Android rugby

A burst of 10 links for you to chew over, as picked by the Technology team

UX Critique >> Tumblr

User interface/experience critiques of iOS 7. All good points. The strongest criticism is that it's not clear what is a button and what is "just" text.

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Demand Media: rise and fall of a content farm >> Variety

The harvest is failing:

Revenues for the most recent quarter were down year-over-year for the first time since that IPO. Co-founder Richard Rosenblatt is no longer CEO as of October, and the search for his replacement is under way. Demand and Rosenblatt declined comment.

The chief exec's role will be tough to fill given how steeply Demand has declined over its seven-year run. Changes in Google's search algorithms have twice hammered the young company in recent years, leaving its few brands that managed to get significant marketplace traction, including eHow.com and Livestrong, haemorrhaging traffic.

Now Demand's focus is on spinning off the only healthy component of its business — domain registration — while trying to motivate its content brands' rapidly eroding audience to spend money on its growing collection of unproven e-commerce ventures.

The revenue from parked domains which people clicked onto is terrifyingly large.

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Bitcoin mining profitability calculator >> Bitcoinx

Increasingly it looks like it's only worth doing if your electricity is free. How soon before organised crime is using the electricity that was used for growing marijuana for Bitcoin mining instead? Might be less profitable - but less criminal too.

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How profitable is AWS? >> Digits To Dollars

Jay Greenberg:

Assume that through the magic of virtualization AWS can run 5 simultaneous users on that server. The figure could be much higher or much lower, but this is a reasonable average. And let's assume the server runs non-stop for two years, but is down for 20% of that time. This accounts for slack time vacancies or what have you, but is just a degree of conservatism for the model. Add all that up, and those $40,000 in costs are far outweighed by the $140,000 in revenue they generate.

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Is Marissa Mayer helping Yahoo — or hurting the struggling tech giant? >> Vanity Fair

But a glittering surface often deflects attention from a messier reality, and that's true with Mayer and Yahoo. No one wants to sound as if they aren't rooting for Yahoo or for her, and because Mayer didn't cooperate for this article, even her friends were often unwilling to speak on the record about her. She's anything but easy to categorize, in ways that are both interesting and possibly troubling for Yahoo's future. "She is a confusing person," says someone who has worked with her closely. "It is a mistake to paint her as an angel or as a devil." Another executive who worked with her agrees that she is a hard person to understand. "There are some parts of Marissa World that are just inexplicably weird," he says. "It doesn't add up."

A long read - make time for it.

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Slowly they modernize: a federal agency that still uses floppy disks >> NYTimes.com

Every day, The Federal Register, the daily journal of the United States government, publishes on its website and in a thick booklet around 100 executive orders, proclamations, proposed rule changes and other government notices that federal agencies are mandated to submit for public inspection.

So far, so good.

It turns out, however, that the Federal Register employees who take in the information for publication from across the government still receive some of it on the 3.5in plastic storage squares that have become all but obsolete in the US.

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Apple's App Store hits one million apps in the United States >> Mac Rumors

Apple has approved a total of approximately 1,439,451 apps since the App Store opened in 2008 and over the course of the year, has been creeping towards the million milestone. Of the 1 million apps available for download, more than half a million are available for Apple's iPad, and over 900,000 are available for the iPhone. The company has now paid out more than $13 billion to App Store developers.

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CVE-2013-6271: Remove device locks from Android phone >> cureblog Security Blog

The vulnerability described here enables any rogue app at any time to remove all existing device locks activated by a user. Curesec disclosed this vulnerability as Google Android Security Team was not responding any more about this issue.

Affects all versions of Android from 4.0 to 4.3; (no vulnerability in 4.4). There's a downloadable APK on the page which you can use to test it; Google's package installer lets run without comment. And it will turn off all your device locks.

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Low-Cost tablets are the netbooks of the tablet category >> Tech.pinions

Ben Bajarin:

I propose we look at low-cost tablets in a similar light as Netbooks. If you recall, a Netbook was in essence a truncated PC. It looked like a PC but failed miserably when someone bought it and tried to use it like a PC. Hence the astronomical return rates we saw in the early Netbook days. Netbooks were treated as second-class citizens to PCs by everyone who made them and by retailers. The term itself was invented to try and call these devices out separately as to not confuse consumers into thinking they were PCs.

The same issue now exists with these low-cost tablets. Consumers who have bought them and tried to use them like higher priced tablets were disappointed. These devices are simply weak tablets in the same ways the Netbook was a weak PC. Both barely sufficed at a few tasks and were extremely limited in their use cases.…

For those of us who track and count these things, the tablet market is more complex and filled with variety than many other segments we have tracked before.

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AT&T follows T-Mobile by splitting phone cost from service plans >> Bloomberg

AT&T, bowing to pressure from smaller rival T-Mobile US, introduced a new line of service plans that it expects will save customers $15 a month on average by excluding device costs.

The Mobile Share Value plan, which will roll out on 8 December, eliminates subsidies used to lower the price of phones. Users who either own a device or pay for one in installments can start at $45 a month for 300 megabytes of data, along with unlimited text and talk, according to a statement today. AT&T's current price for a similar plan is $70, whether or not the customer already has a phone.

The US discovers SIM-free contracts, though it's still gouging customers. $45 for 300MB?

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You can follow Guardian Technology's linkbucket on Pinboard

To suggest a link, either add it below or tag it with @gdntech on the free Delicious service.Source: Theguardian. comReadmore: Gadget News: Boot up: iOS 7 UX critique, Marissa Mayer profiled, Bitcoin mining?, and more

A burst of 9 links for you to chew over, as picked by the Technology team

Self-driving cars to hit Swedish public roads >> TechHive

The project is called "Drive Me" and is a joint initiative between the Volvo Car Group, the Swedish Transport Administration, the Swedish Transport Agency, Lindholmen Science Park and the City of Gothenburg, Volvo said Monday. Together they will make an effort to eliminate deadly car crashes in Sweden, said Erik Coelingh, technical specialist at Volvo Car Group.

In the next few years, Volvo will develop its Scalable Product Architecture (SPA) in its XC90 model. The goal is to have the first self-driving cars available to 100 consumers by 2017, Coelingh said. They will be able let their cars navigate about 50 typical commuter arteries that include motorway conditions and frequent traffic jams in and around Gothenburg, the country's second largest city.

In case you thought Google was the only company doing self-driving cars.

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Review: BlackBerry Z30 >> Neowin

Brad Sams:

The Z30 is the best BlackBerry phone on the market but falls way short of the premium offerings from Android, Apple and even Windows Phone.

The hardware for the Z30 is actually quite good. The phone feels great in your hands and the 5in screen does not seem all that large and in fact, from a hardware point of view, the phone is fantastic.

Where it all goes downhill, is when you turn the device on. The slow boot time and buggy user experience leaves a lot of room for improvement. We had several instances where the touchscreen stopped responding to input for a few seconds or had an app crash for no apparent reason.

The phone still has a considerable learning curve to it as well. Even though the OS now includes a tutorial feature that helps you learn all the gestures, coming from iOS or Android, it's certainly a different experience and it is hard to quantify if that 'difference' is a good thing. The lack of a dedicated home or back button at the bottom of the screen will likely annoy converts to the platform at first and in the retail space, with only a few minutes to try out the platform, could turn off potential buyers.

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IDC forecasts PC shipments to fall by double digits in 2013; volumes expected ro stabilise above 300m units per tear, but with no significant recovery >> IDC

Worldwide PC shipments are expected to fall by -10.1% in 2013, slightly below the previous projection of -9.7%, and by far the most severe yearly contraction on record, according to the International Data Corporation (IDC) Worldwide Quarterly PC Tracker. Interest in PCs has remained limited, leading to little indication of positive growth beyond replacement of existing systems. Total shipments are expected to decline by an additional -3.8% in 2014 before turning slightly positive in the longer term. At these rates, total PC shipments will remain just above 300 million during the forecast – barely ahead of 2008 volumes.

Consumers, who used to be half of the market, are in effect on a buying strike. It's essentially turned into a replacement business.

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Dark marketplace closes after theft of £3m in bitcoins >> BBC News

Darknet market Sheep Marketplace has shut down after $5.3m (£3.3m) in bitcoins was stolen from the site.

The site shut down over the weekend and visitors today see a notice blaming the theft for the closure.

It said the theft was carried out by a vendor on Sheep who exploited a bug in the site's software to steal the virtual cash.

This is a key problem at the moment with Bitcoin: the organisations acting as banks are as vulnerable as the ones in the Wild West of yore.

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How tablets have redefined the rules of personal computing >> TIME.com

Tim Bajarin was asked to look at Microsoft's early efforts with tablets. And now:

While I state that the tablet journey has gone on for well over 20 years, its accelerated growth has come in just the last three years.

Another interesting point of reference is that most homes in developed markets have one PC or laptop. By 2016, these same homes will have about three tablets each, making them in many ways the most important computing tools in the family. With tablets priced as low as $49 with most of the relatively good models priced between $129 and $199, it's not too far fetched to suggest that every person in the home in these markets could have a tablet of their own by 2016. In emerging markets, we could have at least one tablet per home as well.

Although the smartphone has become the dominant personal communications device, its small screen makes it difficult to serve as a fully-functioning personal computer.

What's the dividing line between a phablet and a tablet, though?

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Cloud Horrors >> deRisk the Cloud

Breaking Cloud, our collection of Cloud 'horror' stories showing what can happen when a good cloud goes bad …or when a good plan doesn't exist!

And Obamacare online is straight in at No.1!

