http://www.domainnamenews.com/icann-policy/icann-releases-v3-tld-applicant-guide-book/6240
2009.10.12 in Netbiz | Permalink | TrackBack (0)
“I honestly don’t think so.”
That’s the word from Mark Heesen, president of the National Venture Capital Association (NVCA), which, in part, tracks private investment activity in the United States.
“Twitter is a company that stands by itself,” Heesen explained. “We don’t see a huge amount of money going into the communications space as a whole. There’s more excitement and money going into life sciences and clean tech.”
The latest stats from PricewaterhouseCoopers and Thomson Reuters, compiled for the NVCA, confirm that assertion. In 2009’s second quarter, a mere 25 venture capital firms raised $1.7 billion. Never mind that the amount represents the smallest total of venture funds raised in one quarter since 1996 – none of the cash in the top 10 transactions went directly to the communications field.
“There are always a few folks who look specifically at funding communications ... but I don’t know of a ‘hot sector’ in the communications arena right now,” Heesen said.
That sets Twitter apart as a standalone success story in the industry, for a couple of key reasons. First, the telecom and Internet businesses are still suffering a hangover from the tech bust. The pain is easing; despite that, investors remain reticent about pouring money into communications deals, Heesen said. Second, those transactions are expensive. And few people feel like risking their liquidity in this economic environment.
2009.10.11 in Netbiz , Social Media | Permalink | TrackBack (0)
Microsoft promised the changes after the EU charged it with monopoly abuse for tying the Internet Explorer browser to the Windows operating system installed on most of the world's desktop computers.
Microsoft's general counsel Brad Smith said the EU announcement was "a big step" toward ending its antitrust woes in Europe and would allow the company to focus on European regulatory approval for "our agreement with Yahoo, that is objective no. 1." In July, Yahoo agreed to let Microsoft handle its searches as part of a 10-year deal.
The European Commission said it would on Friday formally seek feedback from computer manufacturers, software companies and consumers on Microsoft's offer to allow users to pick one of 12 browsers when they install Windows. They have a month to respond to regulators.
If the feedback is positive, the EU could accept Microsoft's offer, which would two months later turn into a legally binding settlement to last five years. A settlement would end the EU antitrust case on browsers without adding to the euro1.7 billion ($2.5 billion) in fines that the company has already racked up.
Smith said the company had made numerous changes to an initial offer made in July after extensive discussions with regulators over the last month. Regulators were scathing about earlier offers, among which Microsoft's announcement in June that it might strip browsers entirely from new European versions of Windows to avoid any antitrust problems.
EU Competition Commissioner Neelie Kroes said "Microsoft's commitments would indeed address our competition concerns" and they would have a "direct and immediate impact on the market."
"It would empower all current and future users of Windows in Europe to choose which browser they wished to use," she said.
She also said she trusted Microsoft to offer developers more interoperability information — data used by other companies to create programs that work on Windows — in a separate deal that will not be enforced by regulators.
"I trust Microsoft. I had contact with (CEO) Steve Ballmer, the (investigation) team is in close contact so there can't be a misunderstanding here," Kroes said. "It's the result of a long discussion over a long period."
European users of Windows XP, Vista and Windows 7 — due to launch on Oct. 22 — will automatically be shown a screen explaining what web browsers are and then get a choice of "tell me more" buttons to give them details on what each browser can do.
They can then pick several browsers — listed in alphabetical order — to install along with or instead of Internet Explorer. They can come back to that screen later to change their browser choice.
Smith confirmed that the company would now push ahead with launching Windows 7 in Europe. Microsoft had earlier hinted that EU antitrust trouble could delay the rollout of the new operating system.
Microsoft's Internet Explorer is the most widely used browser worldwide, but Mozilla Corp.'s Firefox is gaining in popularity.
Microsoft is now focusing on Internet search and hoping to grab a greater share of the market from Google Inc. by striking a deal with Yahoo Inc. to use its Bing search engine to process all Yahoo's search requests and steer search-related ads.
Smith said the antitrust landscape has changed radically and the search market — and Google — was now the focus. "We certainly have our concerns about the lack of competition in search and paid search advertising and we've been explicit about it," he said.
The company had not yet decided whether to ask EU or German regulators to review the deal, he said.
Mozilla and Google Inc. — which recently released its own browser, Chrome — are supporting the case against Microsoft. It was originally triggered by a complaint from Norwegian mobile browser company Opera Software ASA that Microsoft was abusing its monopoly to unfairly squeeze out rivals.
Regulators said they would be able to review how and which browsers are offered to make sure that consumers continue to have "genuine choice."
Kroes said a deal would not allow Microsoft to discriminate against personal computer manufacturers who decided to load PCs with another browser and disable Internet Explorer.
Most people buy the software pre-installed on a computer assembled by manufacturers such as Dell Inc. or Hewlett-Packard Co.
