Boot up: Apple's iPhone jailbreak hire, ignoring Google+, Twitter Bootstrap and more

Google+ growth chart by Paul Allen: heading towards 20m in July. Now you can ignore and block them too!

A burst of 6 links for you to chew over, as picked by the Technology team

"Nicholas Allegra, better known as 'comex', the creator of the JailBreakMe website which made it child's play for iPhone owners to jailbreak their devices, has been given an internship at Apple. "The 19-year-old from Chappaqua, New York posted the news of his new position on Twitter."
As Eric Schmidt says, we need to up our game. Where are the British 19-year-olds getting hired (rather than, say, arrested and charged) for their hacking skills?

"We want to make sure you can represent your real-life relationships on Google+ -- whether you want to connect with someone or not :-) So starting today, we're rolling out a new option to Ignore people, in addition to the existing (and stronger) option to Block them."
Now, where have we heard of that before?

"Researchers at anti-malware company F-Secure say they have found the actual infected Excel file that was used in the attack on RSA earlier this year, eventually forcing the company to replace millions of its SecurID tokens. The Outlook email message containing the malicious file apparently was uploaded to Virustotal in March and the researchers dug it out this week."
An Excel file with Flash content which Excel executes. As the researchers say, why does Excel need to execute Flash content? Ever?

Good points. It's been clear for years that Steve Ballmer is not a visionary. But does Microsoft need one?

"Bootstrap is a toolkit from Twitter designed to kickstart development of webapps and sites. It includes base CSS and HTML for typography, forms, buttons, tables, grids, navigation, and more."
Er.. thanks.

Some surprises among there, including one which lasted a glorious minus one days.

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Boot up: Apple's projector plans, Angry Birds maker 'seeks $1.2bn valuation', and more

A quick burst of 6 links for you to chew over, as picked by the Technology team

Nilay Patel: "There is a fundamental problem with patents in the United States.

"It is us.

"By that I mean all of us: the companies and people who directly interact with the patent system, the media that reports on those interactions, the analysts and experts who inform the media, and finally the large, active, and vocal readership that we try and service with our reporting. As a group, we have accepted and let lie the lazy conventional wisdom that the patent system is broken beyond repair, a relic of a previous time that has been obsoleted by the rapid pace of technical innovation, particularly in software, and that it should perhaps be scrapped altogether."

Apple has "plans of integrating mini or pico-like projectors into future iOS devices while introducing a likely projector accessory for MacBooks"

"Rovio Entertainment Oy, the Finnish creator of the "Angry Birds" mobile-phone game, is in talks to receive funding that would value the company at about $1.2 billion, two people with knowledge of the discussions said."

Zuckerberg calls a Chill feature "lame". Here's Chill's response: "So what are we going to do? We've already removed this feature." Lame.

How Google+ hopes to beat Facebook: undercutting it. "For the launch of its Google+ social games platform, Google has found one way to differentiate itself from Facebook. For in-game transactions, Google is only going to be charging a 5 percent commission to game developers instead of the 30 percent that Facebook charges."

"Today we're adding games to Google+. With the Google+ project, we want to bring the nuance and richness of real-life sharing to the web. But sharing is about more than just conversations. The experiences we have together are just as important to our relationships. We want to make playing games online just as fun, and just as meaningful, as playing in real life."

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Boot up: Apple's mobile head jumps ship, tech firms eye InterDigital, and more

A host shows off the side of Apple's iPad. Photograph: Kimberly White/Reuters

A quick burst of 6 links for you to chew over, as picked by the Technology team

"Apple Inc, Nokia and Qualcomm Inc are among several technology companies pondering bids for InterDigital Inc, sources familiar with the situation said."

Google is not out of the picture, either, according to these sources.

"Sources said Miller -- who sold Quattro Wireless, the mobile advertising company he co-founded in 2006, to Apple in early 2010 for $275 million -- will become a general partner at Highland Capital, the Boston-based venture firm that had funded Quattro."

Very slightly smaller, at least in terms of circumscribing circles (or circumscribed circles).

Patents in the mobile industry go for a basement price of around $500,000 each. Rising somewhat when you get to the Nortel ones bought by Apple, Microsoft, RIM et al.