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Supreme Court refuses Amazon's challenge to online sales tax law >> Gigaom

Can states collect sales tax from online retailers that have no physical presence in the state? For now, the answer is yes after the Supreme Court refused a request by Amazon and Overstock to review a lower court's decision that upheld a law that lets New York collect taxes if the companies advertise in the state.

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Want to fight off content pirates? Just stream your show for free >> Businessweek

The question of how to deal with the piracy of music, movies, and other forms of online content isn't likely to be solved soon. But a chapter in a soon-to-be-published book on the digital economy (pdf) by the National Bureau of Economic Research makes a compelling case for media companies speeding up efforts to get as much of their content online as possible.

The study looks at what happened in 2009, when ABC (DIS) added a chunk of TV shows to Hulu, the popular streaming-video service. The results were immediate and striking: Illegal downloads of those shows dropped almost 20% compared with a control group.

It makes a certain amount of sense that people wouldn't seek out illegal copies of shows they can watch legally. More interesting is the impact that ABC's decision seems to have had on the levels of piracy for other content.

Streamed is harder to store, and you can't fast-forward through the ads. Smart.

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Samsung: Tizen and Firefox could be powerful allies against Android and iOS | SamMobile

Samsung has big plans for Tizen, the mobile operating system it is jointly developing with Intel, that's no secret. But, if the words of a Samsung executive are to be believed, those plans might also include the usually unthinkable act of joining forces with a rival operating system. At the Conference for establishing HTML5 Fusion Technique, Wonsuk Lee, Chief Secretary of Samsung, expressed interest in teaming up with Mozilla and bringing Tizen and Firefox OS closer together, due to the support for HTML5 development on both operating systems.

Those sound more like small plans. Samsung's attitude to Tizen seems to be to keep it locked in a box.

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You can follow Guardian Technology's linkbucket on Pinboard

To suggest a link, either add it below or tag it with @gdntech on the free Delicious service.Source: Theguardian. comReadmore: Gadget News: Boot up: self-driving Swedes, Z30 reviewed, PC woes, Bitcoin theft, and more

A quick burst of 8 links for you to chew over, as picked by the Technology team

How we cope with spammers, fakers and cloners >> The Echo Nest Blog

The Echo Nest knows approximately 2.4 million artists as part of our database of music information, which is the largest in the world. However, we also keep a list of artists to ban from our system intentionally, so they never get recommended on any of our clients' services, or in their apps.

This isn't a matter of taste (so Coldplay and Raffi are in no danger). It's because those banned artists are spammers.

Musical spam is much less familiar than email spam, but it works the same way: If it's too hard to find the 10 people who might enjoy a shady or questionable product, spammers go for sheer volume, in their attempts to spoil your online experience with unwanted email or music.

The one who just does silent tracks is quite something.

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Magnus Carlsen's win in chess championship shows powerful role of computers >> WSJ.com

When [chess computing] engines suggest surprising moves, or arrangements of pieces that look "ugly" to human sensibilities, they are often seeing more deeply into the game than their users. They are not perfect; sometimes long-term strategy still eludes them. But players have learned from computers that some kinds of chess positions are playable, or even advantageous, even though they might violate general principles. Having seen how machines go about attacking and especially defending, humans have become emboldened to try the same ideas.

Computers have gone so far that the top human players are now those who most often play the moves that would be chosen by the best engines (which sport names like Houdini, HIARCS and Rybka). Magnus Carlsen's biographers dub him the "hero of the computer era." Indeed, a study published on ChessBase.com earlier this year showed that in the tournament Mr. Carlsen won to qualify for the world championship match, he played more like a computer than any of his opponents.

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Nanoparticle-infused speaker could mean better sound in a smaller package >> ExtremeTech

A team of researchers from Sweden's KTH Royal Institute of Technology have created a new kind of loudspeaker that relies on nanoparticle-infused membranes to generate sound without need of a permanent magnet.

The main constituent of the membrane is cellulose fiber -- the polysaccharide component of plant cell walls. Researchers mixed the cellulose fibers in solution with ferromagnetic salts at 90 degree Celsius, then left the mixture to bond over the course of two months. The remaining water was drained at the end of this period to reveal a hydrogel (a hydrophilic collection of polymers) composed of magnetic cellulose fibers.

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Your medical records - now on sale >> Light Blue Touchpaper

Ross Anderson:

Your medical records are now officially on sale. American drug companies now learn that MedRed BT Health Cloud will provide public access to 50 million de-identified patient records from UK.

David Cameron announced in 2011 that every NHS patient would be a research patient, with their records opened up to private healthcare firms. He promised that our records would be anonymised and we'd have a right to opt out. I pointed out that anonymisation doesn't work very well (as did the Royal Society) but the Information Commissioner predictably went along with the charade (and lobbyists are busy fixing up the new data protection regulation in Brussels to leave huge loopholes for health service management and research).

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How the Apple-Samsung jury split the difference >> Fortune Tech

Although she was a substitute witness hired after Apple's first accounting expert died, [Apple accounting expert witness Julia] Davis kept her cool under tough cross-examination by Samsung, according to jurors. They call her a "superstar witness."

On two of the three baskets - lost profits and lost royalties - the jurors agreed that Apple should get everything it asked for.

On the third - Samsung's $230m in profits - they "butted heads," according to Colleen Allen, the former U.S. military medic who served as forewoman.

Samsung had argued that there were operating costs associated with those profits - $178m, to be exact - and that to be fair the jury ought to reduce Samsung's profits of $230m by $178m.

Allen didn't buy it. She agreed with Davis that "absolutely none of it should come out," because Samsung hadn't provided evidence to show that all those operating costs were associated with the devices at issue in the case.

Notable that the damages assessed for the Nexus 4G ramped up considerably in the new result.

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I've been called the "Erin Brockovich" of revenge porn, and for the first time ever, here is my entire uncensored story of death threats, Anonymous and the FBI >> xoJane

Charlotte Laws:

I'd never heard about revenge porn prior to the call, but for many months after, I would hear about little else. I cancelled appointments, put work on hold and ignored routine tasks because a naked image rarely comes off the Internet unless someone becomes obsessed with its removal. RP website operators are consumed with what they do; therefore, anyone who hopes to prevail against them must be equally consumed.

I emailed the site owner, Hunter Moore, and asked him to take down the photo in accordance with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. He refused.

I was not surprised...

The website was not about pornography; it was about ridiculing and hurting others.

An astonishingly determined woman - which is what was needed in this case.

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Mainstream large-screen smartphones to be 5- to 6-inch models

Handset vendors are expected to continue launching large-size smartphones mainly with 5- to 6in displays, as sales of smartphones with a display size of 6in and above have been weaker than expected, according to industry sources.

The current availability of large-size smartphones with over 6in displays include Samsung Electronics' Galaxy Mega 6.3, Huawei's Ascend Mate, Sony Mobile Communications' Xperia Z Ultra and HTC's HTC One Max. But the sources said that sales of these models have been short of original expectations due mainly to concerns of mobility.

While sales of 5-7in smartphones accounted for over 20% of global smartphone sales at the end of the third quarter of 2013, the ratio of smartphones with display sizes of up to 6-7in reached a mere 3%, revealed the sources.

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Taiwan's Acer struggles to redefine its niche >> FT.com

All PC companies are struggling as consumers spend money on new smartphones and tablets instead of PCs. Some, such as Lenovo, have been able to offset that with steady sales to corporate clients or, in Dell and Hewlett-Packard's case, sales of consulting services.

Acer, however, has historically focused on selling low-frills computers to consumers, making up their low profitability with large volumes.

Margins in the consumer PC business have become so tight that US companies are likely going to pull back from it, leaving only Asian brands more familiar with low margin work, Jerry Shen, Asus' chief executive, said recently.

(Subscription required to read full article.)

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You can follow Guardian Technology's linkbucket on Pinboard. To suggest a link, either add it below or tag it with @gdntech on the free Delicious service.Source: Theguardian. comReadmore: Gadget News: Boot up: music spammers (yes!), chess v computers, Apple-Samsung jury speaks, and more

My kids are enrolled in a parent-cooperative nursery in Sweden, so all parents have roles in the running of the nursery. My role is responsibility for IT, and over the past few years, I have been slowly updating and improving all the hardware and software. Now it's time for the desktop PC to be replaced, and this is where I am at a bit of a loss. As a Mac user, I have little knowledge of what would be suitable. However, I know that the staff – capable as they are – couldn't cope with a switch to Mac.

The main requirements for the hardware are:

• A good financial investment - reliable quality - takes care of itself.

• Future proof/upgradeable (three years or more).

• Can handle images, and Microsoft Office for documents, posters, forms etc.

For software, I'm also looking for a backup system similar to Time Machine on the Mac, and for newsletters, software that can simply edit photos from iPads and digital cameras. Also, I want an email client to let each staff member log into their own account from the same user profile.

Matthew



There are two ways to approach the hardware. Either you can buy from a global giant that specialises in supplying small businesses and offers on-site service, or you can buy from a small, local shop that also specialises in looking after small businesses. The former is probably the safest course, but the latter is worth considering if you are close to a really good local supplier.

If you decide to go with a global giant, both HP and Dell supply cheap, reliable, small-tower desktop computers that are easy to repair and upgrade. Their desktops should easily last three years, and six years is more likely. Indeed, I think you should buy a machine that you expect to run until 14 January, 2020, which is when Microsoft will stop supporting Windows 7. This means you can amortise the cost over 300 weeks or 72 months.

HP or Dell?