Microsoft has also committed to share more information with software developers for the next 10 years to help them make products compatible with Windows, Windows Server, Office, Exchange and SharePoint. The company published the new offer on its Web site.
Smith said Microsoft will also be required to support industry standards and document how it implements them in its software, including in the browser.
This attempts to answer rivals' complaints that the company does not strictly adhere to industry standards for the Web. Several companies were also unhappy that Microsoft developed its own file format OpenXML instead of using the industry standard Open Document Format for saving documents for archives.
Thomas Vinje, legal counsel for a group of companies that complained about Microsoft's business methods, said the settlement does not seem to deal with the flawed way that Microsoft applies standards, its unfair pricing practices or other concerns about patent abuse or standards manipulation.
2009.10.08 in Netbiz | Permalink | TrackBack (0)
2009.10.08 in Infrastructure, Netbiz | Permalink | TrackBack (0)
http://www.ejc.net/media_news/amazon.com_takes_kindle_global/
2009.10.08 in Content, Netbiz | Permalink | TrackBack (0)
http://www.ejc.net/media_news/economy_erodes_internet_advertising_revenue/
2009.10.06 in E-conomy, Netbiz | Permalink | TrackBack (0)
Internet attacks came from 201 different countries in the second quarter, up from 68 countries in the first quarter, according to a report released Thursday.
Akamai Technologies' quarterly "State of the Internet" report compiles data about the online world, from Internet attacks to average connection speeds across the globe.
Among the 201 countries now seen as the source of malware and other Internet threats, the U.S., China, and South Korea accounted for more than half of the attacks in the second quarter.
2009.10.05 in Cybercrime, Infrastructure, Netbiz | Permalink | TrackBack (0)
Internet-enabled TV sets could see wider adoption in the next few years as viewers get comfortable with the idea of running widgets on TV screens, according to a study released by Ernst & Young on Thursday.
Widgets -- or mini-applications -- are already being used in devices like mobile phones and computers to run light applications, and those applications could reach TV sets, the analyst firm said in the study. TV widgets are designed to pull selective content from the Internet to complement TV watching. For example, users can view weather information on TV or buy products advertised on TV from online stores.
Many consumers consider it an "appealing" idea to mesh TV with information from the Internet, according to the study. Web-connected TV shipments could total less than 500,000 in 2009, but top 6 million by 2013, E&Y said in the study, citing statistics from Parks Associates.
Widgets could also be the glue that brings together Internet and TV content. Broadcast TV is already competing with the Web for viewership, and widgets could facilitate content searches through both mediums, giving more entertainment options to viewers.
Many Web sites and technology companies are developing an ecosystem to bring content from the Internet and TV together. Myspace.com, for example, has developed a widget that blends TV with its social-networking offerings. TV watchers could exchange e-mail messages or browse photos on MySpace by activating a widget at the bottom of the TV screen. Users don't need to rely on a browser to access MySpace content.
TVs and chips, for instance, are also being developed to build Web-enabled TVs. Sony, Samsung and LG have said select flat-panel high-definition TV models would be able to run widgets or download movies from online entertainment services like Netflix.
Intel last week announced the CE4100 media processor, which enables the use of Internet and multimedia applications on TVs, Intel said. Intel is also working with companies like CBS and Cinemanow to bring widgets to TVs.
Web-enabled TV has struggled over the past 15 years since Time Warner Cable launched the iTV service in Orlando, E&Y said. Ever since, it has seen many iterations, with companies like AOL, BSkyB, RespondTV, Hewlett-Packard and Apple trying to bring the Internet to TV through devices like set-top boxes or adapters.
The success of widgets depends on applications that users will want to have on their TVs. For example, one-click access to on-demand content from online movie stores is well-suited for widgets.
Widgets for TV use also need to be adopted by television programming and cable operators. The operators will look to monetize widgets by developing an ad sales model around it, which could face some challenges, the study found. For example, viewers could migrate their attention from TV shows to widgets, which could affect the ratings of a program. Conflicting advertising could also appear on a TV screen and widget at the same time, which could affect ad sales models.
http://www.pcworld.com/article/172993/internet_tv_could_boom_in_the_next_few_years_study_says.html
2009.10.05 in Content, Media, Netbiz | Permalink | TrackBack (0)
Research conducted by the University of Pennsylvania and the Berkeley Centre for Law and Technology has found that 66% of adult US citizens do not want advertising to be tailored to what advertisers think are their interests.
Advertisers and publishers have grown increasingly likely to track web users' behaviour and to try to show them adverts that they think will be more relevant to them. Analysing relevance depends on the tracking of behaviour, which has raised questions of web users' rights to privacy.
The survey has found that two thirds of US web users do not want this to happen. It also found that once it explained the actual methods used to track behaviour that figure rose even higher, to between 73% and 86% after three common tactics were explained to them.
