250000 Facebook photos 'land on' dating site

SAN FRANCISCO: Hacking and art mixed in a freshly-launched dating website that lets visitors seek mates by sifting through profile pictures mined from Facebook.

Lovely-faces.com boasted Facebook pictures of about 250,000 people searchable in categories that included nationality, gender, funny, smug, and "climber."

The creators of the online "dating agency" were identified at the website as artists Paolo Cirio and Alessandro Ludovic.

'Our mission was to give all these virtual identities a new shared place to expose themselves freely, breaking Facebook's constraints and boring social rules," the website authors said in an online statement datelined in Berlin.

The artists explained that a million "stolen" Facebook profile pictures were analyzed using facial recognition software that filtered images by expressions.

"Immersing ourselves in the resulting database was a hallucinatory experience as we dove into hundreds of thousands of profile pictures and found ourselves intoxicated by the endless smiles, gazes and often leering expressions," the artists said.

"So we established a new website (lovely-faces.com) giving them justice and granting them the possibility of soon being face to face with anybody who is attracted by their facial expression and related data."

Facebook frowned on lovely-faces, saying that "scraping" or mining information violates the terms of service at the world's leading online social network. Facebook was investigating and vowed to take "appropriate" action.

Ironically, the story of Facebook's genesis tells of its founder Mark Zuckerberg getting in trouble for hacking Harvard University computers while a student to get pictures of coeds for comparison with each other at a website! called "Face Mash" that he created.

Hackers target Nasdaq Stock Market trading platform: Report

NEW YORK: The computer network of the Nasdaq Stock Market was targeted by the online hackers several times last year, setting off an alarm by the US authorities, a Wall Street Journal report said.

The report, citing the people familiar with the matter, however, asserted that the exchange's trading platform was not "compromised".

According to the US newspaper report, the federal investigators are trying to identify the perpetrators and are considering a range of possible motives, including unlawful financial gain, theft of trade secrets and a national-security threat designed to damage the exchange.

The report said it couldn't be determined which other parts of Nasdaq's computer network other than the trading platform were accessed by the hackers.

The Nasdaq situation has alerted the authorities because of the exchange's critical role, which officials put right up with power companies and air-traffic-control operations, all part of the nation's basic infrastructure, it added.

People familiar with the matter called the incident equivalent of someone sneaking into a house and walking around but--apparently, so far--not taking or tampering with anything.

The report said that Nasdaq declined to comment on the issue.

A probe into the matter was started by the Secret Service and now includes the Federal Bureau of Investigation .

The report said that although the authorities haven't yet been able to follow the trail to any specific individual or country, those familiar with the case said some evidence points towards Russia.

It, however, also mentioned that the person or people responsible c! ould be almost anywhere, perhaps using computers in Russia merely as a conduit.

Preserving the stability and reliability of computerised trading, and ensuring that investors have full faith in that system are the two major concerns for the authorities, it noted.

In the past, Nasdaq's publicly accessible website was vandalised in 1999, when a group of hackers had claimed responsibility for defacing the site, as well as major media websites.

Nasdaq officials at that time said the company's internal network wasn't affected.

Nokia's key options in smartphone race

HELSINKI: Stephen Elop , the new chief executive of Nokia, the world's biggest cellphone maker, will unveil his plan to turn around the Finnish company's weakening position in the high end of the market next week.

The average forecast for Nokia's 2011 underlying earnings per share has fallen 5 per cent since it flagged a weak first quarter last week, a poll found.

Following are key options Elop has to choose from:

NO CHANGE -- STRONGER FOCUS

Nokia will most likely reinforce its current software strategy -- focusing increasingly on a new MeeGo platform for high-end models, using its old Symbian workhorse for cheaper smartphones, and offering developers simultaneous access to both with its Qt toolset.

Having its own operating system gives Nokia full control over its devices rather than being beholden to a third party such as Google or Microsoft.

Apple and Blackberry maker RIM have used their own platforms to great effect, while the market is flooded with very similar smartphones running Google's Android.

Elop said on Jan. 27 the opportunity to differentiate would be a top priority when platform decisions were made.

The unproven MeeGo platform was born early last year when Nokia and Intel unveiled a merger of Nokia's Linux Maemo software platform with Intel's Moblin, which is also based on Linux open-source software.

Nokia is yet to unveil a model running MeeGo and only a few vendors have launched or publicly supported the platform. But MeeGo is a key play for Intel, the world's largest chip maker and which is trying to stake out territory in the mobile market.

! Whil e Symbian has been the most popular software platform since the smartphone was born around a decade ago, Android overtook its No 1 position at the end of last year, according to research firm Canalys.

Nokia's Qt software glues the two platforms together, enabling application development for both platforms with one set of tools.

SMALL CHANGE -- WP7 OR ANDROID

Elop said Nokia could join "a competitive ecosystem" as a result of the strategy review, while the opportunity to reopen doors in markets such as the United States would be key.

The comment fuelled expectations Nokia would start to use Android platform or Microsoft's Windows Phone 7.

Nokia could hedge its bets at its strategy revamp next week, saying it would make a range of Windows Phone 7 or Android models for the North American market.

Choosing Android would give Nokia access to the world's leading smartphone platform, but it would take time before its Android models came to market. Smaller rils have already rolled out dozens of look-alike Android phones and it would be difficult for Nokia to differentiate.

Also, Google is Nokia's key rival in services and mapping. Microsoft's new platform, praised in the industry, has yet to win wider support from handset makers and consumers.

However, taking into account Nokia's close relations with Microsoft , Elop's background with the U.S. company, and the platform offering more opportunities to differentiate than Android, it could be more a likely choice for Nokia.

FULL SWAP -- BECOMING DELL

Many investors and analysts hope Nokia will change its software direction -- dumping unproven! MeeGo a nd legacy Symbian platforms and joining Google or Microsoft.

"Get rid of your own proprietary high-end solution MeeGo -- it is the biggest joke in the tech industry right now and will put you even further behind Apple and Google," Adnaan Ahmad from Berenberg Bank said in an open letter to Elop.

That would mean giving control over its future offering to software vendors -- Elop was picked to run the company because of his strong background in software industry.

Choosing outside software could put Nokia, in the longer term, on a par with personal computer makers like Dell, whose shares are valued much below smartphone companies.

Nokia shares trade at 13.4 times expected 2011 earnings, below Apple's 19.3 times but ahead of Dell 9.2 multiple. At Dell's valuation, Nokia shares should be 5.61 euros, not the 8.22 euros they traded for on Friday.

Force10 to expand India development centre

CHENNAI: With the global market for computer networking products and solutions on the rebound, the $175 million revenue Force10 Networks Inc. plans to expand its Indian development centre by adding headcount, investing $10 million and also deepening its presence in the domestic market.

"We plan to add around 100 high calibre engineers in the embedded software space. We will complete investing $10 million in our new centre here by September this year and, going by the trends, the investment may go up," Prakash Sripathy, the company's vice president, told IANS in an interview.

According to him, the San Jose-headquartered company is at a transition point, chalking out new growth plans worldwide.

Force10 has filed the necessary papers with the US capital market regulator to come out with an initial public offer (IPO) of $143 million.

In India, apart from expanding its research centre, Force10 is also thinking of deepening its market presence by developing channel partners and turning the Indian operations to a revenue centre.

Ruling out new development centres in India in the near term, Sripathy said the primary target was to grow out of the 44,000 sq.ft centre housing the company's India headquarters, development lab and data centre at the Olympia Technology Park here.

According to him, the company currently has around 200 own employees and another 100 engineers as contract resources.

The Indian development centre develops nearly 75 percent of Force10's software need and, in the case of hardware, around 25 percent work is done in the country.

"The Indian outfit is working towards developing and launching eight products in 2011 for Force10's global market! s," Srip athy added.

Referring to the growing market for the networking products and solutions, he said the trend augurs well for companies like Force10.

"While hardware costs are coming down the operational expenses and revenue are on the rise for companies. Compared to competition, the cost per port in our boxes are nearly one third of what the competition charges and is also energy efficient," Sripathy claimed.

In the global market Force10 competes with the likes of Cisco and Juniper. In India, Force10 sells its products through Dell and IBM and has plans to look at other channels like tying up with system integrators, Sripathy said.

Citing market research studies, Sripathy said the Indian data centre market was estimated to be in the region of $200 million and logging around 14 percent growth.

According to him, the company is yet to enter the Indian government segment and has a good presence in the enterprises segment.

Hackers penetrate Nasdaq computers: WSJ report

NEW YORK: Computer hackers repeatedly entered the network of the company that runs the Nasdaq stock market in the past year, but the trading platform was not compromised, the Wall Street Journal reported on Friday.

The report cited people familiar with the matter as saying law enforcement investigators were considering a range of motives for the hacking, from financial gain to theft of trade secrets to a national security threat to damage the important stock exchange.

Authorities rank stock exchanges up with power companies and air traffic control centers as critical to the basic infrastructure of the United States.

The probe into the hacking at New York-based Nasdaq OMX Group Inc was started by the U.S. Secret Service and now includes the Federal Bureau of Investigation , the WSJ said.

