoft)So much for thePlayStation Move's sales lead over the Kinect.Wedbush analyst Michael Pachter released a note yesterday saying Microsoft has sold more units of its motion-control device, Kinect, than Sony has sold PlayStation Move units, even though the Move launched weeks earlier.&quot;The higher-priced Kinect controller appears to have overtaken the Move controller in the sales races, with sales about even notwithstanding Move's six-week head start in the marketplace,&quot; Pachter wrote in a research note to clients.Pachter came to that conclusion by analyzing information offered up recently by both Sony and Microsoft. Earlier this week, Sony said that it sold 4.1 million Move units through November since its motion controller's launch back in September. The company later clarified that its sales were those made to retailers and not to consumers. It wouldn't divulge how many units were actually sold to consumers so far.However, using that figure, Pachter estimates that Sony has sold approximately 2.5 million Move units to consumers since the device's launch. That figure matches Microsoft's own announcement this week, claiming it sold 2.5 million Kinect units to consumers in the device's first 25 days of availability. The motion-gaming peripheral launched on November 4 in North America.Based on his contention that sales were even at the end of November, and considering Microsoft's sales pace is far more rapid that Sony's, Pachter believes Kinect is now outselling the Move. And through the rest of the year, that trend will likely continue. In fact, Pachter believes Microsoft will hit its Kinect sales target of 5 million units sold. He believes Sony will sell a total of 3 million Move units by the end of the year.The latest data Pachter presents follows what analysts, including Pachter, have been saying for quite some time.In an interview with CNET last month, Pachter said that he fully believed that Kinect would hit the 5 million sales mark by the end of the year. He said that he thought Sony would sell 3 million PlayStation Move units by the end of 2010, but it was &quot;possible&quot; for the company to sell 3.5 million Move units with &quot;a pickup in advertising.&quot;Neither Sony nor Microsoft immediately responded to a request for comment.<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[Cyber Monday: Beware the malware]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=cyber-monday-beware-the-malware</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=cyber-monday-beware-the-malware</comments>
<pubDate>Wed, 24 Nov 2010 08:10:31 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>Adam01</dc:creator>
<category>Technology</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=cyber-monday-beware-the-malware</guid>
<description><![CDATA[It's the Monday after Thanksgiving and you're sitting at your work computer suffering from food coma. Too bloated to get any real work done, you decide to do something that doesn't occupy too much of the brain--online Christmas shopping.  There's more at stake here than the cost of shipping and handling, though. First off, your boss probably doesn't want you to be surfing Amazon when you have spreadsheets to complete. Secondly, you could be opening up the corporate network to malicious hackers during what is known to be a particularly risky period. Scammers are ready for unsuspecting online shoppers to be hunting for holiday bargains that hit on what has become known as Cyber Monday (given that more than 40 percent of you will be buying holiday gifts online, according to this survey). There will no doubt be malware hiding on retail sites, fake sites created just for distributing viruses and Trojans, and e-mails with malware-laden attachments and links leading to nastiness. Once inside the corporate network, the malware can easily spread to other computers in the company and leave back doors that can be used later for nefarious purposes, putting corporate data at risk. Unless a company forbids Web surfing on company time and uses software to monitor and enforce the policy, there is little recourse once workers start browsing. IT departments should do what they can to protect the networks before then, by using the most up-to-date spam filters and anti-malware software and adjusting the enterprise Internet settings to alert users when a program attempts to download something. Communication is key, too. Corporate IT personnel should consider sending an alert to remind employees of the dangers and to report suspected malware downloads, advises Adam Chernichaw, a privacy expert and partner at the law firm White &amp; Case. Also, they should tell employees to not click &quot;Agree&quot; or &quot;OK&quot; to close a window, but to click the red &quot;X&quot; in the upper corner or press &quot;ALT + F4&quot; instead. Employees should practice safe browsing. CNET contributor Lance Whitney wrote about some general tips for Web surfers from Webroot, including typing URLs in directly instead of following links and keeping a close eye on PayPal and other payment accounts.  Be careful of electronic greeting cards, because they are an easy way to trick people into downloading malware. Verify that the merchant or site a greeting card is sent from is legitimate, warns the United States Computer Emergency Readiness Team, an arm of the Department of Homeland Security. If you get an e-card from someone you don't know, be suspicious. You can always ask friends in an e-mail to confirm that he or she sent you something.  