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Apple’s cloud service not fully baked

Lady Mystery — Fri, 02 Jul 2010 14:55:46 +0000

To stream music, Steve Jobs likely needs licenses and he doesn't have them yet. (Credit: James Martin/CNET)

A story about how Apple planned to “soon” launch a cloud service featuring music and movies stirred a great deal of speculation on Thursday.

The blog Boy Genius Report, citing an anonymous source, wrote that Apple will offer “streaming music and movies from Apple’s servers to your computers,” and will also sync iTunes with devices as well as stream content from a home computer to other Web-enable gadgets.

While some of of this has previously been reported in other publications, including CNET, there’s still question about the timing of the launch. While it’s hard to say what Boy Genius’ source meant by “soon” it’s worth noting that Apple has yet to obtain necessary licenses from the top four recording companies, according to multiple music industry insiders. They added that Apple has indeed engaged in discussions with the music labels but the record execs haven’t even seen all of the details yet.

The way some at the major labels see the situation, Apple could enable iTunes users to stream songs from a home computer to other gadgets without requiring new negotiation, but for Apple to stream music from the company’s servers to computers and other gadgets, the labels would require CEO Steve Jobs to cut a new deal, the sources said.

Apple began laying the groundwork for a cloud work at least since December, when it acquired streaming music service Lala. Since then Apple has held discussions with executives at the film studios and music labels. In the meantime, Google has also discussed launching an iTunes challenger with entertainment companies, one that could offer streaming songs as well as downloads. The obvious benefit of a cloud service is that by storing films and songs on Apple’s servers it would eliminate the need for local storage.

To license or not?
A slim chance exists that Apple doesn’t agree that it needs the labels’ permission to stream music. Michael Robertson, a noted tech entrepreneur and founder of MP3tunes.com, is fighting it out in court against EMI, the smallest of the top record companies over this question.MP3tunes.com offers to store copies of users’ songs on his servers, or the cloud, and then stream the tunes to them via Web-enabled devices. Robertson, who founded pioneering service MP3.com (now owned by CNET), argues that he doesn’t need a license to distribute songs legally acquired by consumers.

In EMI’s copyright complaint, filed in 2007, EMI alleges that Robertson’s MP3tunes.com and Sideload.com are a run-of-the-mill piracy operation. Sideload, a search engine, finds and organizes links to pilfered music files on the Web. MP3tunes then enables those pirated files to be stored, copied, and downloaded to devices without paying a dime to the music creators.

In a 2008 interview, Robertson said that EMI’s allegations are a ruse. What the label is really after is to prevent him and anyone else from storing music in digital lockers without first paying licensing fees.

A music start-up that launched this week, mSpot, appears to be following Robertson’s lead. The service promises to stream users’ music from the cloud to their computers or Android devices. CEO Daren Tsui told The Associated Press this week “We feel that it is the consumer’s right to stream music that they already own to their own mobiles.”

Well, Tsui had better have a good lawyer, as he and mSpot will undoubtedly have to defend that position in court.

And if Apple goes down this path, it too would have to fight as the labels are very much prepared to go to the mattresses over the issue, music sources said.

So, unless Apple is ready to go to war over this, don’t expect an iTunes cloud service–at least one offering music–anytime soon. Music insiders say that while that the whole sector would welcome an iTunes cloud service, negotiating the licenses will likely take months.

Blu-ray apparently isn’t coming to Macs

Lady Mystery — Thu, 01 Jul 2010 15:51:42 +0000

The more Apple customers pelt Steve Jobs’ in-box, the more he seems to respond. But unlike the last flurry of e-mails that were made public on iPhone and iPad issues, this time Jobs is apparently expounding on why Blu-ray won’t be coming to Macs.

According to the MacRumors fan site, which posted an e-mail exchange, one of its readers e-mailed the Apple CEO to ask why a Blu-ray drive didn’t make its way to the company’s newly updated Mac Mini.

In Jobs’ apparent response, he seemed nonplussed by the value of Blu-ray. He supposedly said it doesn’t make much sense to include it in the company’s computers.