A spokesman for Nasdaq OMX Group declined immediate comment on the report.

The WSJ said investigators have been unable to track the hacking to any specific individual or country.

"So far, (the perpetrators) appear to have just been looking around," the Wall Street Journal quoted one unidentified person involved in the Nasdaq case.

It reported that another person familiar with the case said the incidents were, for a computer network, the equivalent of someone sneaking into a house and walking around but so far not taking anything or tampering with anything.

Shareholder-advisory firm backs Apple CEO succession plan

SAN FRANCISCO: An Apple shareholder proposal requiring the company to disclose a succession plan for Chief Executive Officer Steve Jobs gained the support of Institutional Shareholder Services, a proxy-advising service.

ISS, which helps institutional investors decide how to vote on shareholder propositions, wants Apples board to disclose a CEO succession plan annually , according to a report released by the firm. The measure is backed by the Laborers International Union of North America.

Jobs announced a leave of absence on January 17, the third time the Apple co-founder has taken time away from the company since 2004 to deal with health problems. While Chief Operating Officer Tim Cook has assumed control of day-to-day operations, Apples board hasnt said who will take over from Jobs if he cant return. The proposal will be considered at Apples annual shareholder meeting on February 23.

A vote for the shareholder proposal to adopt a succession planning policy is warranted in light of the companys limited disclosure regarding this issue and the markets expression of concern over CEO succession at Apple, Rockville, Maryland- based ISS said in a report dated January 28. The labourers union announced the groups support in a statement on Friday.

APPLES OPPOSITION

Apple, the most valuable technology company, asked shareholders to vote against the proposal in its proxy statement released January 7. The company said its governance guidelines require the board and CEO to annually review succession planning for senior management. That process includes identifying candidates for succession.

Those deliberations are kept confidential. The company said the information could provide competitors with an unfair advantage and give them a! n opport unity to poach executives. The proposal also could harm its ability to retain executives because it would identify whos being considered for positions and how they are being evaluated , Apple said.

Steve Dowling , a spokesman for the Cupertino , California- based company , declined to comment beyond the filing.
Apple, maker of the iPhone and iPad , fell 88 cents to $343.44 in Nasdaq Stock Market trading. Its shares climbed 53% last year.

Nilekani panel moots private IT back offices for government

NEW DELHI: The Nandan Nilekani-headed technology advisory group has recommended formation of private-owned bodies run by professionals and bureaucrats to act as IT back offices of the government.

To be called National Information Utilities (NIUs), these bodies should be 51% owned by private firms having a net worth of at least `300 crore to self finance themselves, Nilekani said in his report presented to Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee on Friday.

Nilekani has suggested that the NIUs should be chaired by a joint secretary or a private professional with a term of five years. These bodies should not be allowed to list on the stock exchanges.

NIUs would help in various IT projects like Tax Information Network , New Pension Scheme, National Treasury Management Agency, Expenditure Information Network and the Goods and Service Tax, the finance minister said.
Effective tax administration and financial governance system calls for creation of IT projects which are reliable, secure and efficient, he added.

Mukherjee had announced the formation of the Technology Advisory Group for Unique Projects (Tagup) in his budget last year. About 5-6 NIUs are expected to be created, of which the GST network would be the first.

The committee, which has members such as Sebi Chairman CB Bhave and DoT Secretary R Chandrashekhar, was formed last February as part of the Union Budget. It recommends that no single private entity should own more than 25% of the shares in an NIU. NIUs should be set up as private companies with a public purpose. The government should own at least 26% in an NIU, wrote Tagup Chairman Nandan Nilekani in the report.

Experts like Neel Ratan, executive director, Pricewa! terhouse Coopers, say NIUs will provide the right vehicle for speedy implementation. The first NIU-GST network will run the GST portal, which will offer dealer registration, return filing and settlement, integrated with the banking system.

One NIU may handle the social sector projects, the other ones may be for taxation and pension management, said a committee member, requesting anonymity. For data security, a Chief Information Security Officer will be appointed for each NIU. The data will be hashed and encrypted to prevent attacks of worms such as Stuxnet.

A dedicated mission execution team would be appointed for GST Network. The Expenditure Information Network will also evolve as a NIU. Currently, plan implementation is on the basis of outlay rather than outcome. It is difficult to track the flow of funds and equally difficult to evaluate their utilisation. The NIU for expenditure info network will be able to monitor outcomes up to the last mile, and ensure disbursal of funds to beneficiaries. The governments Pay And Accounts Office will be able to see each payment authorisation in real time.

Experts like Wipro Technologies e-Governance head Ranbir Singh feel that NIUs would augur well as they would make competitive workforce be available for government projects. UIDAI, DMRC, are examples where competitive professionals have successfully led projects. The NIUs would appoint consultants and professionals at market rates on contractual basis. They would also recruit students from various colleges and universities as interns via an internship program. As a paying customer, the government would be free to take its business to another NIU, if necessary. At the same time, the government could moderate the functioning of the NIU by virtue of being the owner, through its position on the Board.

The report also discussed public bodies such ! as Natio nal Payments Corporation of India (NPCI), which has members such as ICICI Bank , HDFC Bank , SBI, Citibank, HSBC, may be recommended for an NIU structure. Centre for Railway Information Systems, which handles the rail reservations and ticketing in the country, may also be turned into an NIU structure, if the GST Network experiment is successful.

Nokia C5-03 hits shelves

Department of Post roped in for UID initiative

NEW DELHI: The Department of Post today entered into a strategic partnership with the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) for registration and distribution of unique identification (UID) cards to Indian citizens.

"This is not a tactical, but a strategic partnership, where UIDAI will leverage the existing infrastructure of the DoP to reach out to the masses for providing UID," UIDAI Chairman Nandan Nilekani said while signing the agreement.

The Department of Post has offered to include one-and-a-half-lakh post offices for this purpose initially. The UIDAI has floated a request for quotation to finalise the agency that will set up and manage infrastructure for registration and distribution of UID cards at these post offices.

"The RFQ will be opened in the next couple of days and then we will finalise agencies to set up and manage infrastructure across all 1,50,000 offices offered by the DoP," UIDAI Director General and Mission Director R S Sharma explained.

The new partnership will add to the existing infrastructure of the UIDAI, which has over one million enrolment centres in nine states. Under this mission, the authority has installed approximately 5,000 biometric devices for collection of the biometric impressions of citizens, like fingerprint and retina scanners.

"These 5,000 biometric (devices) can collectively enroll 2.5 lakh people per day," Sharma said.

Information Technology and Communications Minister Kapil Sibal , who was also present on the occasion, mentioned that the government sees UID as a critical initiative to achieve the goal of inclusive growth.

"We have an opportunity to use post offices for in! clusive growth through this partnership. If we understand the road ahead, the post offices will be the centre for empowering people," Sibal said.

Dell launches two new smartphones

Glodyne Technoserve set for double-digit growth

The stock of IT infrastructure management services company, Glodyne Technoserve , has recovered in the last three trading sessions . Despite robust third-quarter results, the stock had fallen sharply due to weakness in the broader market. The company is expected to report double-digit growth in revenue and profits in the next fiscal given the traction in its domestic business and the benefits accruing from its recent acquisitions.

Glodyne is a Mumbai-based mid-tier IT company, offering technology infrastructure management (IMS). To expand its market reach and service offerings, the company has adopted an inorganic route - it has acquired five companies in four years. Its recent acquisition of the US-based Decision One has helped Glodyne to strengthen its foothold in the $524-billion American IMS industry.

During the December 2010 quarter, the company's net sales rose 3.4% to 495 crore against the previous quarter. It is expected to grow in double digits during the March 2011 quarter, fuelled by the growth in its US business. Currently, Decision One contributes nearly 40% to the company's total revenue. It is likely to increase to 50% from the next fiscal.

Besides the improved demand in the US market, the company has witnessed a strong traction in the Indian market as well. Recently, it bagged a five-year financial inclusion project from the Bihar government and a labour management system project from the Maharasthra government.

The company is also in talks with a few other states for similar projects. Glodyne is keen on expanding its offering in the domestic education and research segments due to the increased adoption of technology in the public and private schools and colleges.

At the current market price of 744.2, the stock trades at nearly 12 times its ear! nings fo r the trailing 12 months. Owing to the demand traction in the existing businesses, the company is expected to fare well in the coming quarters. The company's management expects 30-40% increase in the topline in FY12 backed by an expansion of nearly 300 basis points in the operating margin to over 20%.

Indians prefer business-oriented apps in their smartphones

NEW DELHI: Smartphone users in India are the most exhaustive users of mobile applications, or apps, and prefer business-oriented apps as compared to users in other countries, a global study by Nokia and Cornell University revealed. Indians also want the latest technology and applications quicker than their counterparts in Germany, Italy, Spain, Brazil, China, the UK, Singapore, South Africa and the US, said the study that covered 5,231 people in November last year.