If you are buying gift cards online, only shop at reputable retailers and not through online auction sites, says the National Retail Federation. Gift cards sold through online auction sites may be counterfeit or stolen and once you buy it it's yours. The group has more online shopping tips on its Web site.  And for people wanting to donate to charity, the U.S. Federal Trade Commission has a charity checklist with tips such as asking groups seeking donations for more information about who is behind the operation, being wary of charities that spring up overnight in response to disasters, and not sending cash or donations.  Web searches can be dangerous any time of year as scammers use search engine optimization tactics to lure people to their sites. But holiday shopping online presents an attractive pool of potential victims. Be extra cautious when doing searches related to &quot;holiday sale&quot; and &quot;Christmas specials&quot; during this time of year. F-Secure has compiled a Holiday 2010 Cyber-Watch List of popular search terms that are expected to be used by scammers to poison search results, which features &quot;Kinect forXbox&quot; and &quot;Call of Duty: Black Ops&quot; at the top.  And make sure you don't do too much shopping at work or you'll instead be online checking out the job wanted ads. <br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[Verizon reignites ad wars with 4G claims]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=verizon-reignites-ad-wars-with-4g-claims</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=verizon-reignites-ad-wars-with-4g-claims</comments>
<pubDate>Mon, 22 Nov 2010 08:10:24 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>Aragon</dc:creator>
<category>Technology</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=verizon-reignites-ad-wars-with-4g-claims</guid>
<description><![CDATA[The wireless marketing wars rage on as Verizon Wireless claims the &quot;most advanced 4G&quot; wireless network in the world and takes more potshots at rival AT&amp;T.It's not easy to be a consumer these days with wireless operators all claiming to have the fastest and most robust network in the U.S. Verizon Wireless is the latest operator to launch a new advertising campaign that promotes its soon-to-be-launched 4G LTE wireless broadband network. The commercial (embedded below), which features a young man using Verizon's 4G wireless network to throw a lightning bolt into the sky like a javelin, claims that Verizon has the most &quot;advanced 4G&quot; wireless network.Last week, Engadget got its hands on Verizon's print advertising campaign, which once again targets rival AT&amp;T's 3G coverage. In this ad, Verizon shows a map of its 3G/4G network coverage, and then shows a map with AT&amp;T's network coverage next to it. Under the maps, the ad points out that Verizon has 4G coverage and AT&amp;T doesn't.The advertisements are just the latest in a long line of attacks among wireless companies as they vie for customers in an increasing saturated mobile market. More than 90 percent of people in the U.S. already subscribe to a cell phone service. With virtually no new customers to win over, wireless operators are battling each other for existing customers.For consumers, the marketing wars can be very confusing as they try to decipher whose claims are accurate. So-called 4G Verizon Wireless, which is using a technology called LTE' T-Mobile USA, which is using a version of its current 3G technology called HSPA+' and Sprint Nextel, which uses WiMax, all claim to have 4G wireless networks. But the truth is that neither Verizon nor T-Mobile nor Sprint actually offers a true 4G wireless service. While current versions of WiMax and LTE are typically referred to in the industry as &quot;4G,&quot; they do not actually meet the International Telecommunication Union's strict definition. To be legitimately considered a 4G technology by the ITU, the network technology is required by the agency to be IP-based and use orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (OFDM). The other main requirement is that the technology needs to support peak download speeds of 100Mbps. The current flavors of LTE and WiMax are not that fast. And neither is the technology T-Mobile is using, which is called HSPA+.That said, these upgraded networks are faster than the current generation of 3G wireless services. Average 3G services offer between 700Kbps and 1.5Mbps. Sprint's WiMax service, built by Clearwire, offers average download speeds of around 6Mbps, Sprint has said. And Verizon claims that tests indicate it is getting download speeds of between 6Mbps and 12Mbps on its precommercial LTE network. T-Mobile's HSPA+ network also gives a significant boost, with speeds between 3Mbps and 7Mbps.It should be noted that AT&amp;T, which plans to test LTE next year, has also upgraded its network to HSPA+. AT&amp;T is not claiming that its upgrade is 4G. But the technology it has used to upgrade its network is the same type of 3G technology that T-Mobile is using.So when it comes to speed, there shouldn't be too much difference among any of the so-called 4G networks. And in AT&amp;T's defense, the company's upgrade to HSPA+ puts it on par with its rivals in terms of theoretical wireless speeds.So what about Verizon's claims of better 4G coverage Again, this claim should be taken with a grain of salt. Not only will the initial launch of the service be limited compared to its 3G wireless network, it also won't immediately have handsets available that can use the network. Verizon plans to be in 38 markets with its 4G service and offer service to 110 million