#EU v. Google: What Each Side Is Saying The European union on Wednesday formally accused Google of abusing its dominant power in web search in violation of antitrust laws.
The action is potentially the most significant antitrust case in the tech industry since regulators on both sides of the Atlantic tangled with Microsoft beginning in the late 1990s
It could force Google to pay billions in fines or to alter the way it presents search results.
Specifically, the European commission said that Google's GOOGL+0. 35%promotion of its own comparison shopping search function may rtificially divert traffic from rival comparison shopping services
which has been investigating Google search practices for about 5 years, detailed its concerns, known as a Statement of Objections,
on Google comparison shopping service here. The accusations did not extend to other areas of search,
like reviews and travel that Google rivals like Yelp YELP+3. 14 %and Tripadvisor TRIP+0. 57%had complained about.
whether Google has violated European antitrust laws with its Android operating system and related mobile services. The commission said it is concerned that Google may have hindered market access to rival mobile apps by pushing Android phone makers to pre-install its suite of mobile services
which include search, maps, Google Drive and the Play store. It also said it is concerned Google may have hindered market access to makers of modified versions of Android.
The commission full concerns on Android are detailed here. Google put out a vigorous defense. In a blog post, Google search chief Amit Singhal said that people have more search choices today than ever before,
and that competition among shopping search engines is thriving. ndeed if you look at shoppingn area where we have seen a lot of complaints
and where the European commission has focused in its Statement of Objectionst clear that (a) there a ton of competition (including from Amazon and ebay EBAY+0. 58%,
%two of the biggest shopping sites in the world) and (b) Google shopping results have not the harmed the competition,
Singhal wrote. In a separate blog post, Hiroshi Lockheimer, an engineering vice president for Android, rebutted the commission concerns regarding Google mobile operating system. ndroid has been a key player in spurring this competition and choice, lowering
prices and increasing choice for everyone, Lockheimer wrote. Google will now has 10 weeks to respond to the commissions charges.
The commission will then evaluate those responses and potentially recommend remedies e
#Tencent Scores#1 On China Brand Ranking, Next Global? Chinese tech companies are becoming more adept at marketing
and brand image, and will become better known in the West as their products and services go global.
This year, three of this year top five are oriented consumer Tencent, Alibaba and Baidu. The brand rankings are compiled by analysis of financial data of publicly traded companies and interviews with consumers.
#Long term Investors Should Prefer Facebook to Google Last week saw another slew of quarterly earnings releases.
which support owning Google or Facebook. Google prices keep dropping, even as growth slows in oremarket Google once again reported higher sales and profits.
And that is a good thing. But, once again, the price of Google primary product declined. Revenues increased because volume gains exceeded the price decline
which indicates that the market for internet ads keeps growing. But this makes 15 straight quarters of price declines for Google.
Due to this long series of small declines, the average price of Google ads (cost per click) has declined 70%*since Q3 2011!
While this is a miraculous example of what economists call demand elasticity, one has to wonder how long growth will continue to outpace price degradation.
At some point the marginal growth in demand may not equal the marginal decline in pricing. Should that happen, revenues will start going down rather than up.
which allows Google to place more ads in more specific locations for advertisers via such automated products as Admob, Adexchange and Doubleclick Bid Manager.
But such computerized ad buying relies on ever more content going onto the web as well as ever more consumption by internet users.
Further, Google revenues are almost entirely search-based advertising, a category Google dominates. But this is largely a PC-related sale.
Today 67.5%of Google ad revenue is from PC searches, while only 32.5%is from mobile searches.
Due to this revenue skew, and the fact that people do more mobile interaction via apps, messaging apps and social media than browser,
search ad growth has fallen considerably. What was a 24%year over year growth rate in Q1 2012 has dropped to more like 15%for the last 8 quarters.
So while the market today is growing and Google is making more money, it is possible to see that growth is slowing.
And Google efforts to create mobile ad sales outside of search have failed largely, as witnessed by the recent death of Google+as competition for Twitter or Facebook.
It is the market shift to mobile which creates the greatest threat to Google ability to grow;
certainly at historical rates. Simultaneously, Facebook announcements showed just how strongly it is continuing to dominate both social media and mobile,
and thus generate higher revenues and profits with outstanding growth. The#1 site for social media and messenger apps is Facebook, by quite a large margin.
