Martyn Williams
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Facebook acquires The Find e-commerce search engine
Facebook has acquired The Find, a nine-year-old company with a search engine that indexes products across thousands of e-commerce sites.The deal, the value of which was not disclosed, was announced in a post on The Find’s website.“Key members of our team are joining the company and will be working hard to integrate our technology to make the ads you see on Facebook every day better and more relevant to you,” the company said.That probably means the ads Facebook users see will be more relevant to products they’ve been browsing and buying online, perhaps highlighting local retailers. One of The Find’s features is that it attempts to mix online and local stores and says its results are based on “your social profile.”To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Google’s solar-drone Internet tests about to take off
Google’s ambitious plans to provide Internet access to remote areas via solar-powered drones are getting ready to take off.Titan Aerospace, the drone-maker acquired last year by Google to help realize the project, recently applied for and received two licenses from the U.S. Federal Communications Commission to run tests over the next six months.The licenses, which are valid from March 8 until September 5, don’t give away much because Google has asked the FCC to keep many of the details confidential for commercial reasons, but they reveal the tests will take place inside a 1,345 square kilometer (520 square mile) area to the east of Albuquerque. The area includes the town of Moriarty, where Titan Aerospace is headquartered and conducts its research and development work.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Hillary Clinton’s email system was insecure for two months
The private email system used by Hillary Clinton when she was U.S. Secretary of State didn’t encrypt messages during the first two months of use, an Internet security company said Wednesday.That would have left emails sent and received by Clinton in early 2009 vulnerable to eavesdropping—just when British and American intelligence agencies were reportedly spying on world leaders.Internet records show the clintonemail.com domain was first registered on Jan. 13, 2009. Clinton became Secretary of State eight days later, but it wasn’t until March 29 that the first SSL certificate was issued for the domain, according to Venafi, a security company that analyzes encryption keys and digital certificates.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Smartphone dead? Fuel cells offer instant power anywhere
If there’s one thing almost every smartphone user wants, it’s longer battery life.While processors, memory and other components have advanced in leaps and bounds, progress in battery technology has been much slower over the last couple of decades.All those people you see charging their phones at airports, coffee shops and other public places are a testament to how often batteries die out during the day. So while engineers are fighting against basic chemistry and physics to improve current Lithium Ion cells, is there a better way to recharge?One answer might be fuel cells, which generate electricity through a chemical reaction and provide instant power anywhere. Unlike portable battery packs, they don’t need to be charged in advance. You just need a fuel cell cartridge.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Volvo cars to start talking to each other
Volvo has developed a system that provides real-time warnings to drivers of black ice or disabled vehicles on the road ahead.The technology is currently being tested in Sweden and pulls data from wheel sensors to detect when tires encounter black ice. When that happens, the car transmits a GPS location to a Volvo server, which then sends the data to other vehicles nearby that are equipped with the system.Drivers of those cars see a small warning icon on the dashboard to alert of the black ice ahead. The icon gets bigger as the car approaches the dangerous area, said Erik Israelsson , project leader for safety at Volvo, during a demonstration at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Google’s Pichai on Xiaomi, Cyanogen and the Apple Watch
In a wide-ranging discussion on stage at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona on Monday, Google senior vice president Sundar Pichai offered his views on lots of issues at the heart of the mobile telecommunications industry.He used the time to confirm Google’s plans to launch a mobile carrier in the U.S. and gave an update on progress of its ambitious Project Loon and Project Titan airborne Internet experiments. Here’s what else he said:To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Google’s Pichai on Xiaomi, Cyanogen and the Apple Watch
In a wide-ranging discussion on stage at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona on Monday, Google senior vice president Sundar Pichai offered his views on lots of issues at the heart of the mobile telecommunications industry.He used the time to confirm Google’s plans to launch a mobile carrier in the U.S. and gave an update on progress of its ambitious Project Loon and Project Titan airborne Internet experiments. Here’s what else he said:To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Google’s Pichai on Xiaomi, Cyanogen and the Apple Watch