"Indians are the most progressive in terms of (mobile) application usage. They use applications to empower themselves. They value their applications and use them as a utility rather than a luxury," said Cornell University's leading sociologist and professor of science and technology studies Trevor Pinch who worked with Nokia to analyse smartphone usage patterns across the world.

Nokia's vice-president of media, George Linardos , said the findings would be played back to application developers to improve their market reach. This is first of a series of research. Data could be useful for follow up surveys with a larger sample size, he said.

More than half of the 501 people surveyed in India benefited from their applications, majorly using them while travelling or commuting and at home. More than three-fourths of the sample had around 30 applications on their smartphones where social networking and music applications were most popular, followed by applications used for business, utilities and gaming.

The research finds application usages particular to various geographies in India. Four in 10 smartphone users downloaded music applications in north India, more than any other region, while more than one-fourth used utility-based applications. In the east, 65% downloaded applications that benefited their lives. Smartphone us! ers in n ortheast India downloaded the maximum number of education applications, compared to any other region. A quarter of people here used almost all the applications they downloaded.
Smartphone users in South India were highest users of gaming apps, compared to other regions. While financial, music and travel apps were more popular in the western region of the country. Around 38% smartphone users would rather use a travel app than a guidebook.

The study revealed insights into smartphone users' behaviour, usage patterns and lead Nokia to derive six kinds of app users. "Apps (applications) are the way in which we bring our devices to life and empower them to be like our own personal magic wands. They tell our stories," said Linardos.

Nokia and Cornell University said smartphone usage patterns in Brazil clearly showed the country's love for music apps while functional apps such as alarm clocks and flashlight appealed most to German users.

Nearly a fourth of British smartphone users rarely used their apps compared to Indians that are the heaviest app users.

Aegis on acquisition spree, sans India

DUBAI: After 16 global takeovers, the Essar Group's BPO arm Aegis is still on the lookout for acquisitions in Africa and Europe to expand its global footprint, but will stay away from Indian companies.

"We will not do acquisition in India that is for sure. It doesn't make any sense because first of all, the assets are very heavily priced... But in Africa and Europe, yes, we will surely go for (opportunities)," Aegis MD and Global CEO Aparup Sengupta said here.

In May, 2010, Aegis announced the acquisition of AGC Networks , the Indian division of US-based enterprise networking solutions firm Avaya , for USD 44.5 million (about Rs 207 crore).

Later in the year, Aegis announced that it will buy out Y&R Inversiones Publicitrias and its business partner in their jointly held BPO firm, Actionline , in Argentina.

Its other acquisitions include Sallie Mae's customer service centre in Texas, Australian BPO UCMS and CCN Group .

Asked about potential targets for acquisitions, Sengupta said, "We are looking at companies that have got some good track record with clients and a reasonably good management team. It has to be value creative for us, we don't want to be paying overly high prices."

The USD 800 million company (in terms of annual revenue) gets about one-third of its revenue from US and the Philippines, while another one-third comes from India, Africa, Australia and New Zealand.

"In terms of geographies, the Philippines is seeing very high growth and we saw a huge uptake in the US during the last quarter," he added.

Internet will run out of IP addresses by Friday

LONDON: The internet will run out of numerical IP (Internet Protocol) addresses by Friday. But the web will not ground to a halt. A new system, Internet Protocol version 6 or IPv6 , will replace version 4.

Every device connected to the net is assigned a number. But with millions of web enabled phones now online, the numbers are running out.

The system, set up in the 1980s with a maximum of 4.1 billion addresses, was supposed to never run out. The original creators of the web initially thought it would be used only for academic purposes.

IP addresses act as phone numbers to ensure that surfers reach websites and e-mails and find their destination, the Daily Mail reports.

The authority that governs such addresses will distribute the last batches Thursday.

"It will just be 'business as usual' if everyone gets their job done," said John Curran, chief executive of the American Registry for Internet Numbers, one of five regional groups that dole out such addresses. They cover the US, Canada and the Caribbean.

Smartphones to run operators into the red in 3 years

PARIS: Rocketing smartphone use could drive mobile operators into losses in three years unless they rapidly adopt technology to capture more revenue from data services, a US network company said Thursday.

Rising investment costs to handle exploding data traffic combined with lower revenue per unit of data could begin to drive some operators into the red in as soon as two years, Tellabs said it calculated based on independent analyst data.

"Carriers can spend themselves bankrupt well before users run out of hunger for capacity," said Tellabs chief executive Rob Pullen.

"Our study shows that simply adding dumb capacity is unsustainable. To avoid the 'end of profit', carriers must bring intelligence to their networks -- it is critical to carrier survival," he was quoted as saying in a statement.

A number of industry players expect mobile data traffic, driven mostly by smartphones , to nearly double each year for the next several years.

While operators are investing heavily to add capacity and roll out fourth-generation networks, they are having difficulty earning money from data transfer and forecasts see falling revenue per unit of data transferred if current trends continue.

Dozens of companies such as Tellabs are offering mobile operators solutions to manage network traffic, reducing needed investments and opening possibilities to capture more revenue through priority services.

"Mobile carriers face a stark choice about their business models: it's either the smart mobile Internet or an unsustainable dumb-pipe business," said Vikram Saksena, Tellabs' chief technology officer.

Tellabs' findings come days before the mobile industry holds its annual gathering in Barcelona,! where a smartphone-driven boom in data traffic overwhelming networks and capturing revenue from data are set to be at the top of the agenda.

Tellabs did not analyse specific mobile operators, but used a model that generalised costs and revenue structures in three major regional markets.

It found that operators in North America were most vulnerable to changes wrought by mobile Internet and that some could plunge into unprofitability as soon as the beginning of 2013, others at the end of that year based on median cost and revenue assumptions.

For developed Asia-Pacific markets, operators would enter the red from the third quarter of 2013 to the third quarter of 2014.

Western European operators are forecast to enter unprofitablity from the beginning of 2014 or 2015.

Oracle Financial says Irish client files lawsuit

MUMBAI: Oracle Financial Services Software Ltd , majority owned by U.S.-based Oracle Corp , said on Thursday an Irish client has filed a lawsuit against the company and one of its units alleging breach of contract, misrepresentation and negligence.

Shares of the software services firm, which the market values at $4.01 billion, dropped as much as 5 percent to 2,063.45 rupees in an upbeat Mumbai market. At 12.11 p.m., the stock was down 4.32 percent at 2,080.05 rupees.

The Irish client, Allied Irish Banks Plc, which has filed the suit in the Irish High Court , is claiming damages of more than 84 million euros, Oracle Financial said.

"Sentiment wise, it's a negative, but going forward it might not be that big a deal," an analyst with a local brokerage said.

The issue is likely to be resolved out of court at a fraction of the cost being claimed as damages, as in the Satyam-Upaid case, said the analyst, who did not wish to be named.

In Dec. 2009, Mahindra Styam Ltd paid $70 million to Britain-based Upaid Systems Ltd in a patent suit settlement.

Mumbai-based Oracle Financial, formerly i-felx Solutions, said it is rigorously defending all allegations and will also counter-claim against the Irish bank for breach of contract and outstanding fees.

First iPad newspaper debuts at 14 cents/day

NEW YORK: A daily newspaper designed by News Corp. exclusively for Apple's iPad is available for $40 annually, comparable to what some big-city publishers charge monthly to deliver their print editions.

The digital newspaper, called The Daily, debuted Wednesday in Apple Inc.'s App Store. News Corp. CEO Rupert Murdoch unveiled it in New York after weeks of anticipation.

The Daily is the latest example of how media companies are trying to mine the iPad's popularity for new streams of revenue. Last month, a company backed by The New York Times Co., The Washington Post Co. and USA Today publisher Gannett Co. launched Ongo, a website that, for $7 a month, pulls together stories from various outlets in one place and lays them out in a clean, ad-free format.

Newspaper publishers are especially desperate because the print advertising revenue they have traditionally relied upon has been falling for the past four years.

News Corp. hasn't been as hard hit as many publishers, mostly because it can fall back on revenue coming from its ownership of the Fox television network and the 20th Century Fox movie studio. News Corp. also owns The Wall Street Journal, one of the few newspapers able to sell a large number of digital subscriptions.

The Daily will cost 99 cents per week, substantially less than the Journal's iPad subscription rate of $3.99 per week. The Daily is also available for $39.99 annually _ about the same as what the San Francisco Chronicle charges a month for home delivery and less than The New York Times' monthly rate of about $47 in the New York City area.

Home delivery prices have risen sharply in the past few years as publishers have asked their subscribers to help offset the drop in advertising. The higher prices have contributed to circ! ulation decreases as more readers get their news for free from the Web.

Murdoch says The Daily can afford a low price because it won't have to pay for printing presses or fuel to deliver editions. It will rely on reporters in New York and Los Angeles, as well as freelancers, to produce up to 100 pages of coverage focused on news, sports, gossip, opinion and entertainment.

The Daily will be the first newspaper whose subscriptions will be billed directly through Apple's iTunes store. The Journal, by contrast, has been allowed to charge users of its iPad app through its own billing system. Apple typically keeps 30 per cent of the revenue from sales made in its app stores.