From HP's range, I would go for the HP 3500 Pro Microtower PC & HP 23bw IPS LED backlit monitor. This has a third generation Intel Core i5-3470 quad-core processor with 4GB of memory, a 500GB hard drive, and 64-bit Windows 7. The closest I can find after wrestling with HP's Swedish site is the HP Pro 3500 MT (C5X65EA). Note that you will want to add a Care Pack to provide three years of next business day on-site service.

"Defective Media Retention" means you get to keep the hard drive if something goes wrong with it. This is highly recommended for data protection purposes. It's even more recommended if the drive contains data about nursery school children.

From Dell's range, I would go for the Vostro 270MT. This has the same specification as the HP machine, including the Core i5-3470 processor. Again, go for three years of Pro (rather than Basic) support. I bought a similar but slightly bigger machine two years ago -- a Dell Vostro 460DT with a Core i5-2500 -- but included an Nvidia GeForce GT 420 graphics card. The 270MT lacks this and will use main memory for graphics, but it should not be a problem for your purposes. In any case, it's easy to add a cheap graphics card or extra memory later.

The third-generation Core i5-3470 is quite a bit faster than, for example, a fourth-generation Haswell Core i7-4600U. Being in a desktop tower, it can run hotter than would be possible in a thin laptop (in this case, 77 Watts vs 15 Watts).

Windows and Office

There are several reasons for getting 64-bit Windows 7 Pro. First, the desktop interface should be an easier step up, compared to Windows 8, for those not already familiar with it. Second, it will be supported until 2020, as mentioned, and it's not going to change, though you should keep updating to newer browsers. Third, Microsoft allows you to run a free virtual copy of Windows XP under Windows 7 Pro, if you have some reason for doing that. Fourth, you're actually buying a copy of Windows 8 with a downgrade to Windows 7 Pro, so you could upgrade to Windows 8 free of charge, if you wanted to.

You don't mention which version of Microsoft Office you have, but if you have the DVDs, you can install the old copy on your new PC. If not, I would buy a DVD copy of Microsoft Office Home and Business 2010. There are some advantages to the new Office 2013, particularly the wealth of templates and the live preview options that make it much easier to make documents look nice. Also, you can synchronise Office 2013 with Outlook.com web-based email without using the old Microsoft Office Outlook Hotmail Connector. However, 2010 is more likely to be familiar to existing users of Office 2007 and 2010. (You don't need to be at the "leading edge", but nor should you fall too far behind.)

Microsoft Office Home and Business 2010 includes Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OneNote and Outlook, which should take care of most of your office needs. Everyone should use the same Microsoft Outlook account for all nursery business email, contacts book and calendar, and Outlook can also be used to organise meetings and keep to-do lists. Staff should not use it to send personal emails: they can use their own web-based mail accounts, such as Google's Gmail or Microsoft's Outlook.com. Of course, you should remind them not to store their passwords in shared web browsers.

This version of Office does not include Microsoft Publisher, but Word already includes simple photo editing tools. Once you have pasted in a photo, you can crop and rotate it, change brightness and contrast, and add effects, including soft edges. I prefer to edit copies of photos first, but the free Paint.net is powerful enough for most ordinary purposes. You don't need Microsoft Publisher (which is included in bigger versions of Office) because you can use the free Serif PagePlus Starter Edition instead. Scribus is a free, open source alternative, but harder to use.

Backup strategies

Windows 7 already has easy-to-use backup and restore, which includes scheduled backups. If you buy a Dell, you may find it includes a similar but unnecessary program, Dell DataSafe Local Backup, which tries to get you to upgrade to a premium version.

Time Machine keeps hourly backups for the past 24 hours, daily backups for the past month, and weekly backups until your backup drive is full. I can't think of a PC product that does the same thing out of the box, but there are plenty of options that keep earlier versions of files, if you set them up. RollBack RX ($69) and Genie Timeline Professional 2013 (£44.95) seem closest to Time Machine. 2BrightSparks' SyncBack Pro (£37.48) should also do everything you need, as long as you watch out for running out of drive space. Altaro's BackupFS (£79) is another option, though it's really designed for servers. However, I'm going by spec sheets: I haven't used any of these programs myself.

The more obvious way of backing things up to an external hard drive is to use a free file synchronisation program. I'd go for either 2BrightSparks' SyncBackFree V6.5 or the open source FreeFileSync (which is the one I use) rather than Microsoft's popular SyncToy 2.1.

Windows 7 already has System Protection turned on by default for the C: drive, so right-clicking on any file offers the menu option to "Restore previous versions". Otherwise, AutoVer freeware provides a really simple way to keep real-time backups of multiple versions of files. Windows 7's backup program can create a disk image as a VHD (Virtual Hard Drive) file that is a complete, mountable clone of your PC. That plus some free file syncing may be all you need.

There are lots of other useful free programs for Windows, but that's a different question, if someone wants to ask it ...

Source: Theguardian. comReadmore: Gadget News: Which PC should I buy to run a small business?

A burst of 8 links for you to chew over, as picked by the Technology team

How long do disk drives last? >> Backblaze blog

Why does a company that keeps more than 25,000 disk drives spinning all the time not know how long they last? Backblaze has been providing reliable and unlimited online backup for over five years. For the past four years, we've had enough drives to provide good statistics, but 78% of the drives we buy are living longer than four years. So while 22% of drives fail in their first four years, and we have detailed information about the failure rates of drives in their first four years, we don't yet know what will happen beyond that. So how long do drives last? Keep reading.

It's a bathtub shape, as you have heard. But how long do the drives stay in the tub?

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The Seattle police department disables Its mesh network (the new apparatus capable of spying on you) >> The Stranger

The Seattle Police Department just announced that it has begun the process of deactivating its wireless mesh network, a powerful tool for sending vast amounts of data that also has powerful surveillance potential. In theory, the network (built by a California-based company called Aruba Networks) could track and indefinitely log the movements of any wireless device with a MAC address (phones, laptops, tablets) that moves through its coverage area.

The possibility of a police department creating a historical digital map of the city, or using such a system for real-time locating of individuals, without governmental or civilian oversight has some serious implications.

Sleeping uneasily in Seattle.

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A month in the life of a Galaxy Note 3 owner >> Android Authority

Joe Hindy:

For the most part, the plethora of Samsung options on my phone remain off. I've always adored Smart Stay and that's on, but the other Smart Screen features are off. Air view and Air gesture are both off. I left Air command on because that's actually useful. The only option in Motions that I have enabled is Smart alert. I have Palm motion on so I can take quick screen shots and Multi-window is on in full capacity. That's really it folks. Voice control is off, Hands-free mode is off, and One-handed operation is off.

Since we are talking about my experience here, I'll go ahead and add that I rooted my device and am running a custom ROM.

He really likes it. Intriguing how people turn off all those Samsung options.

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I think we found a app-breaking bug in Hangouts >> Android

Reddit user Recon0212:

So this probably won't happen to everyone.

We have 12 people in our hangouts group. One of my friends decided it would be funny to spam atleast 10 pages of emoticons (a monkey and a pig, to be exact.)

Upon doing it, none of this could get into the app.

So why does this suck? Well, we all know that the Nexus 5 relies on Hangouts for SMS (Without the use of 3rd party SMS). But if some jerk were to spam you a bunch of emoticons it means you can not use hangouts at all.

The solution we found is to log into Google+ on a computer and leave the group, and you can enter hangouts after that.

All 6 of our devices could not log into Hangouts on our phones ans tablets, but this did not affect iPhone users for some reason.

Hangouts product manager now aware, apparently.

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Frequently Asked Questions >> Coin

Q. How much does a Coin cost?

A. Each Coin costs $100. For you early adopters there is a very limited quantity that can be purchased for $50.

Q. How do I get my Coin?

A. You can pre-order a Coin via our website.

Q. Where can I use Coin?

A. You can use a Coin everywhere cards are accepted including dip-style card readers and ATMs. Use a Coin just like you use your cards now at gas stations, restaurants, the mall, the gym, or other places you frequent.

Q. Will my Coin work outside the US?

A. Not in all cases.

Forget credit cards - now you just need this, and a smartphone. As Arthur Dent might say, we'll see which one runs out of battery first.

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The second operating system hiding in every mobile phone >> OS News

Thom Holwerda:

This operating system is stored in firmware, and runs on the baseband processor. As far as I know, this baseband RTOS is always entirely proprietary. For instance, the RTOS inside Qualcomm baseband processors (in this specific case, the MSM6280) is called AMSS, built upon their own proprietary REX kernel, and is made up of 69 concurrent tasks, handling everything from USB to GPS. It runs on an ARMv5 processor.

The problem here is clear: these baseband processors and the proprietary, closed software they run are poorly understood, as there's no proper peer review. This is actually kind of weird, considering just how important these little bits of software are to the functioning of a modern communication device. You may think these baseband RTOS' [real time operating systems] are safe and secure, but that's not exactly the case. You may have the most secure mobile operating system in the world, but you're still running a second operating system that is poorly understood, poorly documented, proprietary, and all you have to go on are Qualcomm's Infineon's, and others' blue eyes.

What's the betting that the NSA and GCHQ are very, very familiar with these RTOSs - and their bugs?

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Moto G is a game changer but likely to be a commercial failure in India >> BGR

Rajat Agrawal pours some cold water on fevered brows:

Motorola might be a "Google-owned" company but it is not Google. Across the world, barring the US and some Latin American countries, Motorola is a brand that has wound up its business and left. It does not have any market presence in most of the world. It is no longer a tier one OEM as far as the trade is concerned. What's more, the launch of the Moto G does not mean it marks Motorola's re-entry in the countries from where it left.