In a wide-ranging discussion on stage at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona on Monday, Google senior vice president Sundar Pichai offered his views on lots of issues at the heart of the mobile telecommunications industry.+ See our full coverage of MWC 2015 +He used the time to confirm Google’s plans to launch a mobile carrier in the U.S. and gave an update on progress of its ambitious Project Loon and Project Titan airborne Internet experiments. Here’s what else he said:To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Google’s Pichai on Xiaomi, Cyanogen and the Apple Watch
In a wide-ranging discussion on stage at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona on Monday, Google senior vice president Sundar Pichai offered his views on lots of issues at the heart of the mobile telecommunications industry.+ See our full coverage of MWC 2015 +He used the time to confirm Google’s plans to launch a mobile carrier in the U.S. and gave an update on progress of its ambitious Project Loon and Project Titan airborne Internet experiments. Here’s what else he said:To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Google sees success with balloon, airplane Internet
Google’s ambitious efforts to bring balloon and aircraft-borne connectivity to underserved areas of the globe are pushing past some key milestones and the company expects a public launch in a few years.Both projects have captured the imagination of many for their ability to beam Internet signals from platforms high up in the sky to areas without cellular networks, but represent significant engineering challenges for Google—just the kind of thing the company likes, said Sundar Pichai, a senior vice president at Google, speaking at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.The oldest and perhaps best known of the two projects, Project Loon, seeks to use balloons flying around 20 kilometers (65,000 feet) above the Earth to deliver Internet signals. The company’s first experiments used a proprietary WiFi signal but that’s since changed to LTE cellular signals.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Google sees success with balloon, airplane Internet
Google’s ambitious efforts to bring balloon and aircraft-borne connectivity to underserved areas of the globe are pushing past some key milestones and the company expects a public launch in a few years. Both projects have captured the imagination of many for their ability to beam Internet signals from platforms high up in the sky to areas without cellular networks, but represent significant engineering challenges for Google—just the kind of thing the company likes, said Sundar Pichai, a senior vice president at Google, speaking at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. The oldest and perhaps best known of the two projects, Project Loon, seeks to use balloons flying around 20 kilometers (65,000 feet) above the Earth to deliver Internet signals. The company’s first experiments used a proprietary WiFi signal but that’s since changed to LTE cellular signals.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Google confirms carrier plans, details coming soon
Google has confirmed for the first time that it plans to offer connectivity directly to mobile users in the U.S., but a senior executive downplayed the competition it would be to major U.S. cellular carriers.Several reports have said the company is preparing a service that would be offered across an existing cellular network under a Google brand—a so-called “mobile virtual network operator” or MVNO. But the reports hadn’t been confirmed until Sundar Pichai, the company’s senior vice president, spoke at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona on Monday.“You’ll see us announce it in the coming months,” said Pichai.Pichai said it won’t be a full-service mobile network in competition with existing carriers.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Google confirms carrier plans, details coming soon
Google has confirmed for the first time that it plans to offer connectivity directly to mobile users in the U.S., but a senior executive downplayed the competition it would be to major U.S. cellular carriers. Several reports have said the company is preparing a service that would be offered across an existing cellular network under a Google brand—a so-called “mobile virtual network operator” or MVNO. But the reports hadn’t been confirmed until Sundar Pichai, the company’s senior vice president, spoke at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona on Monday.+ See our full coverage of MWC 2015 +To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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SanDisk pushes MicroSD to 200GB