The iPad's rising popularity presents The Daily with a vast audience to target. Nearly 15 million iPads were sold in just nine months last year and research firm Gartner Inc. expects 55 million tablets to be shipped this year. Most of those tablets will likely be iPads.

Newspaper analyst Ken Doctor believes less than 1 per cent of iPad owners are likely to subscribe to The Daily, making it difficult for the digital newspaper to make money. He said The Daily's financial success will hinge on how much advertising revenue it can bring in, much like print editions.

Irish bank drags Oracle Financial Services Software to court

MUMBAI: Oracle Financial Services Software (OFSS), earlier known as i-flex Solutions, is locked in a court battle with Ireland's second largest bank, Allied Irish Banks . The bank is claiming a compensation of 84 million ( 529 crore), a sum that is close to the Indian company's FY10 net profit of Rs 660 crore.

OFSS, on the other hand, has said it intends to file a counter-claim against the bank for breach of contract and outstanding fees. The bank filed a lawsuit against OFSS on January 25 alleging that the implementation of its Flexcube product for retail banking had technical problems.

"All of the allegations being raised by AIB are being rigorously defended by the company and it will also file a counter suit," an OFSS spokesperson told ET. A spokesperson for the Dublin-headquartered bank said the organisation would not comment till the legal proceedings were completed.

Allied Irish has operations in Ireland, Britain, the US and Poland. Its businesses include retail and commercial banking, pensions, credit cards, finance and leasing, capital markets, treasury operations and investment banking. OFSS is one of the few globally successful software product companies from India.

Martin Whybrow, director of IBS Intelligence, which brings out the popular IBS Journal ranking banking softwares based on their global sales and other criteria, termed the filing of a lawsuit as fairly unusual.

"They do happen from time to time, but are fairly unusual," he said. Large contracts usually have detailed service level agreements with in built penalties. "The AIB project was viewed as a particularly strategic one because it was a large implementation involving retail banking. There was meant to be a fair amount of development work within the project," Whyborw told ET from the UK. He said Flexcub! e was st ill one of the top two universal banking systems in terms of new clients added each year, alongside Temenos' T24.

He said there was an increasing adoption of Oracle components within Flexcube since its acquisition by the enterprise software giant and also a stated attempt to focus on the higher end of the market. "This situation (the lawsuit) is unlikely to aid that effort," he said.

"Implementing a retail banking system is very complex from the point of migrating old transactions into the new system and also migrating the details from the old database. Any incomplete details or issues such as duplicate customer records have to be closed before the system goes live," said Hanuman Tripathi, MD of Infrasoft Technologies, which also makes banking software products.

Apple to start Verizon iPhone sales Feb 9

NEW YORK: Apple Inc said on Wednesday that it would kick off online sales of the Verizon Wireless iPhone on Feb 9, a day before the device hits its store shelves.

Electronics retailer Best Buy Co Inc also said on Wednesday that it, too, would distribute the new version of iPhone 4 in its stores starting on Feb. 10, the device's official launch day. It already sells earlier iPhone models.

Verizon Wireless will start online sales of a limited number of iPhones to its existing mobile customers starting at 3 a.m. ET Feb. 3 for delivery on or before Feb 10.

Apple said people ordering the phone on Feb. 9 can have it delivered or reserve it for an in-store pickup Feb. 10, when both companies plan to start offering the phone in their stores a 7 am local time.

Verizon Wireless, a venture of Verizon Communications and Vodafone Group Plc, will be the second U.S. operator to offer iPhone after AT&T Inc's more than three years of exclusive rights to the popular device.

Best Buy shares were up 0.8 percent at $34.69 in afternoon trading on the New York Stock Exchange, where Verizon was down 0.7 percent at $36.01 and AT&T fell 0.6 percent to $27.70. Apple was down 0.3 percent at $344.10 on Nasdaq.

Internet runs out of IP addresses as devices grow

NEW YORK: The spread of Internet use in Asia and the proliferation of Internet-connected phones world-wide are causing the Internet to run out of numerical addresses, which act as phone numbers to ensure that surfers reach websites and e-mails find their destination.

The top-level authority that governs such addresses will distribute the last batches on Thursday, two people with knowledge of the situation said. They spoke on condition of anonymity because a formal announcement wasnt planned until Thursday.

That doesnt mean consumers will suddenly find websites unreachable, though. And if everything goes according to plan, Internet users wont even notice.

It will just be business as usual if everyone gets their job done, said John Curran, CEO of the American Registry for Internet Numbers, or ARIN, one of five regional groups that dole out such addresses. ARIN covers the US, Canada and the Caribbean.

The Internet Assigned Numbers Authority, the top-level administrator of the system, has called a press conference in Miami on Thursday. One person said its last five blocks of Internet Protocol, or IP, addresses will be distributed then. These blocks, each with 16.8 million addresses, will be distributed to the regional registries.

That means the regional groups will have IP addresses to distribute further to Internet service providers, websites and others before running out. Curran expects to deplete his allotment in six to nine months.

The current Internet address system, Internet Protocol version 4, has been in place since the 1980s. It allows for a theoretical maximum of 4.3 billion addresses in use, far beyond what was thought necessary for what was then mainly a network for academic use.

Engineers have kn! own for years that the pool of these IP addresses would one day run out. Websites and service providers have been experimenting with a new technology that allows for many more addresses an infinite number, for all practical purposes. But many have been slow to do so because of a lack of immediate benefits.

The exhaustion of IP addresses at the top level puts pressure on them to move more quickly. The new system is called Internet Protocol version 6, or IPv6. Curran said only about 2% of websites support it. However, many of those are the most-visited sites on the Internet, including Google and Facebook. He expects smaller sites to scramble for IPv6 addresses now.

As Internet service providers run out of IPv4 addresses, theyll have to give subscribers IPv6 addresses. The challenge lies in connecting them to websites that have only IPv4 addresses.


In essence, IPv4 and IPv6 are different languages. Several translation technologies are available, but they havent been tested on a large scale, Curran said. That could lead to problems reaching some websites, or slow surfing.
Were estimating how these boxes will work, but we havent seen one deployed with tens of thousands of customers on it yet, Curran said.

The end game the distribution of the last five blocks was triggered by the distribution of two of the last seven blocks on Tuesday. They went to the Asia Pacific Network Information Centre, the regional registry for East Asia (including India), Australia and the Pacific islands.

Murdoch launches iPad newspaper 'The Daily'

NEW YORK: News Corp.'s Rupert Murdoch unveiled "The Daily" on Wednesday, a digital newspaper created specially for the iPad that will be sold solely through Apple's online store and cost 99 cents a week.

"New times demand new journalism," the 79-year-old News Corp. chairman and chief executive said as he took the wraps off the hotly awaited publication at a press event at the Guggenheim Museum in New York.

Murdoch, who was joined on stage by Eddy Cue, vice president of Internet Services at iPad maker Apple, praised the touchscreen tablet computer as an "incredible new platform" and said The Daily would provide a "fresh new voice."

The Daily would combine the latest technology with "shoe leather reporting, good editing and a skeptical eye," he said. "The Daily will be the model of how stories are told and consumed in this digital age."

Asked what would make The Daily a success, Murdoch replied "When we sell millions.

"Our ambitions are very big, but our costs are very low," he said, adding that News Corp. had spent around $30 million on the publication so far and that costs would run about half a million dollars a week.

Murdoch said The Daily would only be available on the iPad for now but would eventually come to other tablet computers.

"We've been quite honest with Apple," he said. "We expect to be on all major tablets. But we believe that this year and maybe next year really belong to Apple."

The Daily will arrive on a subscriber's iPad every morning and can be updated during the day.

"This is not a once-a-day static product," The Daily editor-in-chief Jesse Angelo said. "We can drop in a new pa! ge any t ime."

Murdoch said The Daily is aimed at a "growing segment of the population that is educated and sophisticated but does not read a national paper.

"But they do consume media," he said. "And they expect content tailored to their specific interest available anytime, anywhere."

The Daily will cost 99 cents a week or $39.99 a year and will be available for free for the first two weeks. It is available in Apple's App Store and can be purchased with an iTunes account.

The Daily's front page on Wednesday displayed a color picture of a demonstrator in Egypt and the headline "Falling Pharaoh."

Inside, it featured news articles, interactive graphics, high-definition quality video, photos and the ability to share information using social media.

The Daily had originally been scheduled to be unveiled in San Francisco last month but the event was delayed at the last minute by Apple's announcement that chief executive Steve Jobs was going on medical leave.

Murdoch said he spoke with Jobs last week and News Corp. released a statement by the Apple chief.

"News Corp. is redefining the news experience with The Daily," Jobs said. "We think it is terrific and iPad users are really going to embrace it."

According to The Wall Street Journal, which is owned by News Corp., News Corp. hired about 100 people to work on The Daily, including journalists from the New Yorker, Forbes, the New York Post and other publications.

The Daily is Murdoch's latest attempt to find a way to charge readers for content online in an era of shrinking newspaper circulation and eroding print advertising revenue.