But, Facebook 2014 acquisition of Whatapp is now#2. Whatsapp has doubled its monthly active users (MAUS) just since the acquisition,
and now reaches 800million. Growth is clearly accelerating, as this is from a standing start in 2011.
Facebook Messenger is#3, just behind Whatsapp. And#5 is Instagram another Facebook acquisition. Altogether 4 of the top 5 sites,
and the ones with greatest growth on mobile, are Facebook. And they total over 3billion MAUS,
growing at over 300million new MAUS/month. Thus Facebook has emerged already as the dominant force, with the most users, in the fast-growing, accelerating, mobile and app sectors.
Just as Google did in internet search a decade ago, beating out companies like Yahoo, Ask jeeves, etc.
Facebook is monetizing its market leadership position Google is moving rapidly to monetize this user base.
From nothing in early 2012, Facebook mobile revenue is now $2. 5b/quarter and represents 67%of global revenue (the inverse of Google revenues.)
Further, Facebook is now taking its own programmatic ad buying tool, Atlas, to advertisers in direct competition with Google.
Only Atlas places ads on both social media and internet browser pages a one-two marketing punch Google has cracked not yet.
Google $17. 3b Q1 2015 revenue is 30 times the revenue of Facebook. There is no doubt Google is growing,
and generating enormous profits. But, for long-term investors, growth is slowing and there is reason to be concerned about the long term growth prospects of Google as the market shifts toward both social and mobile.
Google has failed to build any substantial revenues outside of search and has had some notable failures recently outside its core markets (Google+and Google glass.
Just how long Google will continue growing, and just how fast the market will shift is unclear.
Technology markets have shown the ability to shift a lot faster than many people expected, leaving some painful losers in their wake (Dell, HP, Sun microsystems, Yahoo, etc.
Meanwhile, Facebook is positioned squarely as the leader, without much competition, in the next wave of market growth.
Facebook is monetizing all things social and mobile at a rapid clip, and wisely using acquisitions to increase its strength.
As these markets continue on their well established trends it is hard to be anything other than significantly optimistic for Facebook long-term.*
*1x. 93 x. 88 x. 84 x. 85 x. 94 x. 96 x. 94 x. 93 x. 89 x. 91
x. 94 x. 98 x. 97 x. 95 x. 93=.295
#Court Rules Cops Don't need A Warrant To Get Your Cellphone Records A federal appeals court ruled on Tuesday that the public has no reasonable expectation of privacy
when it comes to their cell phone location records. Cops don need a search warrant to get access to cell tower location records
when investigating criminal cases because this information belongs to a third party, according to the ruling. The case centered on Miami resident Quartavious Davis,
who was convicted of robbery, possession of a firearm, and conspiracy in 2012 after investigators obtained 67 days of Daviscell phone records from Metropcs1,
606 records in total. Davis was sentenced to 162 years in prison. The case was appealed to the 11th U s. Circuit court of appeals on the grounds that Davisfourth Amendment rights were violated.
Using the example of information Google GOOGL-1. 71%collects from its usershich includes names, email addresses, telephone numbers, credit card data, online history, devices used,
meaning that Google users wouldn have a right to privacy around that data. The dissent continued, nd why stop there?
Nearly every website collects information about what we do when we visit. So now, under the majority rule, the Fourth Amendment allows the government to know from Youtube. com what we watch,
or Facebook. com what we post or whom we riend, or Amazon com AMZN-0. 38%what we buy,
or Wikipedia. com what we research, or Match. com whom we datell without a warrant.
A few concurring judges also offered caution about the implications of the case. his case is certainly about the present,
but it is also potentially about the future, Judge Jordan wrote. have some concerns about the government being able to conduct 24/7 electronic tracking (live
GMP corporate spokesperson, told me in an email. Schnure couldn say how big or small those promised savings will be:
a Southern California Edison spokesman told me via email, ut as prices decline for energy storage,
¢he me via Twitter. Even at twice that price, he said, grid-level batteries offer utilities a return on investment now:
The low hanging fruit was the copy cat web design for internet cannabis sites based on already popular traditional internet sites.