potential customers by the end of 2010. The company will likely launch the service next week. But it won't offer 4G service everywhere it currently offers 3G service for at least three years, at which point it will offer faster speed service to 285 million potential customers.What's more, Verizon won't initially offer 4G mobile handsets. Through the end of this year, it's expected to be only offering wireless data cards for laptops. At the upcoming Consumer Electronics Show, the company is expected to launch handsets with general availability in the first quarter of 2011. Meanwhile, AT&amp;T's HSPA+ network will reach 250 million customers by the end of this year and it will be available everywhere its current 3G service is available. So in terms of coverage, AT&amp;T will have the largest, fastest wireless network in the U.S. this year, regardless of whether you call it 4G or 3G. AT&amp;T also doesn't have handsets that can take advantage of the faster HSPA+ yet. The company has introduced a wireless laptop card but hasn't indicated when its HSPA+ handsets will hit store shelves.How do the other two major wireless operators stack up T-Mobile USA, which has also been making some bold 4G claims, will be in 100 markets by the end of 2010, the company has said. And it will be available to more than 200 million potential customers. Sprint Nextel (via Clearwire) is in more than 55 markets today and is adding more each week. Its goal is to reach 120 million potential customers by the end of 2010. Longtime ad foes Verizon and AT&amp;T have a history of dueling advertising campaigns. A year ago, Verizon attacked AT&amp;T with an advertising campaign that compared the two carriers' 3G network coverage. Verizon's tag line was &quot;There's a map for that.&quot; AT&amp;T sued Verizon over its claims of a superior network, but eventually gave up the battle.AT&amp;T also fought back with its own ad campaign enlisting actor Luke Wilson to tout AT&amp;T's faster 3G network.While AT&amp;T hasn't called out the legal cavalry yet, nor has it hired an actor to take up its cause, in this latest round of advertising wars the company did issue a press release Monday stating i has increased spending on its network 55 percent compared to a year ago, investing nearly $6 billion in the first nine months of the year.The company also claims that speed tests indicate its network is 20 percent faster than its &quot;nearest competitor.&quot; And it also claims it completes 98.59 percent of voice calls connected over its network without interruption. &quot;We're very pleased with the nationwide results of the Global Wireless Solutions testing, which demonstrate that we're delivering a superior mobile broadband experience on a nationwide basis,&quot; John Donovan, AT&amp;T's chief technology officer said in a statement. &quot;Our top priority for the weeks and months to come is to continue our focus on network enhancements and improvements to ensure continued access to fast mobile broadband speeds and reliable voice service.&quot;<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[AT&T spins post-Thanksgiving deals]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=att-spins-post-thanksgiving-deals</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=att-spins-post-thanksgiving-deals</comments>
<pubDate>Fri, 19 Nov 2010 08:10:18 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>Kareena</dc:creator>
<category>Technology</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=att-spins-post-thanksgiving-deals</guid>
<description><![CDATA[AT&amp;T will sell the RIM BlackBerry Torch for 1 cent next Saturday.(Credit:Josh Miller/CNET)We've already told you about Amazon Wireless' cell phone deals for the holiday shopping brouhaha, but now AT&amp;T is getting in on the act as well. From Black Friday through Cyber Monday, the carrier will be offering a deal a day for many if its phones. Here's what you'll see. November 26: AT&amp;T says it will offer &quot;some of the best prices ever&quot; on its &quot;most popular&quot; touch-screen devices. At this point, we don't exactly know which handsets that includes, so we'll have to wait and see.November 27: For 24 hours, a selection of the carrier's refurbished devices, including the RIM BlackBerry Torch, will be available for just one penny with a service contract.November 28: Four AT&amp;T messaging handsets, the Pantech Link, the LG Vu Plus, the Sharp FX, and the Pantech Pursuit. Keep in mind that you'll need an unlimited messaging plan or a $20 combination of messaging and data plan.November 29: In what is perhaps the carrier's best deal, AT&amp;T will offers a few smartphones for just one penny if you sign a new contract. The devices list, which will rotate every three hours, will include the HTC Aria, the RIM BlackBerry Curve 3G, the Motorola Flipout, the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10, and the Motorola Bravo.<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[RockMelt rocks Facebook browsing]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=rockmelt-rocks-facebook-browsing</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=rockmelt-rocks-facebook-browsing</comments>
<pubDate>Thu, 11 Nov 2010 08:10:02 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>pnopnolim34</dc:creator>
<category>Mobile &amp; Electronics</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=rockmelt-rocks-facebook-browsing</guid>