The Wall Street Journal requires a subs! cription for full access to WSJ.com and Britain's The Times and The Sunday Times, two other News Corp. papers, recently erected pay walls around their websites.

Google launches virtual tour of world's finest museums

LONDON: Google is harnessing its controversial Street View technology to take you on a virtual tour of the world's finest museums, from the comfort of your home.

The search giant even claims its Art Project tours are better than the real thing, with one exhibit in each location available in a high-resolution image that goes beyond "what is possible with the naked eye".

Each painting is captured in around seven billion pixels, making their online display around 1,000 times more detailed than an average digital camera.

Tate Britain and National Gallery here, Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York), State Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg (Russia) and the Palace of Versailles (France) are among 17 museums that have collaborated with Google to offer 360 degree virtual tours of their galleries.

Other works of art which can now be seen in great detail include Vincent Van Gogh's 'The Starry Night' from the Museum Of Modern Art (New York) and 'The Ambassadors' by Hans Holbein the Younger at the National Gallery, the Daily Mail reports.

Google said it took between four and eight hours to capture each painting in great detail with thousands of images which are "stitched" together.

The technology reveals hard to see details such as the tiny Latin couplet in Holbein's 'The Merchant Georg Gisze'.

Google has used its Street View technology to enable people to explore 385 gallery rooms around the world in the same way as they can wander down streets virtually with Google Maps.

Tate director Sir Nicholas Serota said the project "gives all our audiences an unrivalled opportunity to come really close to great works of art."

Nelson Ma! ttos, vi ce president of engineering at Google, said that "millions of children who will probably never have the opportunity to see these great pieces of art will now be able to do so online".

Bose Lifestyle 235 2.1 audio system

Persistent Systems buys US' Infospectrum

MUMBAI: Persistent Systems said on Wednesday it has signed a definitive agreement to acquire the outsourced product development business of U.S.-based Infospectrum Inc and also its India unit.

Financial details were not provided. The acquisition would help Persistent tap growth opportunities in the European market, it said in a statement.

The transaction is expected to be completed in the current quarter, it said.

Google accuses Microsoft of copying search results

SEATTLE: Google is accusing Microsoft Corp. of cheating as the two duel for Internet search supremacy, but Microsoft denies the charge, saying it's just using all available weapons to lessen its rival's dominance.

The dust-up between the two companies that process virtually all of North America's search requests grabbed the spotlight Tuesday at an event sponsored by Microsoft about the future of Internet searches. Microsoft's practices have even wider implications now that its technology powers Yahoo Inc. searches in the US, Canada, Mexico, Australia, and Brazil as part of a 10-year partnership that grew out of the companies' inability to mount a serious challenge to Google on their own.

Google's attempt to embarrass Microsoft at an event devoted to innovation served as the latest reminder of the tensions between the technology heavyweights. While Microsoft has been pecking at Google in search, Google has been chipping away at Microsoft's advantage in computer software with its own suite of competing products.

"We just want everyone to know the truth about how Microsoft operates as a search engine, which is by taking the hard work of others and presenting it as their own," said Amit Singhal, a Google fellow who oversees the company's closely guarded search formulas. He made his comments in a phone interview.

Microsoft did nothing more than adjust its results after monitoring Internet Explorer users' search requests and clicking activity on Google as well as its own site, Bing, according to Harry Shum , a corporate vice president for Bing. In a blog post, Blum derided Google for engaging in a "a spy-novelesque stunt."

Google Inc. set out to expose Microsoft's tactics last year, said Matt Cutts , the head of Google's Web spam team. That's when it appeared Bing w! as showi ng search results that seemed a little too close to Google's own especially for obscure, misspelled queries.

The similarities raised suspicions that Microsoft's IE Web browser and various other tools were feeding information back that helped Microsoft's engineers make Bing's results more Google-like.

Google laid a trap to prove it. The company made a list of gibberish or obscure search terms and manually linked them to unrelated websites. Then, 20 Google engineers took home laptops loaded with Internet Explorer, searched Google.com for those terms and clicked on the artificial results. Soon after, searching for the same odd terms on Bing would call up the same odd results.

Cutts likened the trap to a mapmaker drawing a fake street or the Yellow Pages adding a fake name to its directory to flush out copycats.

The "Bing Sting" was first reported on the Search Engine Land blog before emerging as a hot topic during a panel discussion that included Cutts and Shum. The San Francisco event was streamed over the Internet.

"It's not like we actually copy anything," Shum said. "We learn from customers who are willing to share data with us, just like Google does."

Those data include not only the searches people type into Bing, but also into Google, and what links they click on. The information can be used to fine-tune Bing's own search results. And that sort of "collective intelligence," Shum said, is how the Web is supposed to work.

LG's first tablet to hit US market in March

SEOUL: LG Electronics said Wednesday it would release its first tablet computer in the United States in March as it prepares to go head to head with Apple's iPad.

LG said the G-slate was among the first tablet models to run on the "Honeycomb" operating system, which is Google's latest generation of Android platforms designed for mobile devices with large screens.

The G-slate features a 8.9-inch screen, smaller than the iPad's nearly 10-inch display but larger than the seven-inch screen of Samsung Electronics' Galaxy Tab. LG did not give a price for the new gadget

The world's third-largest handset maker said the release date for the G-slate's global release would be disclosed later this month.

LG's handset business took a direct hit from smartphone offerings by global rivals and after posting a fourth quarter net loss of $229 million, it is now counting on new smartphones and tablet computers to drive sales.

"LG's table computer is expected to cause a new trend in the global market as well as in North America," the company said in a statement.

The iPad went on sale in South Korea last November, three weeks after Samsung launched its rival tablet computer in its home market.

Samsung's Galaxy Tab is more expensive than the cheapest iPad, which costs between $499 and $829.c

Lava, Micromax, Olive others to offer cheaper alternatives to iPad, Galaxy

NEW DELHI: After a runaway success in the handset business over the last 24 months, many small players, led by domestic upstarts, who jointly account for over 40% of cellphone sales, are now set to enter the nascent tablet PC market in India.

Companies such as Lava, Micromax, Zen, Olive, GFive, Acer and Fly among others will attempt to replicate their success in the tablet PC space by offering products at large discounts compared to an Apple iPad or Samsung Galaxy Tab, targeting the mid-income group.

While Apple, which launched the iPad last week in India, and its primary competitor Samsung are largely restricted to metros and some big cities, the smaller handset players say they plan to ride their strong distribution network and high retailers commission, especially in rural India, to capture a large share of the tablet pie.

Executives with these companies say their products will be a match for the likes of Samsungs Galaxy Tab as they will all use Googles Android operating system. Analysts predict that Android tablets are set to get a boost this year as Google is set to release is Android 3.0, aka Honeycomb, a version of the smartphone operating system designed for tablets.

UK-based research firm Strategy Analytics in a report earlier this month said that Android-based tablets had captured a 22% share of the worlds tablet market last quarter, reducing Apples dominance to 75% of all fourth quarter sales when compared to 95% share in the third quarter, when its iPad accounted for 4.2 million of the 4.4 million tablets sold.

GFive, ranked second in the country in terms of cellphone market share by research firm IDC, has already started field-testing its tablet in India. To be launched in the first week of April, the tablet will come in three models two on Android and on! e on Win dows in seven and ten inch screen sizes. Arshit Pathak, managing director Kingtech Electronics India, a group company of GFive International said the company would price the tablets at around Rs 10,000.

Delhi-based Lava Mobiles will introduce its tablet by September this year that will be priced between Rs 15,000 and Rs 20,000 and will also run on the Android platform. The companys co-founder and director SN Rai said the company has made substantial investment in expanding its research and design expertise, and expects prices of tablets to come down further.

Another Delhi-based handset maker Zen Mobile will launch an Android-based tablet by April. The companys managing director Deepesh Gupta said the 10-inch screen tablet would be priced between Rs 15,000 and Rs 20,000, lower than tablets already in the market. The tablet will be endorsed by our brand ambassador Amitabh Bachchan, he added.

Olive Telecom, which last year was the first Indian company to unveil a tablet, said it sold out its initial stock of the device termed the OlivePad. According to Olive chairman, Arun Khanna, the company will launch a new OlivePad with an upgraded operating system and possibly a lighter version this year, priced at around Rs 23,000.

Newer handset makers coming up with fully-loaded tablets are targeting the mid and low income earning segment, most of who will be first time buyers and who may choose tablets over laptops and netbooks.

While the country sells over 12 million mobile handsets a month, the tablet PC market is estimated to be as low as 10,000 units a month. But, with all leading mobile service providers launching 3G services enabling faster data services, the tablet market is expected to grow exponentially this year.

Domestic companies set to enter tablet PC market in India

NEW DELHI: After a runaway success in the handset business over the last 24 months, many small players, led by domestic upstarts, who jointly account for over 40% of cellphone sales, are now set to enter the nascent tablet PC market in India.

Companies such as Lava, Micromax, Zen, Olive, GFive, Acer and Fly among others will attempt to replicate their success in the tablet PC space by offering products at large discounts compared to an Apple iPad or Samsung Galaxy Tab, targeting the mid-income group.