Apart from the US and Brazil where one will be able to buy the Moto G directly from Motorola, it will be sold through Motorola's partners – carriers, retail chains and distributors – in the rest of the world. This brings the big question of who handles the after-sales service, which is a critical aspect for most emerging countries, including India. Who will set up the service centres across the country, if Motorola is not doing it on its own?

The next challenge for Motorola would be its distribution and sales strategy.

Motorola lost money when it was independent; now it loses money and sells fewer handsets than before.

---

Search animated GIFs on the web >> Giphy

There's a business model just waiting to happen here.

---

You can follow Guardian Technology's linkbucket on Pinboard

To suggest a link, either add it below or tag it with @gdntech on the free Delicious service.Source: Theguardian. comReadmore: Gadget News: Boot up: disk drive life, Note 3 one month on, phone RTOS hacks, and more

Profit or non-profit? Definitely for-profit! First, because the eBay founder Pierre Omidyar's track record (see this the New Inquiry article) shows a fierce appetite for profitable ventures. And second, because there no such thing as a free and independent media press without a strong business side: financial vulnerability is journalism's worst enemy, while profit breeds scalability. How to make money, then, with a narrow niche such as investigative journalism? Can Omidyar's venture move beyond the cross-subsidy system that powered legacy media for decades? This weekend, in a FT.com interview, Henry Blodget justified the deluge of eye-grabbing headlines spread over Business Insider by saying "The dining and motoring sections pay for the Iraq bureau"

For this, Omidyar can look at a wide set of choices: he could devise click-driven contents built on the proven high volume/cheap ads equation. Or he could opt for what I'll call the Porsche Model, one in which the most visible activity (in this case sports car manufacturing) brings only a marginal contribution to the P&L when compared to its financial activities: in 2009, Porsche made $1bn (£620m) in profit from car sales and almost $7bn betting on Volkswagen stock. More realistically, an endowment-like model sounds natural for a deep-pocketed investor like Omidyar. Most US universities are doing fine with that model: a large sum of money, the endowment, is invested and produces enough interest to run operations. One sure thing: if he really wants to go against big corporations and finance, to shield it from pressure, Omidyar should keep its business model disconnected from its editorial operation.

Investigative journalism is a field in which the subscription model can work. In France, the website Mediapart offers a credible example. Known for, among many others feats, its investigation of the budget minister's hidden Swiss bank account that led to his resignation, Mediapart maintains a newsroom of seasoned reporters working on hot topics. In five years, it collected close to 80,000 subscribers paying €9.90 per month; the website intends to make €6m (£5m) in revenue and a profit of €400,000 this year. Small amounts indeed, but not so bad for a market one-fifth the size of the US. Scaling up to the huge English-speaking market, and assuming that it will go for a global scope rather than a US-centric coverage, the Omidyar-Greenwald venture could shoot for 500,000 to 800,000 subscribers within a few years, achieving $40m to $60m in yearly revenue.

On the product side, the motto should be: try everything – on multiple segments and platforms.

Here is possible product-line structure:



Mobile should primarily be a news updating vector. In a developing story, say hearings on the NSA scandal, readers want quotes, live blogging, snapshots – all easy to grab while on the go. Addiction must be the goal.

Newsletters deserve particular attention. They remain an excellent vector to distribute news and a powerful traffic driver. But this requires two conditions: First, they must be carefully designed, written by human beings and not by robots. Second, they must be run like an e-commerce operation: a combination of mass emailing and heavy personalisation based on collected navigation data. For an editorial product, this means mapping out granular "semantic profiles" in order to serve users with tailored contents. If the Omidyar-Greenwald project lives up to its promise, it will deliver a regular stream of exclusive stuff. A cleverly engineered email system (both editorially and technically) stands good chances to become a must-read.

User profiling must allow the creation of several verticals. Judging who will join the venture from the first bylines (see article in CNet), the coverage intends to be broad: from national security to White House politics, sports issues (a sure click-bait), civil liberties, military affairs, etc. This justifies working on audience segmentation, as not everyone will be interested in the same subject. The same goes for social web extensions: the more segmented, the better.

Web TV. If you want to go beyond kittens or Nascar crashes, providing TV contents on the web is more difficult that it appears. But "programmes" available in Scandinavia show that, for developing stories, web TV can be a great substitute for conventional TV as it allows simultaneous coverage of multiple events. Nordic viewers love that.

Fact-checking. Since the Omidyar-Greenwald project is builtt on trust and transparency, it should consider launching the equivalent of politifact.com, a fact-checking website operated by the Tampa Bay Times, which landed a Pulitzer Prize in 2009. A vertical fact-checking site on national security, privacy and data protection issue would definitely be a hit.

Other languages. Going after the Chinese market could be hard to resist. According to Internet World Stats, it is by far the largest single market in the world with 538 million people connected to the web in 2012. For a media venture aimed at lifting the veil on corruption, China offers strong potential in itself. As far as evading censorship, it should be an appealing challenge for the squad of hackers hired by Omidyar-Greenwald.

A print version? Yes. It sounds weird, but I strongly believe that a well-designed weekly, large format (tabloid or Berliner), distributed on selected, affluent markets, would complete the product line. Print remains a vector of choice for specific, long-form readings, ambitious news scenographies with high-impact photographs, for an in-depth profile or a public interest story.

Global Thinking. Its potential for worldwide reach is one of this venture's most interesting factors. It will be of limited interest if it doesn't embrace a global approach to public interest journalism in large democracies but also in countries that are deprived of a free press (a long list). Creating a high standard, worldwide affiliation system to promote investigative journalism everywhere, regardless of the economic and political constraints, should definitely be on the founders' roadmap.

– frederic.filloux@mondaynote.com

Source: Theguardian. comReadmore: Gadget News: Pierre Omidyar and Glenn Greenwald's newsroom – the business model

The words in the standfirst were spoken by an old friend and Amazon veteran, as three French émigrés talked shop at a Palo Alto watering hole. The riposte would fit as the epigraph for The Amazon Money Pump For Dummies, an explanation of Amazon's ever-ascending stock price while the company keeps "losing money".

(I don't like the term business model, and Bizmodel even less so. I prefer money pump with its lively evocations: attach the hose, adjust the valves, prime the mechanism, and then watch the flow of money from the customer's pocket to the investor's purse).

Last quarter, Amazon's revenue grew by 24% year on year, and lost about 1% of its net sales of $17bn (£10.5bn). This strong but profitless revenue growth follows an established pattern:



Despite the company's flat-lined profits, Wall Street loves Amazon and keeps sending its shares to new heights. Since its 1997 IP0, Amazon has gone from $23 to $369 a share:



How come?

[Professional accountants: Avert your eyes; the following simplification could hurt.

Profit isn't cash, it's merely an increase in the value of your assets. Such increase can be illiquid. Profit is an accountant's opinion. Cash is a fact.]

Amazon uses its e-commerce genius to prime the money pump. The company seduces customers through low prices, prompt delivery, an ever-expanding array of services and products, and exemplary customer attention. What keeps the pump going is the lag between the moment they ding my credit card and the time that they pay Samsung for the Galaxy Note tablet I ordered. Last quarter, Amazon's daily revenue was about $200m ($17bn divided by 90 days). If it waits just 24 hours to pay its suppliers, the company has $200m to play with. If it delays payment for a month, that's $6bn it can use to invest in developing the business. Delay an entire quarter … the numbers become dizzying.

But, you'll say, there's nothing profoundly original there. All businesses play this game, retail chains depend on it. Definitely – but what sets Amazon apart is what it does with that flow of free cash. The company is relentless in building the best services and logistics machine on Earth. Just this week, we read that Amazon has hired the US Post Office to deliver Amazon packages (only) on Sundays.

Amazon uses cash to build a better Amazon that keeps bringing in more cash.

Why do suppliers "loan" Amazon such enormous amounts of cash? Why do they let the company grow on their backs? Because, just like Wall Street, they trust that the company will keep growing and give them ever more business. Amazon might be a hard taskmaster, but it can be trusted to pay its bills (eventually) – the same cannot be said of some other retail organisations.

Amazon doesn't care that it doesn't make a "profit" on the sale of a box of Uni-Ball pens that it ships for free. Rather, it focuses on pumping enormous amounts of cash into the virtuous spiral of an ever-expanding business. Wall Street rewards the company with an equally expanding market cap.

How long can Amazon's expansion last? Will the tree grow to the sky? If we consider a single line of business – books, for example – saturation will inevitably set in. But one of the many facets of Bezos' genius is that he's always been able to find new territories. Amazon Web Services is one area where the company is now larger than all of its competitors combined, and shows no sign of slowing down or of approaching saturation.

In the end, we mustn't be fooled by the simplicity of Amazon's money pump. Bezos' genius is in the implementation, in the details. Like a chef who's not afraid to disclose his recipes, Bezos writes to his shareholders every year – his missives are all here – and he always appends his first 1997 letter, thus reminding everyone that he's not about to lose the plot.

The other friend in this conversation, an old Apple hand, happily nodded along as our ex-Amazon compatriot told stories from his years in the Seattle trenches. When asked about the Apple money pump and why Wall Street didn't seem to respect Apple's huge profits, he started with an epigraph of his own:

'The simplest encapsulation of Apple's business model is the iPod.'

To paraphrase: The iPod is the movie star, it brings the audience flocking to the theatre; iTunes is the supporting cast.

iTunes was initially perceived as a money-losing operation, but without it the iPod would have been a good-looking but not terribly useful piece of hardware. iTunes propelled iPod volumes and margin by providing an ecosystem that comprised two innovations: "music by the slice" (v albums,) and a truly new micro-payment system (99 cents charged to a credit card).