“Blu-ray is looking more and more like one of the high end audio formats that appeared as the successor to the CD,” MacRumors reported Jobs as saying. “It will be beaten by Internet downloadable formats.”

The customer wasn’t done, though. The person said that Jobs may be right about the long term but that currently Blu-ray’s superior video quality and storage capacity makes it an ideal format for Mac owners.

Once again, Jobs apparently disagreed. The film business is moving away from physical media, he reportedly said, and Apple plans to stick with the industry.

“The downloadable movie business is rapidly moving to free (Hulu) or rentals (iTunes) so storing purchased movies or TV shows is not an issue,” Jobs reportedly said. “I think you may be wrong. We may see a fast broad move to streamed free and rental content at sufficient quality (at least 720p) to win almost everyone over.”

Of course, Jobs’ apparent comments have an element of self-preservation in them. Currently, Apple offers customers the ability to buy or rent films and television shows through iTunes. By bundling the Mac Mini without a Blu-ray drive, but with an HDMI port for connectivity on an HDTV, Apple seems to be begging users to load up iTunes and download some of its HD video content from the device. A Blu-ray drive could conceivably throw a wrench in that plan.

Beyond that, Jobs has a well-known, and seemingly lasting, distaste for Blu-ray. Back in October 2008, the Apple CEO said that licensing and delivering Blu-ray to customers is a “bag of hurt.”

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Deleting your Facebook account (FAQ)

Lady Mystery — Fri, 21 May 2010 13:08:52 +0000

As members of this popular network- Facebook, do we know all we should know about the site and whether or not our information is private? Do we really care? When we decide to leave and delete our information how long does it take for facebook to really delete it? The questions go on and on, but here is an interesting article that was written by Elinor Mills of CNet News that may shed some light on concerns you may have about this issue:

Are you confused by the myriad changes Facebook keeps making to its privacy settings? Are you angry about your data being exposed without your express consent? Are you just fed up and not going to take it anymore?

You’re not alone. A recent poll from Sophos found that 60 percent of users are considering quitting Facebook over privacy issues. More than 11,000 people have committed to ditching the social-networking site on May 31, according to QuitFacebookDay.com. And more people are searching Google for ways to delete their Facebook accounts than ever, according to the Search Engine Land blog.

But leaving Facebook can be almost as confusing as navigating the privacy backwaters on the site. This New York Times graphic shows that there are 50 settings and more than 170 options to managing the privacy of a Facebook account. Here are some tips on deleting your account and answers to questions about what that means for your data, and more.

What’s the difference between deleting and deactivating a Facebook account?
Deactivation means the profile information and content are hidden from view of others but are saved on Facebook servers in case you want to reactivate the profile. Messages you’ve sent and Wall posts remain, but your name appears in black text that is not clickable since your profile is now hidden.

Deleting an account removes it from the site permanently and you have to start from scratch if you decide later that you want to be on Facebook again. There is a 14-day delay before the data is completely deleted to give users time to change their mind. If you change your mind you can merely log into the account and the deletion request will be canceled.

How do I deactivate my account?

Click the Account tab in the upper right-hand corner of your main page. The Settings tab should be highlighted and there is a Deactivate link at the very bottom of the list. When you click it, you will be asked if you are sure you want to deactivate your account and why you are doing so. You will also be shown photos of you with friends with accompanying messages that say “(Your friend here) will miss you.” There is also a box to check at the bottom to opt out of receiving e-mails from Facebook if friends tag you in photos or invite you to join the site.

How do I delete my Facebook account?

It’s not as easy to find out how to delete your account. I clicked on the Account tab and then Help Center and typed in “delete account” in the search window. Under the question prompt “How do I permanently delete my account” there is a link to this page where you can click the Submit button or the Cancel button.

What happens to my data after I delete my account?

According to this Facebook Help Center page all personally identifiable information associated with your account will be purged from Facebook’s database if you choose to permanently delete the account. “This includes information like your name, e-mail address, mailing address, and IM screen name,” the site says. “Copies of some material (photos, notes, etc.) may remain in our servers for technical reasons, but this material is disassociated from any personal identifiers and completely inaccessible to other users. Facebook also does not use content associated with accounts that have been deactivated or deleted.”