<description><![CDATA[<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[Yes, insults on Facebook can still get you fired]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=yes-insults-on-facebook-can-still-get-you-fired</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=yes-insults-on-facebook-can-still-get-you-fired</comments>
<pubDate>Tue, 09 Nov 2010 08:10:37 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>fanclubmib</dc:creator>
<category>Politics</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=yes-insults-on-facebook-can-still-get-you-fired</guid>
<description><![CDATA[A federal agency recently brought a complaint against a Connecticut medical-services company for allegedly firing an employee over a Facebook post.But it may not be wise to take that as carte blanche to go online and type in exactly what you think of your boss.The general rule is that employers can still fire workers for off-color or unsavory things they say when blogging (or facebooking or tweeting) on the job or about their job.&quot;It would be a mistake for people to say that, 'Just because I'm on Facebook, I can say whatever I want,'&quot; said Charles Cohen, senior counsel at the Morgan Lewis law firm in Washington, D.C. &quot;That's the main point.&quot;There are exceptions to that rule. Union employees with a contract are often protected from being fired without &quot;just cause.&quot; Being fired because you disclosed your religion or sexual orientation on a blog is likely illegal.Finally, organizing a union has long been protected under federal law--which is the right that the National Labor Relations Board is seeking to expand to social-media sites in its new complaint filed against American Medical Response.The complaint says (PDF) that AMR employee Dawnmarie Souza &quot;engaged in concerted activities with other employees by criticizing respondent's supervisor...on her Facebook page&quot; on November 8, 2009. Souza was fired on December 1, 2009. (An administrative-law judge will hear the NLRB's allegations on January 25, 2011.)Note the key phrase &quot;concerted activities.&quot; That's a reference to a 1935 federal law called the National Labor Relations Act. Section 7 of the law says employees have the right to organize labor unions and &quot;to engage in other concerted activities for the purpose of collective bargaining or other mutual aid or protection.&quot;CNET has obtained copies of Souza's Facebook posts. In one, she called her supervisor a &quot;dick.&quot; Another said &quot;he's a scumbag as usual.&quot; One reply said: &quot;I am sorry, hon! Chin up!&quot;Invoking scatological language when describing the relative merits of your job is, of course, a time-honored American tradition. So is firing employees who do it to your face. But is a Facebook post calling a supervisor a &quot;scumbag&quot; necessarily done &quot;for the purpose of collective bargaining or other mutual aid or protection&quot; Perhaps not. Or, at the very least, it may not be exactly what the drafters of that 1935 federal law--billed as promoting &quot;the flow of commerce by removing certain recognized sources of industrial strife and unrest&quot;--had in mind.A 1978 Supreme Court case, Eastex v. NLRB (PDF), said employees could distribute a union newsletter (during nonwork hours) that took explicitly political positions. Federal law, a majority of the justices said, encompasses that newspaper distribution as a type of &quot;concerted activity.&quot;But the majority also acknowledge that &quot;some concerted activity bears a less immediate relationship to employees' interests as employees than other such activity.&quot; That kind of activity, the justices said, &quot;cannot fairly be deemed to come within the 'mutual aid or protection' clause&quot; and could be legally punished by an employer.&quot;We're trying to adapt that law to the modern workplace,&quot; Tony Wagner, a representative of the NLRB for new media, told CNET. &quot;This is really the first case we're aware of that directly involves a social-media component.&quot;Complicating the complaint that the NLRB filed against the Connecticut company is that it's not just about a few Facebook posts: Souza allegedly requested union representation during an internal AMR disciplinary process and was refused. That dispute apparently is what led her to vent online.The NLRB's complaint against the company stresses that point, alleging that AMR &quot;has been discriminating in regard to the hire or tenure, or terms and conditions of employment, of its employees, thereby discouraging membership in a labor organization,&quot; in violation of the law.For its part, AMR says the case is really unrelated to Facebook.&quot;The real issue here doesn't have anything to do with Facebook,&quot; said John Barr, a partner at the Jackson Lewis law firm who represents AMR.Even in the absence of the Facebook posts, &quot;the employee most likely would have been fired,&quot; anyway, because of repeated complaints about her &quot;rude and discourteous behavior.&quot;AMR doesn't monitor Facebook posts, Barr said. Instead, &quot;the way AMR finds out about it is that one day, the supervisor has personnel from the fire department call him up and say, 'What's this on Facebook'&quot; Moreover, he added, AMR has not disciplined other employees for their out-of-school Facebook conversations.