SanDisk has managed to cram 200GB of memory into a MicroSD card.The new card is a 56 percent jump on the current highest capacity MicroSD, a 128GB card.SanDisk said it managed the higher capacity by using a proprietary design and production process that allows for more bits of memory per chip.It didn’t disclose details of the process, but the capacity of the card gives a clue as to how close it has come to the current limits of manufacturing technology.Memory chips are typically sized in powers of 2, with steps such as 16GB, 32GB, 64GB and 128GB. Keeping that patten would result in a 256GB chip, but it appears SanDisk wasn’t able to do that. Instead, it settled for 200MB.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Samsung to launch mobile payments in challenge to Google, Apple
The world’s biggest maker of Android phones launched a major challenge to Google Wallet on Sunday, saying it will soon launch a rival phone-based payment system.Samsung Pay will appear first in the summer in the U.S.—later in other markets—and will allow consumers to make tap-and-go payments with a smartphone. It is being introduced as Google is moving to strengthen its position in the mobile payments market to better compete with Apple Pay.The system will first be available on the Galaxy S6, Samsung’s flagship smartphone that was launched on Sunday at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. It will rely on the contactless NFC payment infrastructure already used by competitors including Google Wallet and Apple Pay.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Samsung to launch mobile payments in challenge to Google, Apple
The world’s biggest maker of Android phones launched a major challenge to Google Wallet on Sunday, saying it will soon launch a rival phone-based payment system. Samsung Pay will appear first in the summer in the U.S.—later in other markets—and will allow consumers to make tap-and-go payments with a smartphone. It is being introduced as Google is moving to strengthen its position in the mobile payments market to better compete with Apple Pay. The system will first be available on the Galaxy S6, Samsung’s flagship smartphone that was launched on Sunday at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. It will rely on the contactless NFC payment infrastructure already used by competitors including Google Wallet and Apple Pay.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Firefox OS coming to US, developed markets in 2016
Firefox OS, the smartphone operating system from Mozilla targeted at low-cost smartphones in emerging markets, is coming to more developed markets.A new project with carriers in the U.S., Japan, South Korea and Spain will see high-spec phones developed for release in 2016. But rather than challenging Android and iOS head on, the project will target something that’s been largely out of fashion in recent years: flip phones and sliders.Andreas Gal, chief technology officer at Mozilla, said some customers like the older form factors but choosing them often means being stuck with an old operating system that has none of the flexibility of a modern smartphone OS.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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HTC One M9 revealed ahead of official launch
HTC’s new flagship Android smartphone, the One M9, has been revealed by a U.S. retailer hours before its expected launch at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.Best Buy is listing a 32GB version of the handset for use on AT&T’s 4G LTE network in the U.S. for US$650.It says the phone is based on a Qualcomm Snapdragon 810 processor running at 2GHz and Google’s Android 5.0 operating system, popularly known as “Lollipop.” It has a 5-inch screen with 1920-by-1080-pixel resolution, a 20-megapixel front-facing camera and a 4-megapixel rear camera.The phone is one of a number of new handsets being launched at the event, which is the biggest annual get-together for the mobile telecommunications industry.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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HTC One M9 revealed ahead of official launch
Martyn Williams, IDGNS HTC’s new flagship Android smartphone, the One M9, has been revealed by a U.S. retailer hours before its expected launch at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.Best Buy is listing a 32GB version of the handset for use on AT&T’s 4G LTE network in the U.S. for US$650.It says the phone is based on a Qualcomm Snapdragon 810 processor running at 2GHz and Google’s Android 5.0 operating system, popularly known as “Lollipop.” It has a 5-inch screen with 1920-by-1080-pixel resolution, a 20-megapixel front-facing camera and a 4-megapixel rear camera.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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Samsung, SKT to demonstrate 7.5Gbps wireless data next week
Samsung Electronics and South Korean mobile operator SK Telecom plan to demonstrate next week research into future “5G” wireless and data transmission at 7.55Gbps.The two companies, which formed a research and development agreement on 5G wireless in October last year, will show off the technology at the Mobile World Congress expo in Barcelona. The annual event, the biggest in the wireless telecommunications industry, begins on Monday.The transmission will use millimeter wave frequencies, which are generally considered to be those over 6GHz. That’s higher than current mobile phone and Wi-Fi frequencies and something that brings advantages and disadvantages.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here