While Apple, which launched the iPad last week in India, and its primary competitor Samsung are largely restricted to metros and some big cities, the smaller handset players say they plan to ride their strong distribution network and high retailers commission, especially in rural India, to capture a large share of the tablet pie.

Executives with these companies say their products will be a match for the likes of Samsungs Galaxy Tab as they will all use Googles Android operating system. Analysts predict that Android tablets are set to get a boost this year as Google is set to release is Android 3.0, aka Honeycomb, a version of the smartphone operating system designed for tablets.

UK-based research firm Strategy Analytics in a report earlier this month said that Android-based tablets had captured a 22% share of the worlds tablet market last quarter, reducing Apples dominance to 75% of all fourth quarter sales when compared to 95% share in the third quarter, when its iPad accounted for 4.2 million of the 4.4 million tablets sold.

GFive, ranked second in the country in terms of cellphone market share by research firm IDC, has already started field-testing its tablet in India. To be launched in the first week of April, the tablet will come in three models two on Android and on! e on Win dows in seven and ten inch screen sizes. Arshit Pathak, managing director Kingtech Electronics India, a group company of GFive International said the company would price the tablets at around Rs 10,000.

Delhi-based Lava Mobiles will introduce its tablet by September this year that will be priced between Rs 15,000 and Rs 20,000 and will also run on the Android platform. The companys co-founder and director SN Rai said the company has made substantial investment in expanding its research and design expertise, and expects prices of tablets to come down further.

Another Delhi-based handset maker Zen Mobile will launch an Android-based tablet by April. The companys managing director Deepesh Gupta said the 10-inch screen tablet would be priced between Rs 15,000 and Rs 20,000, lower than tablets already in the market. The tablet will be endorsed by our brand ambassador Amitabh Bachchan, he added.

Olive Telecom, which last year was the first Indian company to unveil a tablet, said it sold out its initial stock of the device termed the OlivePad. According to Olive chairman, Arun Khanna, the company will launch a new OlivePad with an upgraded operating system and possibly a lighter version this year, priced at around Rs 23,000.

Newer handset makers coming up with fully-loaded tablets are targeting the mid and low income earning segment, most of who will be first time buyers and who may choose tablets over laptops and netbooks.

While the country sells over 12 million mobile handsets a month, the tablet PC market is estimated to be as low as 10,000 units a month. But, with all leading mobile service providers launching 3G services enabling faster data services, the tablet market is expected to grow exponentially this year.

Google touts 'game changer' in online art viewing

LONDON: Google aims to bring the world's great art galleries into the home with a new website that offers virtual tours using Street View technology, the ability to build private collections and ultra-high resolution images.

While most big galleries have been busy making their works accessible online for years, experts told a launch at London's Tate Britain gallery on Tuesday that Google's site was looking to take the online art experience to a new level.

"It could be the game changer," said Julian Raby of the Freer Gallery of Art, part of the Smithsonian in Washington DC, which is one of 17 galleries taking part in the project.

Nelson Mattos, VP Engineering at Google, said the Art Project site (www.googleartproject.com) would allow children from Latin America, India and Africa, who were unlikely to see the originals, to come close to the experience on the internet.

"This really represents a major step forward in the way people are going to interact with these beautiful treasures of art around the world," he said, adding that Google planned to expand the site over the coming years.

Mattos and art curators at the launch said they were confident that no matter how advanced the technology, the new site would never replace visiting the museums.

"We obviously don't believe this technology is going to prevent people from coming to the museums," he added. "We hope that the opposite will happen."

DEPTH OF EXPERIENCE

Raby believed the Art Project would add a new layer of experience to online art viewing.

"Museums up to now have been obsessed with information, and what the Google Art Project does is t! o create an emotive experience," he said.

"I see this not as an alternative (to visiting a museum) but as a stimulus to come and see the real works of art."

Amit Sood, the Google employee who started Art Project from scratch during time his employer freed up for personal initiatives, explained how the company used its Street View technology to develop virtual tours.

Cameras mounted on a special trolley travelled through empty galleries after the public had left, taking 360 degree images of selected rooms which were then stitched together. So far 385 rooms are navigable, and more will be added.

Each of the 17 museums involved also chose one artwork to be photographed using "gigapixel" photo capturing technology, resulting in an image on the computer containing seven billion pixels and providing detail not visible to the naked eye.

And so by zooming in on a broken string on the instrument in Hans Holbein the Younger's "The Ambassadors", from London's National Gallery, the viewer not only sees the string clearly but also where each new brushstroke has been applied.

"We're interested in getting depth of understanding of a limited amount of works," said Tate director Nicholas Serota.

As well as 17 paintings selected for "gigapixel" treatment, the museums made available images of 1,000 more works, allowing people to study them in detail using a custom built zoom viewer.

Users can create their own collections, add comments and share their experiences, opening up educational opportunities.

Mattos said that there was "no commercial benefit" to Google from the enterprise, which the company paid for. He declined to say what costs were involved, however.

Among ! the gall eries featured on the site are the Uffizi in Florence, the Palace of Versailles in France, Museum Kampa in Prague, the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam and the State Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg, Russia.

Microsoft web browser faces security risk

LONDON: Software giant Microsoft has issued a "critical" alert for millions of people using its web browser Internet Explorer, saying a newly-discovered flaw in the Windows operating system can be exploited by hackers to steal personal details.

The glitch is so severe that it potentially affects every user of Internet Explorer. The company said that hackers can take advantage of the flaw in taking over personal computers of more than 900 million using the web browser.

However, other browsers such as Firefox, Google Chrome and Safari are unaffected by the threat because, unlike Internet Explorer, they don't support M HTML files, where the problem lies, the Daily Mail reported.

Microsoft said that the bug is inside Windows, presumably because they don't want users to migrate to other browsers.

This means it affects all versions of the operating system currently supported including Windows XP (SP3), Windows Vista, Windows 7, Windows Server 2003 and Windows Server 2008 (R2).

The company has so far been unable to remove the bug itself and has issued a "fix it" security patch to block any attempts to use it.

All Windows users, particularly those who use Internet Explorer, are being urged to download the patch as the company's security team work on a way to permanently fix the problem.

The company has described the flaw as a serious threat, although no hackers are thought to have yet exploited the vulnerability.

Microsoft spokeswoman Angela Gunn announced the flaw in a security advisory published online Friday.

"An attacker could construct an HTML link designed to trigger a malicious script and somehow convince the target! ed user to click it. When the user clicked that link, the malicious script would run on the user's computer for the rest of the current Internet Explorer session," she was quoted as saying.

"Such a script might collect user information (e.g. email), spoof content displayed in the browser, or otherwise interfere with the user's experience," the warning said.

AMD launches new generation 'Fusion' computer processor

BANGALORE: Global chip-maker AMD today announced the launch of a new chipset that offers higher computing speed and better graphics quality than its predecessors.

The new 'Fusion' processors incorporate a graphics card (GPU) and microprocessor (CPU) on a single chip, allowing computer-makers to develop new form factors for devices.

"AMD Fusion will eliminate the need for consumers to choose between power and performance... This will also allow our partners to offer exciting new form factors on a robust computing platform," AMD India Managing Director and Regional VP (Sales and Marketing) Ravi Swaminathan said.

Over 11 systems based on the new AMD Fusion chipset will be launched in India in the first half of 2011 by manufacturers like Sony, HP , Dell , Lenovo , Asus , MSI and Toshiba .

However, no pricing details were available. "Through Fusion, AMD is targeting the 'sweet spot' for accelerated high-definition experiences across notebooks, desktops and HD netbooks," AMD Corporate Vice-President, Fusion Experience Programme, Manju Hegde said.

A 90-member team from AMD's Research and Development team in Hyderabad played a significant role in the design and development of these microprocessors.

The 'Fusion' family of Accelerated Processing Units (APUs) utilise a single-die design that combines multi-core CPU (x86) technology with a powerful DirectX 11-capable graphics and parallel processing engine.

The APUs also include a dedicated high-definition video acceleration block and a high-speed bus that transmits data across differing types of processor cores within the same design.

The product includes power-saving features! enablin g all-day battery life.

The APUs will come in two versions, based on their performance and power draw, the company said.

"AMD Fusion marks a monumental shift in computing performance, experience and possibilities because of the powerful combination of CPUs and discrete-level GPUs," Swaminathan said.

Android tablets take on Apple iPad

Now, pay for groceries, bills through Airtel

NEW DELHI: Telecom major Bharti Airtel on Monday launched its 'airtel money' service, which will allow its subscribers to pay for groceries, bills and other dues through their mobile phones.

Last year, Bharti airtel was granted the licence to use the semi-closed wallet by the Reserve Bank of India, which allows a customer to exchange physical cash for virtual money which can be stored on mobile phone to pay for goods/ services for transaction of value less than Rs 5,000.

We are proud to launch airtel money as a first-of-its- kind service from a telecom operator, that transforms the mobile phone into a secure and convenient wallet which customers can use to load money and use for shopping and making payments, Bharti airtel President (Mobile Services ) Atul Bindal said in a statement.