That model is what powers the Apple money pump today. The company's personal computers – smartphones, tablets, and laptops/desktops – are the movie stars. Everything else exists to make these lead products more useful and pleasant. Operating systems, applications, stores, Apple TV, the putative iWatch … they're all part of the supporting cast.

Our Apple friend offered another thought: The iPod marked the beginning of the Post-PC era. By 2006 – a year before the introduction of the iPhone – iPod sales had exceeded Mac revenue.

Speaking of cash, Apple doesn't need to play Amazon's timing games. Product margins range from 20-25% for desktops and laptops (compared to HP's 3-5%), to 65% or more for iPhones. With cash reserves reaching $147bn at the end of September 2013, Apple has had to buy shares back and pay dividends to bleed off the excess.

Far from needing a "loan" from its suppliers, Apple heads in exactly the opposite direction. On page 37 of the company's 2013 10-K (annual) filing, you'll find a note referring to "third-party manufacturing commitments and component purchase commitments of $18.6bn ". This is a serious cash outlay, an advance to suppliers to secure components and manufacturing capacity that works out to $50 for every person in the US …

Wall Street's cautious regard for Apple seems ill-advised given Apple's ability to generate cash in embarrassing amounts. As the graph below shows, after following a trajectory superficially similar to Amazon's, Apple apparently "fell from grace" in 2012:



I can think of two explanations, the first one local, the other global.

During fiscal 2012, ending in September of that year, Apple's gross margins reached an unprecedented high of 43.9%. By all standards, this was extremely unusual for a hardware company and, as it turned out, it was unsustainable. In 2013, Apple Gross Margin dropped by more than six percentage points (630 basis points in McKinsey-speak), an enormous amount. Wall Street felt the feast was over.

Also, fiscal 2013 was seen as a drought year. There were no substantial new products beyond the iPhone 5 and the iPad mini announced in September and October 2012, and there was trouble getting the new iMacs into customers' hands during the holiday season.

More globally important is the feeling that Apple has become a "hits" business. iPhones now represent 53% of Apple's revenue, and much more (70%?) of its profits. They sell well, everything looks rosy … until the next season, or the next round of competitive announcements.

This is what makes Wall Street nervous: to some, Apple now looks like a movie studio that's too dependent on the popularity of its small stable of stars.

We hear that history will repeat itself, that the iPhone/iPad will lose the battle to Android, just as the Mac "lost" to Windows in the last century.

Our ex-Apple friend prefers an automotive analogy. Audi, Tim Cook's preferred brand, owns a small portion of the luxury car market (about 7.5%), but it constantly posts increasing profits – and shows no sign of slacking off. Similarly, today's $21bn Mac business holds a mere 10% of the PC market, but Apple "uses" that small share to command 45% of market profits. The formula is no secret but, as with Amazon's logistics and service, the payoff is in the implementation, how the chef combines the ingredients. It's the "mere matter of implementation" that eluded Steve Ballmer's comprehension when he called the MacBook an Intel laptop with an Apple logo slapped on it. Why wouldn't the Mac recipe also work for smartphones and tablets?

– JLG@mondaynote.com

Source: Theguardian. comReadmore: Gadget News: Amazon v Apple: business models compared

The words in the standfirst were spoken by an old friend and Amazon veteran, as three French émigrés talked shop at a Palo Alto watering hole. The riposte would fit as the epigraph for The Amazon Money Pump For Dummies, an explanation of Amazon's ever-ascending stock price while the company keeps "losing money".

(I don't like the term business model, and Bizmodel even less so. I prefer money pump with its lively evocations: attach the hose, adjust the valves, prime the mechanism, and then watch the flow of money from the customer's pocket to the investor's purse).

Last quarter, Amazon's revenue grew by 24% year on year, and lost about 1% of its net sales of $17bn (£10.5bn). This strong but profitless revenue growth follows an established pattern:



Despite the company's flat-lined profits, Wall Street loves Amazon and keeps sending its shares to new heights. Since its 1997 IP0, Amazon has gone from $23 to $369 a share:



How come?

[Professional accountants: Avert your eyes; the following simplification could hurt.

Profit isn't cash, it's merely an increase in the value of your assets. Such increase can be illiquid. Profit is an accountant's opinion. Cash is a fact.]

Amazon uses its e-commerce genius to prime the money pump. The company seduces customers through low prices, prompt delivery, an ever-expanding array of services and products, and exemplary customer attention. What keeps the pump going is the lag between the moment they ding my credit card and the time that they pay Samsung for the Galaxy Note tablet I ordered. Last quarter, Amazon's daily revenue was about $200m ($17bn divided by 90 days). If it waits just 24 hours to pay its suppliers, the company has $200m to play with. If it delays payment for a month, that's $6bn it can use to invest in developing the business. Delay an entire quarter … the numbers become dizzying.

But, you'll say, there's nothing profoundly original there. All businesses play this game, retail chains depend on it. Definitely – but what sets Amazon apart is what it does with that flow of free cash. The company is relentless in building the best services and logistics machine on Earth. Just this week, we read that Amazon has hired the US Post Office to deliver Amazon packages (only) on Sundays.

Amazon uses cash to build a better Amazon that keeps bringing in more cash.

Why do suppliers "loan" Amazon such enormous amounts of cash? Why do they let the company grow on their backs? Because, just like Wall Street, they trust that the company will keep growing and give them ever more business. Amazon might be a hard taskmaster, but it can be trusted to pay its bills (eventually) – the same cannot be said of some other retail organisations.

Amazon doesn't care that it doesn't make a "profit" on the sale of a box of Uni-Ball pens that it ships for free. Rather, it focuses on pumping enormous amounts of cash into the virtuous spiral of an ever-expanding business. Wall Street rewards the company with an equally expanding market cap.

How long can Amazon's expansion last? Will the tree grow to the sky? If we consider a single line of business – books, for example – saturation will inevitably set in. But one of the many facets of Bezos' genius is that he's always been able to find new territories. Amazon Web Services is one area where the company is now larger than all of its competitors combined, and shows no sign of slowing down or of approaching saturation.

In the end, we mustn't be fooled by the simplicity of Amazon's money pump. Bezos' genius is in the implementation, in the details. Like a chef who's not afraid to disclose his recipes, Bezos writes to his shareholders every year – his missives are all here – and he always appends his first 1997 letter, thus reminding everyone that he's not about to lose the plot.

The other friend in this conversation, an old Apple hand, happily nodded along as our ex-Amazon compatriot told stories from his years in the Seattle trenches. When asked about the Apple money pump and why Wall Street didn't seem to respect Apple's huge profits, he started with an epigraph of his own:

'The simplest encapsulation of Apple's business model is the iPod.'

To paraphrase: The iPod is the movie star, it brings the audience flocking to the theatre; iTunes is the supporting cast.

iTunes was initially perceived as a money-losing operation, but without it the iPod would have been a good-looking but not terribly useful piece of hardware. iTunes propelled iPod volumes and margin by providing an ecosystem that comprised two innovations: "music by the slice" (v albums,) and a truly new micro-payment system (99 cents charged to a credit card).

That model is what powers the Apple money pump today. The company's personal computers – smartphones, tablets, and laptops/desktops – are the movie stars. Everything else exists to make these lead products more useful and pleasant. Operating systems, applications, stores, Apple TV, the putative iWatch … they're all part of the supporting cast.

Our Apple friend offered another thought: The iPod marked the beginning of the Post-PC era. By 2006 – a year before the introduction of the iPhone – iPod sales had exceeded Mac revenue.

Speaking of cash, Apple doesn't need to play Amazon's timing games. Product margins range from 20-25% for desktops and laptops (compared to HP's 3-5%), to 65% or more for iPhones. With cash reserves reaching $147bn at the end of September 2013, Apple has had to buy shares back and pay dividends to bleed off the excess.

Far from needing a "loan" from its suppliers, Apple heads in exactly the opposite direction. On page 37 of the company's 2013 10-K (annual) filing, you'll find a note referring to "third-party manufacturing commitments and component purchase commitments of $18.6bn ". This is a serious cash outlay, an advance to suppliers to secure components and manufacturing capacity that works out to $50 for every person in the US …

Wall Street's cautious regard for Apple seems ill-advised given Apple's ability to generate cash in embarrassing amounts. As the graph below shows, after following a trajectory superficially similar to Amazon's, Apple apparently "fell from grace" in 2012:



I can think of two explanations, the first one local, the other global.

During fiscal 2012, ending in September of that year, Apple's gross margins reached an unprecedented high of 43.9%. By all standards, this was extremely unusual for a hardware company and, as it turned out, it was unsustainable. In 2013, Apple Gross Margin dropped by more than six percentage points (630 basis points in McKinsey-speak), an enormous amount. Wall Street felt the feast was over.

Also, fiscal 2013 was seen as a drought year. There were no substantial new products beyond the iPhone 5 and the iPad mini announced in September and October 2012, and there was trouble getting the new iMacs into customers' hands during the holiday season.

More globally important is the feeling that Apple has become a "hits" business. iPhones now represent 53% of Apple's revenue, and much more (70%?) of its profits. They sell well, everything looks rosy … until the next season, or the next round of competitive announcements.

This is what makes Wall Street nervous: to some, Apple now looks like a movie studio that's too dependent on the popularity of its small stable of stars.

We hear that history will repeat itself, that the iPhone/iPad will lose the battle to Android, just as the Mac "lost" to Windows in the last century.