#Whatsapp For ios Will Receive Voice Calling Feature In A few Weeks Whatsapp the instant messaging app that Facebook acquired for $19 billion last year hit 700 million monthly active users
At the Facebook f8 conference this week, Whatsapp cofounder Brian Acton said that the ios version of the messaging app will gain the highly anticipated free voice calling feature within the next few weeks, according to Venturebeat.
Whatsapp launched a desktop client service called Whatsapp Web. The desktop version of Whatsapp only works for Android, Windows phone, Blackberry and Nokia S60 devices right now though.
Hopefully, Whatsapp Web will support ios devices soon. If you have a jailbroken iphone, then you can already access the voice calling feature on Whatsapp.
Why did Facebook acquire Whatsapp? During a keynote at Mobile World Congress last year, Facebook CEO Zuckerberg said that the acquisition was linked to his vision for Internet. org.
Internet. org is an initiative to bring the Internet people who do not have access
since two-thirds of the world is connected not. The amount that Facebook paid for Whatsapp was particularly interesting
because the messaging app is far from profitable. Whatsapp lost $230 million in the first half of last year on revenues of approximately $15 million, reported The Wall street journal
. While Facebook generates most of its revenues from advertising, Whatsapp charges 99 cents per year for a subscription after one year of free service.
Reliance has decided to use Facebook as the social media network for its apps. Few Western app vendors apart from Supercell and King have attacked seriously Korea notoriously insular market It is impressive that Reliance is tackling Korea seriously from the start.
Backers included major VC players like Adreessen Horowitz (a16z) and Google Ventures hope what youl see is the regulations get cleared very soon
#Will Payments On Facebook Be Successful? Facebook: The Social Graph Of Payments Today March 17th, 2015 Facebook has entered into payments in a very big way 1. This is perhaps the biggest news in this sector since its inception.
Much like Wechat a sort of Facebook of China along with Alipay with their hundreds of millions of users to send money via instant message.
To become a person to person payment system in the US the company must apply for
and be granted a money transmitter license in every state. Facebook has been approved money transmitter licenses in every US state and territory along with many European and Asian countries.
My good friend Faisal Khan has been researching this for a number of years. In the US
One could argue that Google system was a communication platform centered around Gmail, but it was linked not fully to the chat system.
and there is a tipping point where one can be certain that the recipient can be found on Facebook.
It turns out a vast majority of Facebook 500 million monthly users are logged on to Facebook Messenger with about 80 million payment cards on file.
With Facebook Payments, the entire system is built currently around the Messenger platform. Fundamentally person to person payments are a form of deep communication
and Facebook Messenger is a logical jumping off point. A vast majority of person to person payments begin with a conversation, perhaps already within messenger.
How Does Facebook Payments Work? To use the system, the sender will need to associate a US based debit card with a Visa or Mastercard logo to their Facebook account.
If the user already has a debit card on file with Facebook from gaming, advertising, or donations, this can be the default card.
The system will allow for the user to image the card via a camera or to manually enter the card into the setup form.
Specimen of Facebook Payments payment sending sequence. To send money press the button in the Messenger message composer,
Specimen of Facebook Payments payment receipt screen. The money is removed instantly from the sender debit account
and delivered to the recipient Facebook associated debit card. Facebook uses the debit card network and the recipient bank
and can take about 24 hours to become usable. Both sender and recipient will see a confirmation message detailing the transfer status and time.
Along the way, Facebook will send the recipient notices to claim the money. As an added security feature, Facebook may ask users some extra security questions before a transfer can be authorized.
This may take the form of id you ever own a red caror n what city did you live in during the period of 1984 1986 etc.
Banking On Debit cards Facebook is currently a debit card based system and is using a similar system that Square adopted for Square Cash 2,
and optimizations made by Facebook to make the system more fault tolerant and redundant. Facebook is also using more recognized APIS that will have the ability in the future to also allow payments from credit cards using the full extent of systems like Visa VPP API 2. The system will also be able to easily scale to countries outside the US
and localize from a technical standpoint and a regulatory stand point. I am rather certain that Facebook has negotiated with a number of regional debit card networks to lower effective rates that Facebook will pay for each transaction.