Crowdsourcing: Making the crowds on net work for you

In 2010 Mumbai-based anchor and model Nazneen Batliwalla, created her profile on Balaji Telefilms site Hoonur.com. Soon she was hired for an entertainment show Anjaana Anjaani on Zoom TV channel, where five couples battle it out to be the choicest one in front of actors Ranbir Kapoor and Priyanka Chopra.

Twenty-six-year-old Ashish Dubey joined a Gurgaon based telecom software developer as marketing manager for Asia Pacific, from nVidia , a chip maker, where he worked at its Mumbai office as a product manager. He was hired from LinkedIn, the professional networking site. What paid off from them was not just their CVs that were diligently upgraded with each project completed, but comments from his peers and friends who duly acknowledged their work, on LinkedIn and Facebook.

In another instance, Canadian mining company Goldcorp, unable to find gold, put all its geological data online, asking for help on where the gold was located and put up $500,000 in prize money for accurate suggestions. They got submissions from people all over the world, including people using 3D computer modelling techniques. They found $3 billion worth of gold and Goldcorp became one of Canadas biggest mining companies! At $500,000 prize money, it was the most ambitious online public help project.

Such appeals for outside help for projects and going through peer comments when hiring talent, are termed crowdsourcing. It is helping companies find solutions to problems in a democratic manner. Online crowds say whats the best feature in a product or who is the right person for a job. Open source computer systems, such as Linux and Googles Android, are written and refined by members of the public. Another example of such collaboration is Wikipedia, which allows users to write and edit entries for its online encyclopaedia. But now, this wave is spreading, with websites! literal ly `employing the crowds to get work done or hire talent.

For talent hunt, crowdsourcing has become mainstream. It helps HR managers look for profiles, often unconventional, cross checks for references on the internet to hire talent, and dole out work for a reward. It becomes especially important for finding out profiles if a company is based in India, but looking for people in a different country, says Mumbai based Vikram Bharadwaj, CEO, Redileon, an executive search firm. Though direct hiring for talent through online means is rare unless it is for a short term project, he adds.

Crowdsourcing in a broader sense is a concept that is spawning website business models. Facebook , LinkedIn, Apnacircle, Ebay, Sourceforge, Codeplex, Innocentive, Freelancer, Yahoo, YouTube or Google Answers create millions of bytes of user generated content on the web everyday. This spans sharing opinions on new products, updating profiles or personal videos. The number of hits and comments that they generate reveals the wisdom of crowds, and hence its becoming the tool to gauge popularity of say, a radio jockey or to point out flaws in a product.

Wikipedia defines crowdsourcing an act of outsourcing tasks, traditionally performed to an undefined, large group of people or community, through an open call. The concept is used to solve problems, hire talent, buy products, form opinion, or offer services all of which results in traffic in cyberpsace, which directly results in revenue. Jimmy Wales founded Wikipedia invites millions to post a biography about an event or person. SourceForge.net invites the open source community to develop projects. Status messages and tweets on social networks are either a reflection of ones current mood, seek an appreciation, sympathy, or form an opinion. In simple words they offer a solution to a prob! lem.

For non-traditional hiring too, crowdsourcing has become mainstream. Artists, freelancers, technology professionals, writers and designers, do get work from the internet, by posting their profiles or bidding for work. Elance.com, Rentacoder.com and Guru.com, sites like these thrive on individual entrepreneurship, with people whose work is recommended by `crowds gaining in the process. Noida based Shamit Sinha, for instance started Synapse India, which works on projects put out on Elance.com. The company garners over $4.5 million in sales.

The ways of hiring have changed. Now, if a record company wants to hire a singer in a specific genre, instead of putting out an ad or hire from a job site, the company can go directly to YouTube, select the genre, and hire seeing their work.

Kunal Gupta, director of Noida based, Mount Talent Consulting , for instance, posts his senior level IT requirements needs on chat tagline on Gmail. He is a chat friend to a large number of technology professionals, who frequently keep on checking his tag status. It helps them to either apply or refer a friend to get a big referral bonus.

Food and beverages company PepsiCo India uses the social networking platform quite actively to get new hires. The company uses platforms like LinkedIn to start groups like `PepsiCo Jobs and `Womens League that help in reaching out to relevant profiles online and tapping on referrals from within its employee professional networks. A profile on a professional network not only carries the resume of the candidate but also testimonials from colleagues and bosses that highlight key strengths of the candidate, says PepsiCo India head-talent acquisition Nagina Singh .

(By Harsimran Julka & Mahima Puri)

Intel finds chip flaw, cuts revenue forecast

NEW YORK: Intel Corp cut its first-quarter revenue forecast by $300 mn on Monday because of costs associated with correcting a design flaw it discovered in one of its chips.

Intel said it had stopped shipments of the chip, which is used in PCs with the company's latest generation Sandy Bridge processors, and had implemented a fix. It estimated the total cost to repair and replace the chip at about $700 mn.

The world's largest chipmaker, whose shares were down 1.6 percent after the announcement, said it did not expect the problem to have a material effect on full-year revenue. It will begin delivering an updated version of the chip to customers in late February.

But since the flaw affected some of the chipset units shipped in the fourth quarter, Intel plans to take a charge that will reduce its gross margin by roughly 4 percentage points for that period.

It will also take a first-quarter charge that will cut its gross margin by 2 percentage points.

Analysts said the financial impact would be muted, but added that the issue would ding the company's reputation, at least temporarily.

"This is a minor negative and not as big an issue as it seems," said Miller Tabak analyst Brendan Furlong. "It's obviously an embarrassment, rather than a major problem for the company."

The chip issue, along with the two acquisitions that are closing, including the purchase of security software firm McAfee, which is due to close in the first quarter, prompted Intel to revise its overall outlook.

Helped by the deals, it now expects first-quarter revenue of $11.7 bn, give or take $400 mn, compared with its previous expectation of $11.5 bn, give or take $400 mn.

! Shar es of Intel were down 34 cents at $21.12 on Nasdaq.

Airtel launches mobile wallet service

Google's Android topples Nokia's Symbian as the most popular smartphone platform

HELSINKI: Google's Android dethroned Nokia's Symbian as the most popular smartphone platform in the last quarter of 2010, ending a reign that began with the birth of the industry 10 years ago.

Research firm Canalys said on Monday phone makers sold a total of 32.9 million Android-equipped phones in the last quarter, compared with Symbian's total sales of 31 million. The landmark piles pressure on Nokia as it struggles to reassert itself at the top end of the mobile handsets market.

Following Apple's 2007 entrance into smartphones, Google rolled out its open-source Android operating system, which has become the standard for smaller phone makers.

Hit models from Samsung Electronics, HTC and LG Electronics helped Android in the quarter, while Symbian suffered from troubles of its owner and main user, Nokia.

"We have seen some strong products from a number of vendors," said Canalys analyst Tim Shepherd.

Android performs well in tablet segment

Google Inc's Android software won a 22 percent share of the tablet computer market in the fourth quarter, biting at the heels of Apple Inc's iPad, which still has a massive market lead.

Research firm Strategy Analytics said Apple's share of the global market for tablets fell to 75 percent in the fourth quarter from 95 percent in the third quarter while the overall market increased 120 percent to almost 10 million units.

The Galaxy tablet from Samsung Electronics was the main competitor to iPad in the quarter as it was on sale in dozens of countries, according to the research firm.

Samsung has said it sold 2 million Galaxy tablets in! the las t three months, still putting it far behind Apple, which sold more than 7 million iPads in the last quarter. It was not immediately clear whether both companies were referring to the exact same time period.

Strategy Analytics expects Android to increase its tablet market share further in the first half of this year as new devices such as the Xoom from Motorola Mobility are expected to go on sale during that time.

However, Canada's Research In Motion will add yet more competition to the burgeoning market when it launches its PlayBook tablet toward the end of this quarter.

The United States was the biggest tablet market by far in the fourth quarter, Strategy Analytics said.

Android gains 22% tablet market share: Analyst

NEW YORK: Google Inc's Android software won a 22 per cent share of the tablet computer market in the fourth quarter, biting at the heels of Apple Inc's iPad, which still has a massive market lead.

Research firm Strategy Analytics said Apple's share of the global market for tablets fell to 75 per cent in the fourth quarter from 95 per cent in the third quarter while the overall market increased 120 per cent to almost 10 million units.

The Galaxy tablet from Samsung Electronics was the main competitor to iPad in the quarter as it was on sale in dozens of countries, according to the research firm.

Samsung has said it sold 2 million Galaxy tablets in the last three months, still putting it far behind Apple, which sold more than 7 million iPads in the last quarter. It was not immediately clear whether both companies were referring to the exact same time period.

Strategy Analytics expects Android to increase its tablet market share further in the first half of this year as new devices such as the Xoom from Motorola Mobility are expected to go on sale during that time.

However, Canada's Research In Motion will add yet more competition to the burgeoning market when it launches its PlayBook tablet toward the end of this quarter.

The United States was the biggest tablet market by far in the fourth quarter, Strategy Analytics said.