I asked a Facebook spokesman why copies would need to be kept at all and for how long, exactly when all traces of the data are gone entirely, and whether any data remain on any servers of partners, and if so for how long? Here is his reply: “When a photo or video is deleted, or when a person deletes his or her account, we quickly delete all of the metadata for the photo as well as any and all tagging and linking information. For all practical purposes, the photo no longer exists, and we wouldn’t be able find it if we were asked or even compelled to do so. This is similar to what happens when you delete information from the hard drive of your computer. Technically, the bits that make up the photo persist somewhere, but, again, the photo is impossible to find. It’s possible that someone who previously had access to a photo and saved the direct URL from our content delivery network partner (this is different from the Facebook URL) could still access the photo. However, again, the person would have to know the URL, and the photo only exists in the CDN’s (content delivery network’s) cache for a limited amount of time.”

If I’m not ready to leave Facebook what can I do?

You can shore up your privacy settings and hope that Facebook doesn’t make any new modifications that will undo what you’ve specified. There are several tools that can automatically check your Facebook settings and set them to the most private option, including browser bookmark tool SaveFace and a Facebook privacy scanner available at ReclaimPrivacy.org.

Or you can do it yourself in a number of steps. First, make sure the default setting for different types of information you have on your page–particularly Posts by Me–is not set to the default of “everyone,” which means everyone on the Internet. Click the Account tab at the top right of your profile page and click Privacy Settings. From there you can set the information in Personal Information and Posts, as well as Contact Information, and Friends, Tags, and Connections to a range of options from “everyone” to “only me.” You also need to set privacy for each of your photo albums, under the Personal Information and Posts section.

Under the Search option you can specify who can see your search result on Facebook and allow or disallow search engines to display a preview of your Facebook profile. The Applications and Websites section lets you control how much of your information friends and applications can see and share. There you can opt out of the Instant Personalization setting, which allows partner sites like Yelp and Pandora to provide a customized experience when you visit their sites based on your Facebook activities.

To block ads from sharing your information you can click Account Settings from the top-right Account tab on your main page and click the Facebook Ads tab and switch it to the default “only my friends” to “no one.” The Huffington Post has a helpful video that walks through all of these steps.

And if you want to just make a statement but not leave the site, you can join the Facebook Protest movement and avoid logging on June 6.

What other social-networking sites are there?

Wikipedia has a long list of potential alternatives, but none of them are as popular as Facebook, which boasts 400 million active users. A social network is only as useful as the number of friends or relevant contacts it has and it would be tough to get your friends to move en masse to another site.

One upcoming promising option is Diaspora, which calls itself “the privacy aware, personally controlled, do-it-all distributed open-source social network” and was started in response to the Facebook’s problems. The creators are raising money to finish the site and had reached the $100,000 mark on Thursday, but it’s unclear when it will be up and running.

What does Facebook say about all of this?

Company executives realize there is a backlash and that they’ve got a public relations problem on their hands. They held a companywide meeting last week to assuage the concerns of the rank and file.

A Facebook spokesman said he could not provide an executive to discuss the privacy issues with CNET this week. However, Elliot Schrage, Facebook’s vice president of public policy, answered reader questions on The New York Times site last week. “Clearly, we need to rethink the tempo of change and how we communicate it,” he said. “Trust me. We’ll do better.”

Asked why the company doesn’t put the control in the hands of its users with an opt-in policy, Schrage said: “Everything is opt-in on Facebook. Participating in the service is a choice…Please don’t share if you’re not comfortable. That said, we certainly will continue to work to improve the ease and access of controls to make more people more comfortable.”

What does the government say?

So far, there have been no Congressional hearings or battle cries from Washington, D.C., but there have been some complaints lodged. More than a dozen privacy and consumer groups complained to then Federal Trade Commission about Facebook late last year. And more recently, Sen. Charles Schumer of New York has asked the agency to question Facebook about its privacy practices.

What’s all the fuss, anyway?