This will actually be a win/win for both camps. The debit card networks will see a huge growth of aggregate transactions allowing the networks to continue to be relevant and vital in this new space.
And Facebook will of course see lower costs than most companies in this space. I see this pattern perhaps playing out through the world and thus
By the next Facebook developer conference we may see this presented along with very unique useless for the APIS Facebook most certainly will produce.
Now The Person To Person Payments Party Is Ready To Begin Facebook is entering into a market that has many existing solutions,
including: Google Paypal Venmo Square Banks And others It is very clear that a sort of shakeout will commence that will define competing products and perhaps remove a few products from the market.
There is little doubt that the landscape will be changed far one year from now. Square Square Cash seems to be in a very vulnerable position before Facebook Payments 3 and
I tried to present the case days after the product was announced that this will prove to be a huge waste of time, talent,
Paypal+Venmo Paypal and Venmo will see a challenge from Facebook Payments. There is no doubt about it.
and marketing needed to respond to Facebook. There are many ways that Paypal and Venmo can stay vital and relevant because of the scale they have achieved already.
Google Google has been sending person to person money via Gmail for over two years and although it is not breaking any records,
or a picture is quite genius. Google will need to lower costs and continue to innovate.
and a system that will surprise even Facebook. The plans have been in process for quite some time and unlike Facebook
Paypal, Google, and Square, Apple will not handle any payments themselves. High Likelihood Of Success There is little doubt that Facebook will be successful In person to Person payments.
If not just by the size of the user base and the utility this new feature will offer.
One can surmise that at some point, even though currently there is no revenue model from Facebook pavements,
there is a path where the cards on file will become a source for payments for products and services from merchants.
Specimen of revenue sources at Facebook. The Payment isruptionera Is Now Officially Over In less then 12 months
and listed Apple, Facebook, and retailers themselves. Today, Apple Pay, Facebook Payments, and MCX/Currentc are here.
It was fun times as my thesis and postulations were controversial and constrain. This was the height of the ayments disruptionmania
and many medical schools now use e-learning tools like webcasts and online study aids to broaden enrollment
when it opened two small program sites in Kenya and Haiti, it delivered classes to students in many of the world poorest places.
a web and mobile application that supports workforce skill building. The app delivers informational content to distributed teams,
In the Philippines, for example, a group of doctors founded an online community called Healthxph that uses social media to mobilize discussion about healthcare topics.
In neighboring Indonesia, more than three-quarters of doctors in major cities reported using the Internet regularly to build their knowledge and skills
Premera is stressing that the company will not email or call customers about the breach. To protect against phishing attacks,
and links or replying to emails about the breach. Based in Mountlake Terrace, Washington, Premera is one of the largest health insurance providers in the Pacific Northwest, with $7. 6 billion in revenue in 2013 and 1. 8 million members in Washington and Alaska n
#Youtube Now Lets You View And Upload 360-Degree Videos Youtube has announced that it is now supporting 360-degree video uploads.
Some of the cameras that are compatible with Youtube 360-degree video uploads include Bublcam, 360cam by Giroptic, Allie by IC Real Tech, the SP360 by Kodak and the RICOH THETA.
This means that viewers can watch videos in any direction for a different perspective instead of just where the camera is facing.
said Youtube staff in a blog post. ou could let viewers see the stage and the crowd of your concert, the sky and the ground as you wingsuit glide,
When you upload a Youtube video with a 360-degree camera, the viewer is able to tap on the video
If you are using the Youtube app on an Android device then you can pan around the video simply by moving your smartphone and tablet around.
As of right now, the 360-degree Youtube videos are supported by just the Chrome browser on the desktop and the Youtube app on Android devices.
Youtube said that 360-degree videos will be supported on other platforms in the near future like the iphone and ipad.
Youtube also has plans to make the 360-degree videos accessible through virtual reality platforms, which is the best way to view immersive content.
The experience feels very similar to Google GOOGL-0. 94%Street view . If you are near the Youtube Space L a. studio on Bluff Creek Drive in Los angeles,
the Creator Tech team is letting people try out the 360-degree cameras and put together those types of videos with help from the staff between now through April.
When you are ready to upload 360-degree videos on Youtube, you can find technical information on Github with a Python script to insert the correct video metadata.