Our ex-Apple friend prefers an automotive analogy. Audi, Tim Cook's preferred brand, owns a small portion of the luxury car market (about 7.5%), but it constantly posts increasing profits – and shows no sign of slacking off. Similarly, today's $21bn Mac business holds a mere 10% of the PC market, but Apple "uses" that small share to command 45% of market profits. The formula is no secret but, as with Amazon's logistics and service, the payoff is in the implementation, how the chef combines the ingredients. It's the "mere matter of implementation" that eluded Steve Ballmer's comprehension when he called the MacBook an Intel laptop with an Apple logo slapped on it. Why wouldn't the Mac recipe also work for smartphones and tablets?

– JLG@mondaynote.com

Source: Theguardian. comReadmore: Gadget News: Amazon vs Apple: business models compared

Profit or non-profit? Definitely for-profit! First, because the eBay founder Pierre Omidyar's track record (see this the New Inquiry article) shows a fierce appetite for profitable ventures. And second, because there no such thing as a free and independent media press without a strong business side: financial vulnerability is journalism's worst enemy, while profit breeds scalability. How to make money, then, with a narrow niche such as investigative journalism? Can Omidyar's venture move beyond the cross-subsidy system that powered legacy media for decades? This weekend, in a FT.com interview, Henry Blodget justified the deluge of eye-grabbing headlines spread over Business Insider by saying "The dining and motoring sections pay for the Iraq bureau"

For this, Omidyar can look at a wide set of choices: he could devise click-driven contents built on the proven high volume/cheap ads equation. Or he could opt for what I'll call the Porsche Model, one in which the most visible activity (in this case sports car manufacturing) brings only a marginal contribution to the P&L when compared to its financial activities: in 2009, Porsche made $1bn (£620m) in profit from car sales and almost $7bn betting on Volkswagen stock. More realistically, an endowment-like model sounds natural for a deep-pocketed investor like Omidyar. Most US universities are doing fine with that model: a large sum of money, the endowment, is invested and produces enough interest to run operations. One sure thing: if he really wants to go against big corporations and finance, to shield it from pressure, Omidyar should keep its business model disconnected from its editorial operation.

Investigative journalism is a field in which the subscription model can work. In France, the website Mediapart offers a credible example. Known for, among many others feats, its investigation of the budget minister's hidden Swiss bank account that led to his resignation, Mediapart maintains a newsroom of seasoned reporters working on hot topics. In five years, it collected close to 80,000 subscribers paying €9.90 per month; the website intends to make €6m (£5m) in revenue and a profit of €400,000 this year. Small amounts indeed, but not so bad for a market one-fifth the size of the US. Scaling up to the huge English-speaking market, and assuming that it will go for a global scope rather than a US-centric coverage, the Omidyar-Greenwald venture could shoot for 500,000 to 800,000 subscribers within a few years, achieving $40m to $60m in yearly revenue.

On the product side, the motto should be: try everything – on multiple segments and platforms.

Here is possible product-line structure:



Mobile should primarily be a news updating vector. In a developing story, say hearings on the NSA scandal, readers want quotes, live blogging, snapshots – all easy to grab while on the go. Addiction must be the goal.

Newsletters deserve particular attention. They remain an excellent vector to distribute news and a powerful traffic driver. But this requires two conditions: First, they must be carefully designed, written by human beings and not by robots. Second, they must be run like an e-commerce operation: a combination of mass emailing and heavy personalisation based on collected navigation data. For an editorial product, this means mapping out granular "semantic profiles" in order to serve users with tailored contents. If the Omidyar-Greenwald project lives up to its promise, it will deliver a regular stream of exclusive stuff. A cleverly engineered email system (both editorially and technically) stands good chances to become a must-read.

User profiling must allow the creation of several verticals. Judging who will join the venture from the first bylines (see article in CNet), the coverage intends to be broad: from national security to White House politics, sports issues (a sure click-bait), civil liberties, military affairs, etc. This justifies working on audience segmentation, as not everyone will be interested in the same subject. The same goes for social web extensions: the more segmented, the better.

Web TV. If you want to go beyond kittens or Nascar crashes, providing TV contents on the web is more difficult that it appears. But "programmes" available in Scandinavia show that, for developing stories, web TV can be a great substitute for conventional TV as it allows simultaneous coverage of multiple events. Nordic viewers love that.

Fact-checking. Since the Omidyar-Greenwald project is builtt on trust and transparency, it should consider launching the equivalent of politifact.com, a fact-checking website operated by the Tampa Bay Times, which landed a Pulitzer Prize in 2009. A vertical fact-checking site on national security, privacy and data protection issue would definitely be a hit.

Other languages. Going after the Chinese market could be hard to resist. According to Internet World Stats, it is by far the largest single market in the world with 538 million people connected to the web in 2012. For a media venture aimed at lifting the veil on corruption, China offers strong potential in itself. As far as evading censorship, it should be an appealing challenge for the squad of hackers hired by Omidyar-Greenwald.

A print version? Yes. It sounds weird, but I strongly believe that a well-designed weekly, large format (tabloid or Berliner), distributed on selected, affluent markets, would complete the product line. Print remains a vector of choice for specific, long-form readings, ambitious news scenographies with high-impact photographs, for an in-depth profile or a public interest story.

Global Thinking. Its potential for worldwide reach is one of this venture's most interesting factors. It will be of limited interest if it doesn't embrace a global approach to public interest journalism in large democracies but also in countries that are deprived of a free press (a long list). Creating a high standard, worldwide affiliation system to promote investigative journalism everywhere, regardless of the economic and political constraints, should definitely be on the founders' roadmap.

– frederic.filloux@mondaynote.com

Source: Theguardian. comReadmore: Gadget News: Pierre Omidyar and Glenn Greenwald's newsroom – the business model

A burst of 8 links for you to chew over, as picked by the Technology team

How long do disk drives last? >> Backblaze blog

Why does a company that keeps more than 25,000 disk drives spinning all the time not know how long they last? Backblaze has been providing reliable and unlimited online backup for over five years. For the past four years, we've had enough drives to provide good statistics, but 78% of the drives we buy are living longer than four years. So while 22% of drives fail in their first four years, and we have detailed information about the failure rates of drives in their first four years, we don't yet know what will happen beyond that. So how long do drives last? Keep reading.

It's a bathtub shape, as you have heard. But how long do the drives stay in the tub?

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The Seattle police department disables Its mesh network (the new apparatus capable of spying on you) >> The Stranger

The Seattle Police Department just announced that it has begun the process of deactivating its wireless mesh network, a powerful tool for sending vast amounts of data that also has powerful surveillance potential. In theory, the network (built by a California-based company called Aruba Networks) could track and indefinitely log the movements of any wireless device with a MAC address (phones, laptops, tablets) that moves through its coverage area.

The possibility of a police department creating a historical digital map of the city, or using such a system for real-time locating of individuals, without governmental or civilian oversight has some serious implications.

Sleeping uneasily in Seattle.

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A month in the life of a Galaxy Note 3 owner >> Android Authority

Joe Hindy:

For the most part, the plethora of Samsung options on my phone remain off. I've always adored Smart Stay and that's on, but the other Smart Screen features are off. Air view and Air gesture are both off. I left Air command on because that's actually useful. The only option in Motions that I have enabled is Smart alert. I have Palm motion on so I can take quick screen shots and Multi-window is on in full capacity. That's really it folks. Voice control is off, Hands-free mode is off, and One-handed operation is off.

Since we are talking about my experience here, I'll go ahead and add that I rooted my device and am running a custom ROM.

He really likes it. Intriguing how people turn off all those Samsung options.

---

I think we found a app-breaking bug in Hangouts >> Android

Reddit user Recon0212:

So this probably won't happen to everyone.

We have 12 people in our hangouts group. One of my friends decided it would be funny to spam atleast 10 pages of emoticons (a monkey and a pig, to be exact.)

Upon doing it, none of this could get into the app.

So why does this suck? Well, we all know that the Nexus 5 relies on Hangouts for SMS (Without the use of 3rd party SMS). But if some jerk were to spam you a bunch of emoticons it means you can not use hangouts at all.

The solution we found is to log into Google+ on a computer and leave the group, and you can enter hangouts after that.

All 6 of our devices could not log into Hangouts on our phones ans tablets, but this did not affect iPhone users for some reason.

Hangouts product manager now aware, apparently.

---

Frequently Asked Questions >> Coin

Q. How much does a Coin cost?

A. Each Coin costs $100. For you early adopters there is a very limited quantity that can be purchased for $50.

Q. How do I get my Coin?

A. You can pre-order a Coin via our website.

Q. Where can I use Coin?

A. You can use a Coin everywhere cards are accepted including dip-style card readers and ATMs. Use a Coin just like you use your cards now at gas stations, restaurants, the mall, the gym, or other places you frequent.

Q. Will my Coin work outside the US?

A. Not in all cases.

Forget credit cards - now you just need this, and a smartphone. As Arthur Dent might say, we'll see which one runs out of battery first.

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The second operating system hiding in every mobile phone >> OS News

Thom Holwerda:

This operating system is stored in firmware, and runs on the baseband processor. As far as I know, this baseband RTOS is always entirely proprietary. For instance, the RTOS inside Qualcomm baseband processors (in this specific case, the MSM6280) is called AMSS, built upon their own proprietary REX kernel, and is made up of 69 concurrent tasks, handling everything from USB to GPS. It runs on an ARMv5 processor.

