Technology blogTechnologyBoot up: Grindr 'hacked to expose private pictures', Apple's secrets, and more
Plus the MegaUpload indictment in full, and Acer says ultrabooks to account for 25-35% of its notebook shipments in 2012A quick burst of 14 links for you to chew over, as picked by the Technology team
Love online: 100,000 Grindr users exposed in hack attack >>> Sydney Morning Herald
This is big.
The hacker discovered a way to log in as another user, impersonate that user, chat and send photos on their behalf. The vulnerabilities are also present in Blendr, the straight version of the app, according to a security expert who said both apps had "no real security" and were "poorly designed".
Two things about SOPA/PIPA and then I'll shut up :) >> Joel Spolsky - Google+
Founder and chief executive of Stack Exchange, Joel Spolsky, with some sensible reflections post PIPA and SOPA. This is starting to feel too cogent and organised for the internet:
The internet seems to ignore legislation until somebody tries to take something away from us... then we carefully defend that one thing and never counter-attack. Then the other side says, "OK, compromise," and gets half of what they want. That's not the way to win... that's the way to see a steady and continuous erosion of rights online. The solution is to start lobbying for our own laws.
A Post PIPA Post >> A VC
Respected investor Fred Wilson prepares for the long fight over PIPA. Back to the drawing board for the proposed legislation - but will the content and tech industries get around the same table?
This post on Google+ statistics is a billion* times better than any other post >> VentureBeat
Remember those stats about Google+ users?
This isn't the first time Google has tried to mislead with statistics about Google+. In July, Page claimed that the service had 10 million users who shared 1 billion items a day.
That sounds incredibly impressive. But let's do the math. That would mean that the average user was sharing 100 items a day. Robert Scoble was flooding my feed before I blocked him, but I don't think even he was sharing 100 items a day. (I have since unblocked him.)
So how did we get to that number? Well, it turns out Google was counting every potential recipient of that message. A single message from Scoble today would count 240,000 times toward that number. That's preposterous.
Google is by no means alone in how it plays with numbers. This deception happens nearly every day and is especially rampant in Silicon Valley where new business models are created and standard metrics aren't always available. It also reflects the optimistic nature of the Valley. We want to see exponential growth. We see hockey sticks everywhere. Even worse, these statistics get thrown around in the echo chamber and presented as fact. And as they get reblogged and retweeted, they lose the disclaimers that made them technically true in the first place.
Apple, America and a squeezed middle class >> NYTimes.com
"Companies once felt an obligation to support American workers, even when it wasn't the best financial choice," said Betsey Stevenson, the chief economist at the Labor Department until last September. "That's disappeared. Profits and efficiency have trumped generosity."
Companies and other economists say that notion is naïve. Though Americans are among the most educated workers in the world, the nation has stopped training enough people in the mid-level skills that factories need, executives say.
To thrive, companies argue they need to move work where it can generate enough profits to keep paying for innovation. Doing otherwise risks losing even more American jobs over time, as evidenced by the legions of once-proud domestic manufacturers -- including G.M. and others -- that have shrunk as nimble competitors have emerged.
A very important and revealing article.
Android Design - UI Overview >> Android developer
Android now has its own design language, for 4.0 onward. Looks very smooth and well thought-out. And also, "We've made the inclusion of the unmodified Holo theme family a compatibility requirement for devices running Android 4.0 and forward. If the device has Android Market it will have the Holo themes as they were originally designed.", Is this the end of skinning a la Samsung TouchWiz and HTC Sense?
The secrets Apple keeps >> Fortune Tech
An extract from Adam Lashinsky's book on the culture inside Apple. Basically, it sounds like the most secretive society you can imagine; the modern ideas of management, such as transparency and close attention within divisions to profit/loss accounts, simply don't apply.
Ultrabooks to account for 25-35% of Acer notebook shipments in 2012, says chairman >> Digitimes
Acer plans to launch its second-generation ultrabook models in the second quarter of 2012 and more new models in the third, with ultrabooks to account for 25-35% of its total notebook shipments for the year, according to company chairman JT Wang.
Sales of Acer's first ultrabook, the Aspire S3, totaled about 250,000-300,000 units in the first quarter after launch, and the company expects sales for its new Aspire S5 tablet PC will be even better.
That sounds like a Windows 8 tablet PC, rather than an Android one. US and Europe are expected to see slow sales.
Really? Research firm predicts Windows Phone will climb past iPhone by 2015 >> GeekWire
Microsoft's Windows Phone sales are so small right now that the company doesn't feel compelled to report them as part of its quarterly financial results. But a new report from IHS iSuppli predicts that Microsoft will take the No. 2 slot in smartphone market share in 2015, edging out longtime rival Apple and its iPhone.
It's not the first time an analyst has made this type of prediction. Both Gartner and IDC have made similar projections in the past. But the optimism from iSuppli is notable because it's based on recent developments -- particularly Microsoft's partnership with Nokia.
Essentially, it suggests you'll have two manufacturers each with just under 20% of the market, while Android from multiple makers will have 60%.
MPs want changes to ePetitions system and website >> eDemocracyBlog.com
Basically, to water it down and have debates that arise from them shoved out of the Commons chamber.
Whoa, Google Plus Has 54m Daily Users? Not Quite. >> Forbes
Here's what Page said, according to the transcript of his remarks he posted on Google Plus:
"I'm also pleased to announce that there are over 90M Google+ users -- well over double what I announced just a quarter ago on our earnings call. Engagement on + is also growing tremendously. I have some amazing data to share there for the first time: +users are very engaged with our products -- over 60% of them engage daily, and over 80% weekly."
Note that Page said users are "very engaged with our products" -- "products," plural. So 60% of the 90 million people who have created Google Plus profiles engage with some Google product every day, but that product could be Gmail, Google Documents, Google Calendar or even just Google Search. Google just isn't breaking out how many of those 90 million users are actually visiting G+ pages every day, week or month.
The more you examine his quote, in fact, the less it seems to mean about Google+.
MegaUpload Indictment in full >> Scribd
All 72 pages. If you found you couldn't get it from the US Department of Justice site for some reason...
Building Classrooms of the 21st Century with Motorola >> The Official Motorola Blog
Our world is always changing, and the way that children are being taught is also evolving everyday. Motorola Mobility believes in empowering students with innovative technology to help them not only learn better, but have more fun doing it. So earlier this year, we gave students at one San Diego high school Motorola XOOM tablets to see what would happen.
Why Guru3D probably never will review Ubisoft titles anymore >> Anno 2070
Here's what Ubisofts DRM is doing these days, they don't just verify the number of PCs you work on, nope .. they monitor hardware changes. So once we inserted that GeForce GTX 590 the hardware id # hash changed rendering our activation invalid.
What a bunch of rubbish ....This means that if we'd like to make a VGA performance review on Anno 2070 we'd need to purchase the game seven times. Ubisoft claims that you can send an email towards their support so that the activations are reset, we did so .. yet are still awaiting reaction.
When contacting Ubisoft marketing here in the Netherlands, their reply goes like this: 'Sorry to disappoint you - the game is indeed restricted to 3 hardware changes and there simply is no way to bypass that. We also do not have 7 copies of the game for you'.
I'm sorry, but I am not about to purchase the title seven times to make a review that by default benefits Ubisoft sales.
Looks like the reviewing torch has passed to sites that don't specialise in that way. How many VGA users do we have out there?
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