Youtube plans to make the process of uploading 360-degree videos automatic, but that script will be required in the meantime.
Keep in mind that the quality of the 360-degree videos are not as high as we see in the standard Youtube videos.
And the 360-degree videos take up about four-to-five times the bandwidth of regular Youtube videos.
Youtube set up a playlist of some 360-degree videos so that you can see multiple examples.
Here are a few examples of the new 360-degree videos on Youtube (watch these using Google chrome on your desktop
or the Youtube app for Android to see the 360-degree controls) e
#In Historic Turn, CO2 EMISSIONS Flatline in 2014, Even as Global economy Grows A key stumbling block in the effort to combat global warming has been the intimate link between greenhouse gas emissions and economic growth.
How Social media Is Killing The Concert Experience I usually avoid Times square, but I had bought my ticket to see American Authors five months earlier
it is not difficult to find concert recordings on Youtube. Most artists produce live session music videos,
My friend was sending emails while I played ninja to avoid flailing ipads the mini ones feel mega
and Twitter campaign#bestdayofmylife, after their biggest hit. Besides adding another incentive for all phones on deck,
Frampton is no social media scrooge, he one of the few artists who personally engages with his online fan base.
Pink floyd cofounder Roger Waters told his Facebook followers that he ould never turn on a cell phone at any musical event.
These artists are not damning social media, but reminding fans that there is a spiritual and emotional connection between music and the listener,
and if the purpose of social media and mobile messaging is communication, a concert distracts from that.
Twitter has a unique place in the social media sphere in that it was created purposefully for live events.
Twitter mission statement iso give everyone the power to create and share ideas and information instantly, without barriers.
According to Twitter website, more than 80%of active users tweet from their phones, making the flutter of the little blue bird at concerts less surprising.
Where is the line between engaging in Twitter purpose and engaging in the concert purpose?
#Facebook's first satellite will beam Internet to rural Africa starting in 2016 With the exception of a select few locations,
As result, only about 20 percent of the population is able to connect to the Internet.
Facebook hopes to change those statistics with a new project in its Internet. org initiative.
As part of this program, Facebook is partnering with French satellite communications provider Eutelsat to beam an Internet connection to remote parts of Africa."
"I'm excited to announce our first project to deliver Internet from space, "wrote Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg in a Facebook posting.
Facebook is working with Eutelsat to provide Internet access to sub-Saharan portions of Africa via Eutelsat's new AMOS-6 geostationary satellite,
which will cover West, East and Southern Africa. Amazingly, the satellite will deliver affordable broadband Internet using off-the-shelf consumer equipment for connectivity
--so it'll be easy and cheap to build more of these satellites in the future. Eutelsat is setting up a new company in London to oversee its African broadband business
while Facebook will work locally in Africa to deliver Internet service to rural communities. The satellite-based service is expected to go online in mid-2016.
The African satellite project is part of Facebook's broader Internet. org initiative which debuted in 2013.
Through Internet. org, Facebook wants to connect the world by providing internet access to developing countries worldwide.
Internet. org was criticized highly for providing access only to Facebook and a handful of other web sites and services instead of the full, open internet.
Internet. org responded to critics by recently expanding its service to include any sites that meet Facebook's development criteria a
and used directed evolution techniques to identify molecules that bound near the active site of ß-Gal,
affording the parasite time to grow out of site from the immune system. Some these parasite-derived red blood cell surface proteins have an affinity for carbohydrate residues found on the surface of cells lining blood vessels.
#"Google maps for the Body"zooms in from whole organs down to individual cells The algorithms used for zooming in
and out on Google maps and Google street view have made it possible to visually traverse through layers of the body starting with a whole joint and drilling all the way down to the cellular level.
Google, Brown and Stanford universities, Cleveland Clinic, and optics and medical device manufacturer Zeiss. It uses imaging technology originally developed to scan for defects in silicon wafers,
and with help from Google's Maps algorithms the researchers can zoom and pan through a whole organ or tissue joint all the way down to individual cells.
Unlike Google's Body Browser, which visualizes the layers of the body in three-dimensional rendered graphics,
this so-called"Google maps for the Body"uses real images that get seamlessly stitched together and layered on top of each other."
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