The problem here is clear: these baseband processors and the proprietary, closed software they run are poorly understood, as there's no proper peer review. This is actually kind of weird, considering just how important these little bits of software are to the functioning of a modern communication device. You may think these baseband RTOS' [real time operating systems] are safe and secure, but that's not exactly the case. You may have the most secure mobile operating system in the world, but you're still running a second operating system that is poorly understood, poorly documented, proprietary, and all you have to go on are Qualcomm's Infineon's, and others' blue eyes.

What's the betting that the NSA and GCHQ are very, very familiar with these RTOSs - and their bugs?

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Moto G is a game changer but likely to be a commercial failure in India >> BGR

Rajat Agrawal pours some cold water on fevered brows:

Motorola might be a "Google-owned" company but it is not Google. Across the world, barring the US and some Latin American countries, Motorola is a brand that has wound up its business and left. It does not have any market presence in most of the world. It is no longer a tier one OEM as far as the trade is concerned. What's more, the launch of the Moto G does not mean it marks Motorola's re-entry in the countries from where it left.

Apart from the US and Brazil where one will be able to buy the Moto G directly from Motorola, it will be sold through Motorola's partners – carriers, retail chains and distributors – in the rest of the world. This brings the big question of who handles the after-sales service, which is a critical aspect for most emerging countries, including India. Who will set up the service centres across the country, if Motorola is not doing it on its own?

The next challenge for Motorola would be its distribution and sales strategy.

Motorola lost money when it was independent; now it loses money and sells fewer handsets than before.

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Search animated GIFs on the web >> Giphy

There's a business model just waiting to happen here.

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To suggest a link, either add it below or tag it with @gdntech on the free Delicious service.Source: Theguardian. comReadmore: Gadget News: Boot up: disk drive life, Note 3 one month on, phone RTOS hacks, and more

I'm looking for a new pocket camera for holidays. Best of three? I'm considering the Canon Powershot SX240 HS, the Panasonic Lumix DMC-SZ3EB-K (£84.00), and the Canon Ixus 510 HS (£139.99). Or is it worth making the step up to a Nikon 1 J2?

Dhiren



These are all good cameras, so you'll need to make a final decision based on three things: the technical specifications, the price, and the handling qualities. I can deal with the tech specs, with a bit of help from DP Review's side-by-side camera comparisons. You'll have to decide how much you want to pay. But you should also try to get some hands-on experience of these cameras in a shop. It's a good idea to get the feel of different cameras and choose one you think you'll enjoy using, as long as it isn't trashed in reviews.

I'd eliminate the Canon Ixus 510 on the grounds of its relatively poor ergonomics (touch screen) and limited image quality, even though it has the same size sensor as the other two (1/2.3"). It does have an appealing style and it's very small -- the reasons my son bought a very similar model. However, the Lumix DMC-SZ3 is a couple of millimetres smaller, and on the Amazon links you provided, dramatically cheaper (£84 vs £140).

Choosing between the Lumix DMC-SZ3 and the Canon Powershot SX240 HS is harder, and I think you would be happy with either. I'd lean towards the SX240 as this is something of a modern classic – along with the SX260 HS, which is the same camera with built-in GPS. There are better Lumix cameras, but compared with the DMC-SZ3, the Powershot SX240 has a better screen and a longer optical zoom (20x vs 10x), plus an HDMI port.

I would expect the Powershot SX240 to produce slightly better photos, with less noise. You might think the Lumix DMC-SZ3 would be better because it's a 16 megapixel camera whereas the SX240 HS only offers 12MP, but the reverse is more likely, given that the sensor sizes are the same. (If someone out there can produce comparison shots, that would be nice.) As Apple said, with some justification, at the iPhone 5S launch: "bigger pixels = better picture".

A German review of the Lumix DMC-SZ3 suggests the Samsung WB30F "smart camera" (£94) as a better option, and I'd tend to agree. I've been using Samsung compacts for the past couple of years, though both models (a WB2000 and a WB750) have had Schneider Kreuznach rather than Samsung zoom lenses. They are very solid and have worked well. The only minor foible was when the WB750 lens stopped zooming, which was cured by removing and then replacing the battery. (Also, it only cost me £95 in Jessops when the SX240 HS was around twice the price.)

Stepping up to "mirrorless"

Whether it's worth stepping up to a Nikon J1 or J2 is an interesting question. There's no doubt that digital compact cameras are being squeezed from below by smartphone cameras, and the Nokia Lumia 1120 probably outperforms most cheap compacts. If you are going on holiday or to a special event, a so-called "travel zoom" like the Powershot SX240 wins every time. You get more shooting range and better quality from the 20x zoom lens, better image quality from the larger sensors, better flash exposures, and better battery life. However, if you are just snapping your lunch for Facebook, none of those things matters.

To get a significant step up in quality means using a bigger image sensor, which means using bigger lenses that gather more light. Both of those cost money. This is where a new type of digital camera enters the picture. They're often called mirrorless cameras, or interchangeable lens cameras (ILCs), or Micro Four Thirds (MFT), after the sensor size used by Olympus and Panasonic.

Really, the naming depends whether you are looking up or down. For smartphone and compact camera owners looking for something better, the key differentiator is interchangeable lenses, so ILC makes sense. For digital SLR owners looking for something smaller and lighter, the lack of a blinking mirror is the significant difference. (SLRs already have interchangeable lenses.) Either way, ILCs are not a new kind of camera at all. They're the digital heirs of the Leica and Contax rangefinder cameras that were the staple of photojournalists from the 1930s to the 1980s, and in some cases the present day.

The Nikon 1 J2 provides a significant step up in the imaging department: it has a 1" sensor generating 10 megapixels. The actual dimensions are 13.2 x 8.8mm (116 sq mm) compared with the Canon Powershot SX240's 6.17 x 4.55mm (28 sq mm). In other words, the image sensor is four times the size. It's also very good value at the current lowest price, which is £199.99 from Argos or Jessops, with the standard 10-30mm lens. It used to sell for £500.

However, you could find the 3x optical zoom range a bit restrictive, so have a look for a bundle that includes a 30-110mm lens as well. According to the site I always consult, Camera Price Buster, the lowest price for a J2 two-lens outfit is £299.99, but it's pink.

You could also consider the older Nikon 1 J1 model, which has the same basic specification. The main advantages of the J2 are its much better screen (twice the pixels), aluminium-finish body, Creative Mode, and slow-motion video. The J1 should therefore be cheaper, but according to Camera Price Buster, it isn't.

Bigger sensors

Although the Nikon 1 J2 is a terrific all-round family camera with a relatively large sensor, it has been criticised for having too small a sensor. Photographers who are trading down from DSLRs rather than moving up from phones are usually looking for the extra quality delivered by Micro Four Thirds and APS-C sensors.

With this in mind, the options include the Canon EOS M (£349), Sony NEX3NL (£294.99), Lumix G DMC-GF6 (£359) and the Samsung NX1000 (£259.99).

The Canon EOS M, for example, has an APS-C sensor, which measures 22.3 x 14.9mm (332 sq mm). This is more than 10 times the size of the sensor in the Canon Powershot SX240 HS (28 sq mm). For smartphone buffs, the comparable round numbers are 58 sq mm for the Nokia Lumia 1020's 2/3" sensor and 17 sq mm for the iPhone 5S's 1/3" sensor.

Of course, there's not much point in having the extra quality if you only look at pictures on screens and never have photo albums printed out. Also, there's not much point in having a camera with interchangeable lenses if you only own or use one lens. However, extra wide-angle and telephoto lenses cost money, and reduce pocketability.

ILCs can certainly provide high quality results, and they do it at relatively low prices compared to DSLRs or even smartphones like the iPhone 5S (£549 to £709). But travel zoom compacts like the Canon Powershot SX240 HS do what most people need for a much lower price.

Source: Theguardian. comReadmore: Gadget News: Which pocket camera should I buy for holidays?

I'm pretty sure cycling is thought of as low tech, once you have sunk all your cash into high-spec bike. This isn't true. There is a lot on the market for cyclists who enjoy a bit of technology to help make cycling easier, fun, and most of all, safer. Technology can sometimes be said to be bad for us. It keeps us indoors and inactive. Not the case if you incorporate it with a bike.

Head to toe

• MET designed a Crossover helmet that not only offers good protection and comfort, but also has a rear flashing LED light built in for added visibility. You can also buy attachable lights for your current helmet, or how about a helmet camera if you feel like visually logging your rides, or in case of an accident?

• The Rapha rain jacket is a must have. Advances in clothing technology allow it to be pretty much weather-proof and fold away small enough to fit into your pocket.

• If you are looking for a high-tech shoe, then Lake have it covered. Everything from fibreglass to high impact and air-mesh, you might think you were buying a small aeroplane if you didn't know better.

Technology helps when designing shoes, as small details in the shape of a shoe can make all the difference in helping get the foot in the correct position to give the most power when peddling.

Now thats the cyclist covered (almost literally), what about the bike? You can buy a top-end bike that has all the best components, but there is always room for additions. People add to their cars all the time and bikes are no different. It really is something you can personalise.

Fit out your ride

• The Garmin Edge 510 is a great bit of kit for any cyclist. Incorporating touchscreen technology, it is sleek and very user friendly. With social-media sharing, your friends can see your progress and routes. And using wireless data transfers to its own app (available on iOS and Android systems) directly to your smartphone, you get to see your data instantly. Features like Live Tracking are also appealing, not only as a way for friends to follow you, but this can be an additional safety feature for family to know where you are at all times.

• Now we come to lights. A huge part of bike safety is visibility. The Blaze bike light projects a laser image of a bike onto the road ahead of you (think Batman image but of a bike). This enables drivers to see it before they see you, in theory. It has been met with a mixed reaction, as have other similar laser lights.