This interactive site entitled “The Evolution of Privacy on Facebook” shows visually exactly how site changes to the privacy settings over time have encroached on users’ privacy, revealing more of their data to more and more people.

Facebook is obviously making a business decision to expose more member content that can be monetized. Web surfers are used to dealing with the privacy versus profit trade-off, but what really irks them is that with each modification, users have to go back in and redo their settings or risk having photos, contact information, and other data exposed to the public that they want only friends to see.

Ted Weinstein, a San Francisco-based literary agent, said he is annoyed that Facebook keeps changing the rules on privacy and he has removed almost everything from his profile bit by bit. But he’s reluctant to entirely cut ties with all of his contacts on the site.

“I don’t want to throw those (Facebook contact) linkages away lightly. So I have removed material I’m not comfortable having everybody I’ve ever connected with having access to,” he said in an interview. “I don’t have confidence that Facebook won’t make changes that make my prior settings irrelevant.”

Others have had enough.

On Friday at 1 p.m. PDT blogger and serial Web entrepreneur Jason Calacanis will be severing the Facebook link to his 5,000 friends on the site by deleting his account live on the Internet.

“Simply put, I no longer trust Facebook or Mark Zuckerberg with my information,” Calacanis wrote in his newsletter this week announcing his plans to broadcast his protest on UStream. “Additionally, Facebook has become a waste of time for me.”

CNET

Qualys to scan Web sites for malware

Lady Mystery — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 14:18:18 +0000

by: Elinor Mills

Qualys is set to launch on Monday a free service for Web site operators that will scan their sites for malware.

As part of the service, QualysGuard Malware Detection crawls the pages of customer sites and looks for invisible iFrames, malicious JavaScript code, and other indications of a stealth threat to visitors and provides automated alerts and reports to Web site owners.

The company has profiled Internet Explorer 6 and Adobe’s Acrobat, Reader, and Flash Player to understand exactly what happens under normal conditions so it can quickly detect deviations that occur when malware is present, said Wolfgang Kandek, chief technology officer at Qualys.

Profiles and testing on additional apps will be forthcoming, he said. “We think (those apps) are what attackers typically have in their sights right now, but we will not stop there,” he said.

Google spinoff Dasient offers a free service that alerts Web sites when they appear on malware blacklists and a paid service that detects and quarantines malware on sites.

CNet

Is Google preparing to challenge iTunes in the cloud?

Lady Mystery — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 04:55:53 +0000

As the four biggest record companies wait to hear more about a proposed iTunes cloud music service, word comes now that Google has kicked the tires on a start-up specializing in cloud media.

Google has showed interest in possibly acquiring Los Angeles-based Catch Media, a company that intends to help make it simple for consumers to enjoy their digital movies, music, and books across numerous different hardware and service platforms, according to sources with knowledge of the negotiations. It’s unclear whether talks between Google and Catch have gone beyond informal discussions.

If Google did acquire the company, it could help the search giant keep pace with Apple’s expected efforts to take iTunes to cloud computing. Last month, CNET reported that Apple has spoken to the top labels about plans to offer a streaming music service free of charge to consumers. Before agreeing to any new licensing deals, the labels are waiting for Apple to supply more information.

A Google spokesman responded to a request for comment by writing: “While we’re always talking to various people about various things, we don’t comment on rumor or speculation.” A representative from Catch declined to comment.

Catch doesn’t offer or store content. The company wants to be to digital media what Plus, Cirrus, and ATM networks are to the banking industry. Catch has developed a technology that helps hardware companies and service providers register, track, route and clear digital media as it moves across different platforms.

If Catch has its way, consumers will one day access media from different vendors and devices as easily as people withdraw money from any available ATM.

More at CNET

BlackBerry Storm 9500 – touch the power

Lady Mystery — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 03:53:14 +0000

The list of BlackBerry Storm features goes on with DataViz documents as standard, giving access to Microsoft Word, Excel and Powerpoint files whilst on the move, plus a comprehensive address book and calender.