&quot;It's the company's position that the Facebook posting was not protected activity&quot; under Section 7, Barr said.While this appears to be the first time that the NLRB has taken action against an employer based on social media, it has addressed the topic before. In a memorandum sent to Sears in December 2009 (PDF), the agency said the company's Internet policy did not violate the law.Sears' policy prohibited the &quot;disparagement of company's or competitors' products, services, executive leadership, employees, strategy, and business prospects&quot; through social media.That's remarkably similar to AMR's Internet policy, which says: &quot;Employees are prohibited from making disparaging, discriminatory, or defamatory comments when discussing the company or the employee's superiors, co-workers, and/or competitors.&quot;This is hardly the first time someone was fired for Facebook comments made at work (or about the employer), and it won't be the last.Last year, a U.K. employee was fired for saying her job was boring. So was a Swiss insurance worker who was fired after claiming that she was so sick, she couldn't use a computer but was caught logging on to Facebook from home. &quot;We don't have the contours yet, vis-a-vis, this medium,&quot; said Cohen, the employment lawyer in Washington, D.C. &quot;We have a lot of analogies from the past.&quot;<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[Kimmel launches day to delete your Facebook friends]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=kimmel-launches-day-to-delete-your-facebook-friends</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=kimmel-launches-day-to-delete-your-facebook-friends</comments>
<pubDate>Sun, 07 Nov 2010 07:10:17 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>Ayesha01</dc:creator>
<category>Marketing and advertising</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=kimmel-launches-day-to-delete-your-facebook-friends</guid>
<description><![CDATA[Are you friend obese Is the burden of too many Facebook friends weighing you down Do you spend your days so concerned about those hundreds who hang on your every word that you can no longer function as, say, the CEO of a major tech companyJimmy Kimmel, the talk show host who isn't Jimmy Fallon, has a solution. He would like you to observe National Unfriend Day.On November 17, he encourages you to remove some of the friend fat in your life. William Shatner helped Kimmel in his announcement by philosophizing: &quot;These people on Facebook..they're not your friends. That's all.&quot;So cast off those people whose updates reek of rancor, whose babies dribble with unhappiness, whose dogs look as uninteresting as their owners. Eliminate ex-lovers whose bodies and lives have sagged. Unfriend everyone whom you haven't seen in real life within the last 10 years, unless they have emigrated to another continent or are currently serving five years for illegally downloading cartoons.Tell your parents: &quot;Look, Mom and Dad, I'm downsizing my life. I'm paring down my pairings. And you're just one of the pairings that has to go.&quot;I know that many of you have mathematical tendencies, so you might also try to simply delete every second friend on your bloated list. Choose the odd or even numbers, I don't mind. Then see if you really miss anyone. See if you suddenly receive more conventional missives of pain, like emails, phone calls, or, most excitingly, late-night visits to your door.Then, as your current lover, half-sister or supervisor stares at you with miffed mien, whisper to them as gently as you can: &quot;It wasn't my idea. It was my friend Jimmy's.&quot;<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[PayPal fixes security hole in iPhone app]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=paypal-fixes-security-hole-in-iphone-app</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=paypal-fixes-security-hole-in-iphone-app</comments>
<pubDate>Wed, 03 Nov 2010 07:10:11 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>Ayesha01</dc:creator>
<category>Mobile &amp; Electronics</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=paypal-fixes-security-hole-in-iphone-app</guid>
<description><![CDATA[(Credit:PayPal)PayPal rushed a fix out today for itsiPhone app after learning that it contained a flaw that could be used by attackers to trick PayPal users into divulging their account information.  The authentication vulnerability in PayPal's iPhone app could have allowed someone to conduct what is called a &quot;man-in-the-middle&quot; attack, PayPal spokesman Anuj Nayar told CNET. In such an attack, people who happen to be accessing their PayPal accounts over an unsecured Wi-Fi network could be tricked into thinking they are on the legitimate PayPal site when they aren't. Only PayPal's iPhone app, which has been downloaded more than 4 million times, is affected' the Android app nor the company's Web site are affected, Nayar said. iPhone users will have to download the update from the iPhone app store to secure their phones.  &quot;We don't believe any customers have been affected at all, and if there were any affected they would be 100 percent covered by PayPal,&quot; he said. The Wall Street Journal reported on the matter today after being contacted by viaForensics, the mobile security firm that discovered the problem.  PayPal learned of the problem yesterday from the newspaper, according to Nayar. &quot;As soon as we found out, we moved to push a fix to address this vulnerability,&quot; he said.  Nayar complained that viaForensics put users at risk by publicizing the information before giving PayPal a chance to fix it. &quot;We work closely with the security community and...we ask them to report to us before going public,&quot; he said.  ViaForensics could not be reached for comment late today. <br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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