• Punctures. The one thing I dread when out on my bike miles from home. All the fuss of having to get back, take the wheel off, repair the puncture and replace the wheel. Now technology has a quick fix answer in the form of Hutchinson's Fast Air. A can that inflates the tyre and seals the puncture. With liquid latex and CO2, it makes life a lot easier when out.

• There are a lot of saddles on the market and they need to fit, or you will find them a pain in the backside. They range from full comfort to ones with titanium rails and gel padding. Some are even designed to assure blood flow to arteries, like the Specialised Romin Expert. This is a bit of bike kit where technology could save you a lot of pain and discomfort, so it's worth finding the right one for you.

What about indoor cycling?

If the winter weather isn't your thing, or its just too harsh outside, that doesn't mean you need to hang up your cleats just yet. There are ways that technology can help keep you fit in the comfort of your own home.

The Tacx i-Genius Multiplayer brings cycling and technology together with impressive gameplay. Virtual reality trainers are set to make cycling inside fun and competitive. The trainer hooks up to your PC and you see a real-time VR race on the screen. On a hill, the software-simulated flywheel works to make you feel every gradient you go up or down, ensuring a realistic ride.

Whether you think cycling and technology belong together or not, I think its fair to say that they could prove to have a great friendship with each other. Allowing cyclists to feel safer, track rides, improve on previous ride times and therefore get fitter. Times have thankfully moved on from the wooden bike and I look forward to seeing where technology takes cycling next.

Source: Theguardian. comReadmore: Gadget News: Bike to the future – how technology can bring you and your bike into 2013

Once upon a time, our youngest child took it upon herself to sell our old Chevy Tahoe. She thought her father was a little too soft in his negotiations on the sales lot, too inclined to leave money on the table in his rush to end the suffering.

We arrive at the dealership. She hops out, introduces herself to the salesperson, and then this kid – not yet old enough to vote – begins her pitch. She starts out by making it clear that the car has its faults: a couple of dents in the rear bumper, a stubborn glove compartment door, a cup holder that's missing a flange. Flaws disclosed, she then shows off the impeccable engine, the spotless interior, the good-as-new finish (in preparation, she'd had the truck detailed inside and out, including the engine compartment).

The dealer was charmed and genuinely complimentary. He says my daughter's approach is the opposite of the usual posturing. The typical seller touts the car's low mileage, the documented maintenance, the vows of unimpeachable driver manners. The seller tries to hide the tired tyres and nicked rims, the white smoke that pours from the tail pipe, the "organic" aroma that emanates from the seat cushions – as if these flaws would go unnoticed by an experienced, sceptical professional.

"Give the bad news first," said the gent. "Don't let the buyer discover them, it puts you on the defensive. Start the conversation at the bottom and end with a flourish." (Music to this old salesman's ears. My first jobs were in sales after an "unanticipated family event" threw me onto the streets 50 years ago. I'm still fond of the trade, happiest when well executed, sad when not).

The fellow should have a word or two with Apple execs. They did it again, they bragged about their refurbished iWork suite only to let customers discover that the actual product fails to meet expectations.

We'll get into details in a moment, but a look into past events will help establish the context for what I believe to be a pattern, a cultural problem that starts at the top (and all problems of culture within a company begin at the executive level).

Readers might recall the 2008 MobileMe announcement, incautiously pitched as Exchange for the Rest of Us. When MobileMe crashed, the product team was harshly criticised by the same salesman, Steve Jobs, who touted the product in the first place. We'll sidestep questions of the efficacy of publicly shaming a product team, and head to more important matters: What were Jobs and the rest of Apple execs doing before announcing MobileMe? Did they try the product? Did they ask real friends – meaning non-sycophantic ones – how they used it, for what, and how they really felt?

Skipping some trivial examples, we land on the Maps embarrassment. To be sure, it was well handled … after the fact. Punishment was meted out and an honest, constructive apology made. The expression of regret was a welcome departure from Apple's usual, pugnacious stance. But the same questions linger: What did Apple execs know and when did they know it? Who actually tried Apple Maps before the launch? Were the execs who touted the service ignorant and therefore incompetent, or were they dishonest, knowingly misrepresenting its capabilities? Which is worse?

This is a pattern.

Perhaps Apple could benefit from my daughter's approach: Temper the pitch by confessing the faults.

"Dear customers, as you know, we're playing the long game. This isn't a finished product, it's a work in progress, and we'll put your critical feedback to good use."

Bad news first, calibrate expectations. One would think that (finally!) the Maps snafu would have seared this simple logic into the minds of the Apple execs.

But, no.

We now have the iWork missteps. Apple calls its new productivity suite "groundbreaking". Eddy Cue, Apple's head of internet software and services, is ecstatic:

"This is the biggest day for apps in Apple's history. These new versions deliver seamless experiences across devices that you can't find anywhere else and are packed with great features."

Neither in the written announcement nor during the live presentation will one find a word of caution about iWork's many unpleasant "features".

The idea, as best we can discern through the PR fog, is to make iOS and OS X versions of Pages, Numbers, and Keynote "more compatible" with each other (after Apple has told us, for more than two years, how compatible they already are).

To achieve this legitimate, long-game goal, the iWork apps weren't just patched up, they were re-written.

The logic of a fresh, clean start sounds compelling, but history isn't always on the side of rewriting-from-scratch angels. A well-known, unfortunate example is what happened when Lotus tried a cross-platform rewrite of its historic Lotus 1-2-3 productivity suite. Quoting from a Wikipedia article:

"Lotus suffered technical setbacks in this period. Version 3 of Lotus 1-2-3, fully rewritten from its original macro assembler into the more portable C language, was delayed by more than a year as the totally new 1-2-3 had to be made portable across platforms and fully compatible with existing macro sets and file formats."

The iWorks rewrite fares no better. The result is a messy pile of missing features and outright bugs that educed many irate comments, such as these observations by Lawrence Lessig, a prominent activist, Harvard Law professor, and angry Apple customer [emphasis and edits mine]:

"So this has been a week from Apple hell. Apple did a major upgrade of its suite of software – from the operating system through applications. Stupidly (really, inexcusably stupid), I upgraded immediately. Every Apple-related product I use has been crippled in important ways. "

"In the 'hybrid economy' that the internet is, there is an ethical obligation to treat users decently. 'Decency' of course is complex, and multi-faceted. But the single dimension I want to talk about here is this: They must learn to talk to us . In the face of the slew of either bugs or 'features' (because as you'll see, it's unclear in some cases whether Apple considers the change a problem at all), a decent company would at least acknowledge to the public the problems it identifies as problems, and indicate that they are working to fix it."

Lessig's articulate blog post, On the pathological way Apple deals with its customers (well worth your time), enumerates the long litany of iWork offences.



[About that seemingly errant screenshot, abovem … keep reading.]

Shortly thereafter, Apple issued a support document restating the reasons for the changes:

"Applications were rewritten from the ground up to be fully 64-bit and to support a unified file format between OS X and iOS 7 versions"

and promising fixes and further improvements:

"We plan to reintroduce some of these features in the next few releases and will continue to add brand new features on an ongoing basis."

Which led our law professor, who had complained about the "pathologically constipated way in which Apple communicates with its customers", to write another (shorter) post and thank the company for having at last "found its voice".

Unfortunately, Lessig's list of bugs is woefully short of the sum of iWork's offences. For example, in the old Pages 4.0 days, when I click on a link I'm transported to the intended destination. In Pages 5.0, instead of the expected jump, I get this:

[See above.]

Well, I tried CMD-CTRL-Shift-4, frame the shot, place the cursor, Pages 5.0 insists on pasting it smack in the middle of a previous paragraph [again, see above].

Pages has changed it's click-on-a-link behavior; I can get used to that, but it won't let me paste at the cursor? That's pretty bad. Could there be more?

There's more. I save my work, restart the machine, and the Save function in Pages 5.0 acts up:



What app has changed my file? Another enigma. I'm not sharing with anyone, just saving my work in my Dropbox, something that has never caused trouble before.

Another unacceptable surprise: Try sending a Pages 5.0 file to a Gmail account. I just checked, it still doesn't work. Why wasn't this wasn't known in advance and not fixed by now?

I have to stop. I'll leave comparing the even more crippled iCloud version of iWork to the genuinely functional Web version of Office 365 for another day and conclude.

First. Who knew and should have known about iWork's bugs and undocumented idiosyncrasies? (I'll add another: Beware the new autocorrect)

Second. Why brag instead of calmly making a case for the long game and telling loyal customers about the dents they will inevitably discover?

Last and most important, what does this new fiasco say about the Apple's management culture? The new iPhones, iPad and iOS 7 speak well of the company's justly acclaimed attention to both strategy and implementation. Perhaps there were no cycles, no neurons, no love left for iWork. Perhaps a wise general puts the best troops on the most important battles. Then, why not regroup, wait six months and come up with an April 2014 announcement worthy of Apple's best work?

— JLG@mondaynote.com

This hasn't been a good week using Apple products and services. I've had trouble loading my iTunes Music library on an iPad, with Mail and other Mavericks glitches, moving data and apps from one computer to another, a phantom Genius Bar appointment in another city and a stubborn refusal to change my Apple ID. At every turn, Apple supports people, in person, on the phone or email, were unfailingly courteous and helpful. I refrained from mentioning iWork to these nice people.

Source: Theguardian. comReadmore: Gadget News: Apple's new iWork: another missed opportunity to set expectations