The BlackBerry Storm has both SureType and QWERTY keyboard options, via a clickable soft-touch screen and with auto-screen rotation, dictated by how the phone is held. The RIM BlackBerry 9500 Storm has one of the fastest smartphone processor’s on the market (624Mhz), along with 128MB of RAM and internal storage of 1GB, plus Micro-SD expansion up to 32GB.

BlackBerry Storm 9500 specifications

» Wireless email, Organiser, Web Browser, Phone
» 3.2 MP Camera, Video Recorder, BlackBerry Maps, Media Player
» Built in GPS, Corporate data access, SMS, MMS, Intstant Messenger
» SurePress touch screen, SureType, Multi-tap, QWERTY
» 3.5mm stereo headset connection, integrated earpiece / microphone
» Built-in speakerphone, Bluetooth v2.0, headset, handsfree
» Full video and audio format support, high resolution 480 x 360 pixel screen
» Polyphonic / MIDI ringtones, MP3 ringtones, vibrate mode
» battery-life up to 15 days (on standby), 1Gb onboard memory
» 128 MB flash memory, expandable memory – microSD support
» RIM wireless modem, tethered modem support

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Microsoft Windows Phone 7 Series

Lady Mystery — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 15:20:21 +0000

For the last 4 years I have been using my current cell phone which has given very good service especially for the purpose it was bought for – to receive and send calls and messages. But it has dawned on me that there are many other purposes a cell phone services. In these growing ages of technology I think I will have to get with it and finally I see and has fallen in love with the Window Phone 7 series.

Microsoft has finally made the official announcement about the next version of Windows Mobile – Windows Phone 7 Series – but there’s a long list of questions that Microsoft says it won’t answer until the MIX conference in March. In the meantime, here’s what we do know about the phones that will be on sale for ‘the holiday season’ (which to US companies starts in October or November).

The name: Windows Phone 7 Series is the best way Microsoft could come up with to say that (despite persistent rumours) they’re not manufacturing phone hardware themselves or putting the Microsoft name on it. Oded Ran from the Windows Phone team in the UK told ZDNet: “Many of the consumers we’re speaking with are not necessarily aware of Windows Mobile and we do not want them to think Microsoft is launching a Windows phone. ‘Series’ also says there are different form factors. It’s just like when you buy a Windows PC; you don’t think Microsoft manufactures it. ‘Series’ was the best word we tested as being able to convey that.”

The interface: The look of the Windows Phone 7 Series prototype demonstrated at Mobile Word Congress is has many similarities to the Zune HD, but that doesn’t mean it’s based on the same code. The visual design is a style that Microsoft is calling ‘Metro’ internally, which Ran told us is a reference to the clarity of information and typography on the signs you see at train stations and Joe Belfiore says has its roots in Windows. (Despite the use of sub-pixel positioning to give extremely clear text, even in Web pages, even when you zoom in, it’s unlikely that there’s any connection to the XPS device independent rendering and printing technology introduced in Windows Vista which also had the codename Metro – and more likely that he’s referring to the Media Center interface in Windows 7.)

When you pick up a Windows Phone Series 7 device, the first thing you’ll see is the Lock screen, showing the time and date, plus details like the number of unread messages, missed calls or your next meeting. Swipe your finger to unlock the phone and you see the tiled Start ‘experience’; some of these animated tiles are shown by default, like email, others you can customise.

Nokia, Intel to merge Linux mobile platforms

Lady Mystery — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 13:39:50 +0000

BARCELONA, Spain (MarketWatch) — Nokia Corp. and Intel Corp. on Monday announced the merger of their Linux operating systems to create a new mobile platform called Meego tailored to work across a range of devices including smartphones, netbooks, tablets and connected TVs.

This is the latest step in cooperation between Nokia /quotes/comstock/13*!nok/quotes/nls/nok (NOK 12.94, -0.15, -1.15%) , the world’s largest maker of mobile phones, and Intel /quotes/comstock/15*!intc/quotes/nls/intc (INTC 20.43, +0.37, +1.84%) , the No. 1 chip maker, and will likely make them more competitive against the rapid rise of Google’s /quotes/comstock/15*!goog/quotes/nls/goog (GOOG 533.12, -3.28, -0.61%) Android.