Steve Sinofsky, head of the Windows division, explains how you size your Windows team: "When folks do the math and come up with the number of developers on the team, we usually hear one of two reactions: "wow, that is a lot, and there is no way that can work," or "wow, you build a product for a billion people with a pretty small number folks." It is to our benefit to have the smallest number of people on the team possible, but it is to your benefit to have the largest number of people adding all the things that folks might want. So, we find a place in the middle. We want the team to be manageable and able to produce high quality, full-featured code."

Though he doesn't say how many that actually is in practice.

"Each and every Chinese IPO failed investors in 2011 so far. This doesn't mean Tudou (NASDAQ:TUDO) will fail as well, but it raises a red flag."

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Boot up: Apple's Secret Service call, Android's crucial summer, Twitter ads coming and more

US Secret Service agents escort Barack Obama. He didn't put the software on machines in an Apple store. Photograph: Jason Reed/Reuters

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

"Artist Kyle McDonald installed a program on computers in two New York Apple Store locations that automatically takes a photo every minute. Now his personal computers have been confiscated by the U.S. Secret Service."
Artist has bad idea. Has quality of idea forcibly demonstrated to him. Perhaps next time, ask first?

"The innocent-seeming "1 Tip" ad is actually the tip of something much larger: a vast array of diet and weight-loss companies hawking everything from pills made from African mangoes to potions made from exotic acai berries. Federal officials have alleged that the companies behind the ads make inflated claims about their products and use deceptive means to market them. "The take so far: at least $1 billion and counting. "The "1 Tip" ads are the work of armies of "affiliates," independent promoters who place them on behalf of small diet-product sellers with names such as HCG Ultra Lean Plus. The promoters profit each time someone clicks through to the product seller's site and orders a free sample. The sample, however, isn't always so free."

"This is a crucial summer for Android. It rose to prominence as the anti-iPhone, but has managed to unite Apple, Microsoft, and Research in Motion in a consortium of competitors who are trying to hit Google in its most vulnerable spot. "As [Andy] Reback related years ago, modern patent litigation isn't really all that different from a protection racket: you pay, or you get hurt. If Google wants to keep the Android miracle rolling, it's going to have to find a way to offer its own brand of protection before its partners opt for peace of mind over loyalty."
The question is, what?

Read it, and then write your own punchline.

"As Twitter raises even more money, it's getting more serious about making money. The service is set to start showing ads in users' "timelines" within the next month, following through on plans it has talked about for more than a year.
"Twitter is pushing a new ad product called "Promoted Tweets To Followers," set to launch by early August."
This will either go very well (nobody will notice them) or catastophically (everyone will notice them).

"The day would simply feel incomplete without a spicy rumor about the next iPhone, and today's is a spicy one indeed. According to a photo that surfaced on the web yesterday, the next iPhone iteration will be known as the iPhone 5, but the more interesting part is that the smartphone will pack dual cameras on its back, presumably for capturing 3D photos and videos."
Which a bit of playing with Photoshop reveals as fake. Isn't there a site where you can upload photos to see their fake-ness?

Fascinating, detailed read.

"From Brazil to France to Australia to India, new laws and platforms are giving citizens new means to ask for, demand or simply create greater government transparency. The open data movement has truly gone global, with 19 international open data websites live around the globe. This week, the world will see another open government platform go live in Kenya."
Amazing.

"Omar Khan, the Samsung CTO who was responsible for the rise of the GalTab and other Android-powered smartphones, is moving to Citibank to handle that company's global digital banking initiatives. He will be replaced by Nick Dicarlo and Gavin Kim in 'product and service spokesperson responsibilities for Samsung Mobile.'"
Techcrunch suggests this indicates a certain amount of "political infighting". Or, possibly, not a big enough raise?

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Boot up: Google+ -disks, Apple's patent poker, the tablet 'slowdown' and more

When you're the stronger player, the cards almost don't matter. Photograph: Alamy

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

Also - tell us how you like the slightly tweaked look. Better? Worse? (Here's how it looked on Friday.)

"Many Google+ users saw a massive amount of notification email messages from the service this afternoon, and now Google's head of social, Vic Gundotra, has an explanation. "'For about 80 minutes we ran out of disk space on the service that keeps track of notifications,' Gundotra wrote on Google+ tonight. 'Hence our system continued to try sending notifications. Over, and over again. Yikes.'"
If you needed any confirmation that this is a rushed, half-baked product launch, then this is it. Google+ may have grown massively beyond expectations, but disk space is pretty cheap down Google way. And available - if you plan for it.