Publishers keen to increase advertising revenue and advertisers have claimed that tracking that does not identify users by name is acceptable to most people because of the benefits that accrue from being shown more relevant ads. "To marketers, it is self-evident that consumers want customized commercial messages," the academics' report says. The survey's data appear to refute that argument.
"Contrary to what many marketers claim, most adult Americans (66%) do not want marketers to tailor advertisements to their interests," said the study. "We conducted this survey to determine which view Americans hold. In high percentages, they stand on the side of privacy advocates." "That is the case even among young adults whom advertisers often portray as caring little about information privacy," it said. "Our survey did find that younger American adults are less likely to say no to tailored advertising than are older ones."
Other surveys have been conducted, but the academics from California and Pennsylvania said that they used methodologies that rendered their results less useful than their own study. The new study was based on phone interviews with 1,000 randomly-selected people which was weighted using census data to be nationally representative.
The study also found that even when tailored ads come with discounts or specially fashioned news, a majority do not want their web use to be tracked. Surveyed people also overwhelmingly backed legislating further to protect web users.
"69% of American adults feel there should be a law that gives people the right to know everything that a website knows about them; 92% agree there should be a law that requires websites and advertising companies to delete all stored information about an individual, if requested to do so; [and] 63% believe advertisers should be required by law to immediately delete information about their internet activity," the report said.
Companies that track web use often claim that the tracking is anonymous because a user's name is not discovered or stored. Privacy advocates argue that some of the data that is gathered, such as the internet protocol (IP) address of a person's internet connection, is inherently personal and that its gathering and storage is no longer anonymous.
But the new study found that even if anonymity could be guaranteed, web users would still reject tracking and ad tailoring.
"Assurance of anonymous tracking doesn’t seem to lower Americans’ concerns about behavioral targeting," it said. "They are quite negative when it comes to the general scenario of free content supported by tailored advertising that results from 'following the websites you visit and the content you look at' in a manner that keeps them anonymous. 68% definitely would not allow it, and 19% would probably not allow it. 10% would probably allow, and only 2% would definitely do it; 1% say they don’t know what they would do."
The strength of web users' feeling about the issue is reflected in the fact that 35% of them said that executives whose firms use information illegally should face jail time.
"This survey’s findings support the proposition that consumers should have a substantive right to reject behavioral targeting and its underlying practices," said the report.
2009.10.02 in Content, Netbiz , Privacy/Security | Permalink | TrackBack (0)
Washington said Wednesday that it would give other governments and the private sector a greater oversight role in an organization that oversees the Internet.
The move follows criticism from European regulators and others that the American government could wield too much influence over a system used by hundreds of millions of people worldwide. Those critics have complained, among other things, about the slow rollout of Internet addresses in languages other than English.
Washington, however, stopped short Wednesday of cutting ties with the organization, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, or Icann. The government agreed instead to establish advisory panels made up of government and private-sector representatives around the world.
The panels will review how open are the decisions made by Icann, whether they reflect the public interest, ensure stability and promote competition for domain names, like those ending in “.com” and other suffixes. Icann decisions could influence what domain names are available, what languages they are in and how much they cost.
“The Internet is on a long-term arch from being 100 percent American to being 100 percent global,” said Rod Beckstrom, the former U.S. cybersecurity chief who joined Icann in July as chief executive. “This is a significant step along that arch to becoming more global.”
Icann has had oversight over domain names under a series of loose agreements with the U.S. government, which financed much of the Internet’s development. The latest expired Wednesday.
Many critics of Icann and its American oversight, including the European Union’s Internet chief, Viviane Reding, saw the expiration as an opportunity to revamp Internet governance.
Ms. Reding praised the new framework in a statement, and said the governments that now have more of a say in Icann should take advantage of the opportunity.
The Commerce Department has a guaranteed seat on only one of those panels, with the remaining representatives to be picked by leaders from Icann and its advisory committee of government officials.
But the panels’ recommendations will not be binding on Icann, and the Commerce Department retains oversight through a separate contract for Icann to handle the nuts-and-bolts of domain name administration. That contract runs through 2011; the new one taking effect Thursday covers Icann’s broader role in setting guidelines and policies.
Icann also agreed to remain a nonprofit organization headquartered in the United States, with offices around the world.
Mr. Beckstrom said some critics abroad might take that to mean Internet governance still is not truly global. But he said the arrangement should ultimately bolster Icann’s standing internationally.
“The U.S. government is saying, ‘O.K., you have become a multistakeholder body. Congratulations. Now on to the next set of challenges,”’ Mr. Beckstrom said.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/01/technology/internet/01icann.html?_r=1
2009.10.02 in E-Strategies/Policy , Governance , Netbiz | Permalink | TrackBack (0)