It’s also a significant development in an industry that is finding it harder and harder to cope with the fast-growing number of mobile operating systems. On top of Android, there are the iPhone system from Apple /quotes/comstock/15*!aapl/quotes/nls/aapl (AAPL 200.38, +1.71, +0.86%) , Palm’s /quotes/comstock/15*!palm/quotes/nls/palm (PALM 9.99, +0.37, +3.85%) WebOS, Symbian, Microsoft’s /quotes/comstock/15*!msft/quotes/nls/msft (MSFT 27.93, -0.19, -0.68%) system and Samsung’s Bada.

The fragmentation has had a serious impact on the industry, making the design of new phones and the writing of application a long and costly process.

Meego, which will be released in the second quarter and hosted by the Linux foundation, will merge Intel’s Moblin and Nokia’s Maemo and feature Qt, a popular program that lets developers write an application only once for a range of various devices.

Moblin has been offered on netbooks from Dell and Acer and even made an appearance at the Las Vegas Consumer Electronics Show last month on an LG phone. Maemo is the operating system on Nokia’s high-end N900 device.

Both companies said that applications that run on Maemo or Moblin will run on Meego.

Importantly, Meego will support ubiquitous ARM-based architecture as well as Intel chips, thus ensuring a raft of handset makers using chips based on ARM technology can start using it, allowing it potentially to gain market share from the open-source Android.

The launch of Meego was made on the sidelines of Mobile World Congress, the wireless telecoms industry’s largest annual gathering, held in Barcelona this week.

“We have been working on Meego to define a new mobile platform beyond phones and smart books. It will reduce time to market and complexity. We will reshape the traditional ecosystem,” said Nokia’s head of mobile devices, Kai Oistamo.

He added that Meego would benefit from the largest developer community in the world.

“This is a great potential for a new class of devices to emerge that really push the envelope on performance,” said Renee James, the head of software for Intel.

Analysts said the move is clever.

“This makes perfect sense and gives Nokia and Intel a better weapon to fight Android with a platform that goes across devices, making it more attractive to developers,” said Carolina Milanesi, analyst at research house Gartner.

At U.K.-based telecoms research house CCS Insight Geoff Blaber said “Meego could become a formidable alternative platform that spans multiple device categories.”

He added that the fusion of Maemo and Moblin in a platform adopting the Qt environment should prove “highly attractive” to developers.

Still, Nokia insisted the launch of Meego doesn’t mean it will give up on Symbian, the operating system that powers its smart phones which has come under fire in the past two years. Critics have complained that Symbian hasn’t been revamped fast enough, leading to a dreary user interface and little developer enthusiasm for writing new applications on it.

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MWC 2010: Samsung’s Android Based Halo Soon

Lady Mystery — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 12:54:51 +0000

Samsung i8520 Halo with Android 2.1

While Samsung was busy prepping its own Bada OS, there was another group of engineers working on Samsung’s next Android based device that would be known as the i8250 when launched. The phone has been officially showcased at the MWC and the best part about this is that it comes with a pico-projector!

The phone, which is likely to be christened Halo, (the official name as we learn now, is “Beam”) will run Android 2.1 and would be a worthy competitor to the likes of the Nexus One and the Motorola Droid. From what little is known about the phone now, the Halo comes with a 3.7-inch AMOLED screen (same size as that of the Nexus One and the Droid). It will feature a 5 megapixel camera for imaging and video capture. This is apart from the VGA front camera that would be used for video calling purposes. The Halo will also support 720p video recording (making it the third phone we heard of today to be capable of recording HD video).

Unlike Nexus One, the Halo will support native DivX and Xvid playback support. Connectivity options include Bluetooth 2.1 and 802.11b/g/n support for Wi-Fi. It will feature a 3.5-mm headphone jack and with 16GB of internal storage and microSD expansion slot, storage should not be problem. It would be a Quad Band phone with support for GSM/EDGE as well as for tri-band UMTS 900/1900/2100. This device will pack in all the above mentioned features plus a pico-projector in a slim body. It is expected to be shipped by the third quarter of 2010.

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