Good piece looking at the play-by-play of the mobile patents battle from Nortel.

"It was a theme picked up by at least eight other news outlets, including VentureBeat ("Tablet sales slow"), The Loop ("'media tablet' market isn't as strong as previously thought") and Forbes ("Sales Dip Hints Media Tablets Won't Replace PCs Any Time Soon").
"The source for all these pessimist headlines? An IDC report that the total number of tablet computers shipped into sales channels in Q1 2011 was 7.2 million. "At first that struck me as absurd, given that Apple (AAPL) alone is expected to report next week that it sold a good deal more than 7.2 million iPads last quarter. "Then I took a second look at IDC's report. What I missed the first time -- and what these reporters failed to take into account -- is that IDC was talking about Q1 2011, which runs from January to March, not Q2 2011, which ran from April to June. Of course tablet sales dipped after the October-to-December holiday quarter. We knew that months ago. This is news?"

"IPads are currently selling better than Android tablets to Android smartphone users. So claims Canaccord Genuity analyst Mike Walkley, who expects Apple to dominate the tablet market for some time to come. "Our smartphone and handset checks indicate iPads are selling better to Android smartphone users than the current Android tablets," Walkley said in a Friday note to clients (although he provided no numbers in support of the assertion)."

"There, you've just hidden the list of people you've chosen to follow on Google+. "My question is: If this setting is one that everyone on Google seems to feel is important for their privacy, why isn't it the default for the rest of us?"

"It breaks my heart to say this, but Mac OSX Lion's interface feels like a failure. Its stated mission was to simplify the operating system, to unify it with the clean experience of iOS. That didn't happen. "If it weren't for the fast, rock-solid Unix, graphics and networking cores, Lion would be Apple's very own Vista."
Couldn't it be Apple's Vista even with the Unix, graphics and cores?

"Has anyone noticed that this week's released screenshots of the New Xbox Dashboard conspicuously omit the Zune logo? If you look at the Music experience shot, below, you'll see some generic music note graphics, but no Zune. "The Zune brand, of course, is being phased out. This is just the latest public-facing example of this slow migration."
More like a slow eradication from Microsoft's history, Soviet-style.

"Perhaps the biggest piece of news we learned from Forsythe is that in the Mac App Store, for the first time since its creation seven years ago, Growl will not be free. Devs working on the project are "still talking" about the final price, but "it most likely will be a dollar or two dollars at most," according to Forsythe. Some may turn up their noses at paying anything for the results of an open source project, but Forsythe says the reasoning behind the charge is simple: "I'm a grown adult," he says, "and my wife wonders why I spend time working on my open source project and not with my two-month old." For all the work Forsythe and his fellow devs have put into Growl, a few bucks seems little to ask."
Growl is a very fine piece of software. It's pretty hard to begrudge someone a couple of dollars.

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Boot-up: Intel on Apple's app store, demand media lawyers feisty get, and much more

Are there more than 300,000 apps available in Apple? App store alone, but many of those are created by retailers? fake?. Photo: Robert Galbraith/Reuters/Corbis

Quickly to chew over, as picked by the technology team burst of 7 links for you

"If you tweet even if you see a Pseudonym--tweet - do, how much you reveal about yourself?" More than you realize, argues a new paper from researchers at the MITRE Corporation. The paper, "Them gender on Twitter," which presented this week at the Conference to the empirical methods in natural language processing in Scotland shows that machines often sex on Twitter find a person can read only by their Tweets. And those know is making: the results for advertisers and others could be useful. "

Gender biased words for men: "http" and "Google". For women: "Chocolate" and "Man", among many others. Can an algorithm stereotype? Then again, it is currently correctly about 75% of the time.

"Steam is on a monthly survey to collect data our customers use what types of computer hardware and software." Participation in the survey is optional and anonymous. "The collected information is incredibly helpful for us as we on what types of technology investments to make and to offer products decisions."

It's also really interesting to see the range of steam users.

"Apple can iOS app store ecosystem will have phenomenal success with his, but Intel says it's about the online app sales in the wrong direction."
"As expected, Intel preferred his app-store in-a-box-AppUp program, which allows world + dog to create their own app stores with its software tools, then let the messy details how Intel collect payments to treat and deployment of software for customers, all for a 70/30 revenue split."