Soota can't poach MindTree clients, staff

MUMBAI: Ashok Soota , who announced his decision to move out of MindTree and resign from his role as executive chairman, is bound by a non-compete agreement that prevents him from taking any MindTree client and employee with him, said a person with knowledge of the matter. Soota is starting a new venture and has asked the board to release him by March 31.

The veteran IT leader is held in high esteem and there were fears that after his departure, many employees and clients would also move out of MindTree to join him. Soota, who co-founded MindTree with nine others, is the single largest shareholder in the company with over 11% stake.

Investment bankers are closely watching the developments and awaiting the outcome of the board meeting to be held early this week to determine how the company will move forward. Company officials could not be reached for comment.

Some of the immediate concerns around Soota's departure is if the company will be able to contain the damage and reassure all stakeholders that it is business as usual. Else it could lose business and talent to rivals, who are stepping up hiring to meet increased demand after the downturn, and risk a possible implosion, said bankers. "A lot depends on how quickly the board acts. The earlier the better," said an analyst tracking the developments.

Financial investors, Walden and Nalanda, which hold around 10% each, and Global Technology Ventures with a 6.6% stake are the other large investors in the firm. Among the promoters, Bagchi and Krishnakumar hold around 5% each and S Janakiraman, president and group CEO of product engineering services holds around 2.5%. Bagchi, Krishnakumar and Janakiraman also play a more central role in the company's decision making.

The board could do one of two things-it could el! evate Su broto Bagchi to the role of non-executive chairman and find someone to lead the strategic initiatives function that Soota was heading, or move Krishnakumar N, who is currently CEO and MD, to the role of chairman and find a new CEO. Bagchi is not seen as taking an executive role, those familiar with the company said.

The departure of someone of Soota's stature as well as the uncharacterisitic manner in which it was announced- through a personal mail from Soota than a company announcement-has also raised questions about MindTree's flagging performance in recent times. A long-time associate of Soota said differences have been simmering between the members of the founding team for nearly a year, which lead to his eventual exit from the firm he founded and nurtured.

Some of the differences may have been over the company's strategy and positioning as a high-end technology player, with skills in IT services and R&D. "When MindTree was set up in 1999, they replicated the Wipro model of IT services and R&D. But even for Wipro, R&D was a highly fluctuating business. Wipro was able to absorb the impact because it had scale business in IT services," said a former colleague of Soota.

Soota was said to be a strong believer in MindTree's R&D focus, which was also one of the goals of the founding team. There has been a lot of debate within the company itself if it should move from R&D into more of enterprise IT in recent months, said a technology analyst, requesting anonymity.

"Having a 10-member founding team also comes with its own challenges. There is limited ability to attract new talent since most of key positions are with the founders," said a senior IT industry executive.

Mobile phones say quite a lot about their owners: Study

MELBOURNE: Believe it or not, mobile phones say quite a lot about their owners, says a new study. Social analyst David Chalke said a person's mobile phone could give outsiders insight into their attitudes towards work, rest and play.

"Twenty years ago when you said 'your phone', you meant the white Telecom commander on the wall in the kitchen, but it doesn't mean that at all now it means your social accessory. "People always used to say it about cars, 'you drive what you are'... and now your phone (represents) what you are," he was quoted by the 'Courrier Mail' as saying. In fact, a research by Roy Morgan revealed most attributes differed between the owners of mobile phone brands. The typical iPhone user thinks computers give them control over their lives. "iPhone is the Alfa Romeo," Chalke said.

SonyEricsson users like a full social life and fast food. Users of an LG handset are usually women aged 14 to 24, not mechanically minded and unlikely to have pay TV . "LG is the Kia," Chalke said.

Samsung users tend to be conservative dressers over 50 who don't like taking risks. "Samsung is the Daihatsu." BlackBerry users are high-earners aged 35 to 49. Nokia users are unlikely to be aged 14 to 24 and less likely to have played arcade video games in the past three months, according to him. "Nokia is the security blanket ... it is the Toyota of phones," Chalke said.

Fast, clean and secure: Browsers getting smart

It takes around 100 milliseconds to bat your eyelid. And the race now among the popularly used browsers is to optimize javascript performance to be within the time you bat your eyelid twice. There is very little difference between the speeds clocked by the latest versions of the browsers of Google, Microsoft and Mozilla. What this means is that applications and graphics pop up at enviable speeds.

Google's Chrome, Microsoft's latest Internet Explorer 9 Beta version and Mozilla Firebox's 4 Beta 10 update offer just that - ultra fast speeds, a clean browser and a high level of security. Perhaps the key differentiator here is the user interface experience and extra features/extensions that each browser offers. It is in this niche services, that one browser scores over the other, says Harish Vaidyanathan, Director, Evangelism, Microsoft India . But for ordinary users, these advanced features help them save time and increase efficiency. For instance, you don't have to key in the entire URL address in any of these browsers.

All the three latest versions are smart enough to throw up the exact link you are looking for. In some cases, they even offer different options or they may even track your browsing history and display sites you visit very often. You may not need to open separate applications to view Excel sheets or your photo albums, these have now become integrated into the browser itself. Here's a look at some of the fascinating developments introduced by the major browsers.

Google Chrome Browser

Tabs are getting very adventurous across browsers. Instead of having multiple windows piled up at the bottom, it saves so much space to have tabs neatly arranged on the top. The fascinating thing here is that you can have split tabs into different windows. This means that you can write that resea! rch proj ect you have been working on and at the same time keep a tab on the cricket scores. And this is how you do it:

1. Drag a tab to the middle of either side of your computer screen

2. When the docking icon appears, release the mouse over the icon and the tab will snap into place, filling exactly half your screen

3. Four other docking positions will help you work simultaneously in multiple tabs with ease

A niche feature which is likely to catch on in a big way is the link the chrome browser can give to your mobile phone. And this is how it works:

1. Download the 'Chrome to Phone' feature.

2. A button gets added to the browser that instantly sends the web page, map or YouTube video to your mobile phone.

You need a phone which runs Froyo (Android 2.2) to use the Chrome to Phone feature.

There are also some interesting features that you can add like the Google mail checker for instance, which displays the number of unread messages you have in your Google mail box right on top of your screen. You will have to download the Google mail checker to activate this application. Once done, you just need to click the button to open your inbox.

For movie buffs, there is a 'switching off the lights' feature (which has to be downloaded). If this is activated, the page fades to dark and there is an automatic focus on the video.

Internet Explorer 9 Beta

Unlike the older versions of the Internet Explorer browser which were bloated and slow compared to the competition, the latest version IE9, which has already seen 20 million downloads (since the launch of the beta in September 2010), is more clean offeri! ng plent y of real estate space for users to browse. "The focus is on a clean, fast, secure browsing experience," says Harish of Microsoft.

For sites which you use very often, you can take the icon displayed on the tab and pin it to the task-bar at the bottom of the screen. The next time you want to visit the site, all you need to do is click on that icon. These jump-list icons can reduce the time you take to navigate from site to site.

The latest version allows for split screen viewing of tabs. This is called a tag rip-off:

1. Pull the tab and drag and drop it onto the screen. The content continues to render seamlessly

2. This exercise can be repeated with other tabs and you can even merge the tabs bacK

The result is you can do a lot of work simultaneously whether it be chatting with your friends, streaming internet radio or writing a document.

There is a brand new Javascript engine, codenamed Chakra, under-the-hood that delivers good JavaScript performance on real-world websites.

But what IE9 seems to score over the other browsers is with security. You can check out the performance of the new Internet Explorer 9 Beta at http://ie.microsoft.com/testdrive

So what's next? "We are eagerly waiting for Web 3.0 and that's going to be the Graphical Web," he says.

Firefox 4 Beta 10

One thing Mozilla has been saying about Firefox 4 Beta 10, is that its new JgerMonkey JavaScript engine ensures faster start-up time, faster graphics rendering and quicker page load speed. But what users will find useful is the efficient tab control that you can enjoy. If you are looking up something on art history, for instance, you can open 5-6 tabs! simulta neously. You can pile them up into one group and minimize it for future use. And this is how you do it:

1. You can click on any tab & drag it to the side, to form a group

2. After piling all your tabs, you can minimize this so that it becomes a pile

3. In case you need to see it, just press the expand button

Firefox 4, the Beta version of which can be downloaded by anyone, by default gives screen shots of the eight most frequented sites you've visited.

Like Chrome, Firefox 4 also offers features to stay in sync with your mobile phone. You can synchronize your settings, passwords, bookmarks, history, open tabs and other customizations across multiple devices so you can take Firefox with you wherever you go. But this is not available on all mobile phones yet.

Tips for smart browsing

If you are not too sure of the URL you want, you can directly enter the search query and the new browsers can immediately sniff out what you want & throw up options.

Multitasking is possible on all three browsers. You can pull off one of the tabs, drag it away from the browser and have the contents of two or four sites accommodated on a single screen.

To access your favourite sites quickly, just drag the address onto the task bar at the bottom of the screen. The next time you browse, all you need to do is click on the icon and your favourite page will pop up.