Essentially Intel franchise build would like to make, but you take the same cut as Apple or Google is doing. Hard to see the real benefits of franchising your own app store.

"Microsoft was its 12,000 or so participants his annual sales Conference Microsoft Global Exchange (MGX) by tweeting and blogging secrets last week keep." But at least an enterprising participants managed to one of the infamous sales videos to take that like to show the company on these events.
"On 20 July during the MGX softies showed their spoof of"Google mail man"is due to open meetings, inspire the troops selling Office 365 against Google apps, and in particular gmail." In the video to find for serving up riffles Google mail man by post, keywords-map. The news: Google cares more for advertising revenue as privacy. "

Searches Google for context? Yes, by computer. Looked Microsoft risks as it is desperate to smear Google. But mud can remain.

"There is something perverserweise flattering an entire site dedicated to your supposed Terribleness." But demand media is apparently not the attention of demand Studios sucks, a blog, refugees, unhappy and enjoy other critics of so-called content farm. "This week, as the demand of the market capitalisation fell below $1 billion for the first time, as it was in January, the company's lawyers stop a letter and refrain from holders of demand sucks Studio and managed temporarily take down some their Internet service provider to the internal documents that it was not written."

But the site soon returned - but without the content. Demand media need to be careful on this.

"Spend some time at the Ottawa Hospital and it probably form is not long to take a look at an e-health digital revolution."

"Doctors use check-ups, a diagnosis with digital images of X-rays, to explain MRIs or other test results iPads for interactive at the bedside." "Full of patients medical record can be drawn up on the iPad as the pages of reference works and other medical resources, a physician from a bookshelf could once have considered."

Yes, but a House?

"Recently, the FDA cleared a Radiology app for the iPhone and the iPad, the doctors, which display medical images including MRI, CT and PET scans."

"While the Agency sagt-the app - called Mobile MIM, made from MIM software-was approved for the production of medical diagnosis, it is called ' is intended to replace any full workstations and is for use only if it no access to a workstation.'"

We have heard, a seller of health doctors in the United States, iPads take business meeting, because it is a good bet that is the doctor.

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Boot-up: Google +-disks, Apple's patent poker, the Tablet slowdown and more

If you are the stronger player, important almost not the cards. Photograph: Alamy
A burst of 8 links for you to chew over, as picked by the technology team.
-Tell us what you look like the slightly tweaked. Better? Bad? (Here is how it looked on Friday.)

"Many Google + users saw an enormous amount of e-Mail notifications from the service this afternoon, and now Google has head of the social, Vic Gundotra, an explanation." "For 80 minutes we ran the space on the service, notifications, the ' Gundotra wrote about Google + tonight."Therefore our system continue to try sending notifications. Over and over again. Yikes.'""
If you confirm that this überhasteten a half-baked launch, then it is. Google + can have grown beyond expectations, but space is pretty cheap, Google way. And available-if you plan it.

Well look at the play-by-play of the mobile patents battle of Nortel.
"It was a subject of at least eight other news outlets, including VentureBeat ("Tablet sales slow"), the loop ("'Media Tablet' market not as strong as previously thought") and Forbes picked up (" sales dip notes media tablets will not replace PCs of any time soon ")."

"The source for these pessimist headlines?" 7.2 Million was an IDC report, that the number of tablet computers in sales channels delivered in the first quarter of 2011. "At first, that posted, sold me as absurd, given the fact that Apple (AAPL) alone reports next week is expected, that a good deal more than 7.2 million iPads last quarter."I also have a second look at the IDC report. What I missed first painting - and what this reporter, not berücksichtigen-- is that IDC Q1 2011, said that from January to March, 2011 leads not Q2 that ran from April to June. Course tablet sales after the October December dipped holiday quarter. We knew that months ago. "Is this news?"

"IPads be sold tablets for Android Smartphone users currently better than Android." So claims Canaccord Genuity Analyst Mike Walkley, the Apple Tablet market for quite some time dominate expected. "Walkley"our Smartphone handset review and indicate which iPads for Android Smartphone users better than the current Android sell tablets,"said in a Friday letter to customers (although he not numbers in support of the assertion provided)."

"There you have to only the list of people you have chosen on Google + follow hidden."My question is: If this setting is one that everyone on Google seems to feel is important for their privacy, why it is not the default for the rest of us? "

"It breaks my heart to say this, but Mac OSX Lion interface feels like a failure." Its stated mission was, the operating system, it with the clean experience of iOS to unify to simplify. That won't happen. "If it fast for the reliable Unix, graphics and networking cores, Lion Apple's own Vista would."

Could be not it be Apple's Vista even with UNIX, graphics and cores?
"Has anyone noticed that this week of published screenshots of the new Xbox Dashboard conspicuously omit the Zune logo?" If you look at the music experience shot below you see some generic music note graphics, but no Zune. "The Zune brand, is of course, gradually abolished." "This is just the latest public example of this slow migration."

More like a slow removal of Microsoft's history, Soviet-style.

"Perhaps is the biggest piece of news, we from Forsythe learned that is not free for the first time since its inception before seven years growl in the Mac app store." Talk devs of the project "still the final price, but"there are likely a dollar or two dollars at the most"according to Forsythe of". Some can pay their noses to appear nothing for the results of an open source project, but Forsythe says the reasoning behind the charge is simple: "I am an adult adults", he says, "and my wife wonder why I spend time working on my open source project and not with my two - month old." "For all the work of Forsythe and his colleagues have devs in Growl, a few dollars seems to ask."
Growl is a very fine piece of software. It's pretty hard to someone a few dollars below.

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Boot-up: Apple's secret service call, androids ultimate summer, Twitter view come and more

U.S. agents accompany Barack Obama. He has put the software on machines in an Apple retail store. Photo: Jason Reed/Reuters
A burst of 9 links for you to chew over, as picked by the technology team
"Artist Kyle McDonald a program installed on computers in two New York Apple store locations, the a photo makes automatically every minute." "Now have his computers were confiscated by the US secret service."

Artist has a bad idea. Has the quality of the idea been violent to him. Perhaps you ask first next time?

"The innocent-looking"1 tip"display is actually the tip of something much larger: a variety of diet and weight loss companies hawking everything from pills, between African mangoes and potions made from exotic Acai berries produced." Federal officials have claimed that their products of companies map after the inflated claims about and make fraudulent funds use them to market. "Take this so far: at least $1 billion and counting."
The "1 tip" map independent promoters that ultra lean plus place them on behalf of small diet product seller named HCG are the work of armies of 'connected undertakings'. The promoters will benefit every time when someone clicks through on the ordered product seller Web site and a free sample. "The example, but not always so free."

"This is a crucial summer for Android." It rose to prominence as the anti-iPhone, but has managed to combine Apple, Microsoft and research in motion in a consortium of competitors trying, Google in its most vulnerable point taken. "Like [Andy] Reback years ago, modern related patent litigation is not really everything, what other than a protection racket: you pay or get hurt." "If Google wants to keep rolling the wonders of the Android, it will need to find a way, provide protection to the own brand before its partners for peace of mind over loyalty opt."

The question, what is?

Read it, and then write your own punchline.

"How Twitter raises more money, it is more serious about money to get." The service will show set to launch, which display in users "Timeline" within the next month after by using plans that it spoke for more than a year.

"Twitter is a new ad product called" promotes tweets, followers, "from early August press start."

This will either go very well (no one will notice them) or Catastophically (everyone will notice it).

"The day would simply without a spicy rumors about the next iPhone feel incomplete, and today is a spicy indeed." "According to a photo, popped up yesterday on the Web that next iPhone iteration will be known, as the iPhone 5, but more interesting part is that the Smartphone dual cameras on the back, is probably for the collection of 3D photos and videos pack."

It reveals a lot of games with Photoshop as a forgery. There is no a website where you can upload photos to see their fake-ness?
Fascinating, read detailed.

"From Brazil to France to Australia to India, new laws and platforms citizens provide new means to request, demand or create more transparency of the Government." The open data movement is truly global, with 19 international open data Web site around the globe live gone. "This week, the world see go live any other open government platform in Kenya." Amazing.

"Omar Khan, the Samsung CTO working Android-powered Citibank responsible for the rise of the GalTab and other mobile devices, the company's to handle global digital banking initiatives." He is replaced by Nick Dicarlo and Gavin Kim in ' product and the speaker responsible for Samsung mobile.' "

TechCrunch suggests that this a certain "political infighting" shows. Or may be not a big enough raise?

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