Swisscom will erneut die besten Apps mit dem "App of the Year Award" auszeichnen. Bis Ende August können in der Schweiz wohnhafte Entwickler und registrierte Unternehmen ihre Applikationen für iPhone, Android und Windows Phone einreichen. Die Gewinner-Apps werden mit einer breiten kommunikativen Präsenz in Swisscom-Medien (Shop Magazin, Online etc.) ausgezeichnet und erhalten ein Tablet ihrer Wahl.
Die Deutsche Telekom will im Tarifkonflikt mit Verdi für die rund 17.000 Beschäftigten bei der Bonner Zentrale die Schlichtung anrufen. Personalvorstand Thomas Sattelberger sehe keine Chancen mehr für eine Einigung, begründete der Konzern in Bonn den Schritt. Die Gewerkschaft Verdi hatte zuvor mit einer Ausweitung der Warnstreiks gedroht.
Der erfolgsverwöhnte iPhone- und iPad-Hersteller Apple muss an der Börse einen Dämpfer hinnehmen: Die Aktie fällt seit Tagen. Am Montag durchbrach das Papier die vielbeachtete Marke von 600 Dollar und notierte im frühen Handel um 2 Prozent niedriger bei 591 Dollar (454 Euro).
Die deutsche Software AG baut mit der Übernahme des britischen Technologieanbieters My-Channels ihr Angebot im Bereich Datenübertragung aus. Mit dem Zukauf biete die Software AG ihren Unternehmenskunden künftig ein äusserst schnelles Kommunikationsprogramm, teilte der zweitgrösste deutsche Softwarekonzerns nach SAP mit.
Der französische Stardesigner Philippe Starck arbeitet doch nicht direkt mit Apple zusammen, wie Starck selbst Ende letzter Woche Medien gegenüber angegeben hatte. Der Designer setze ein Projekt, das er mit dem verstorbenen Apple-Gründer Steve Jobs begonnen habe, nun mit dessen Frau Laurene fort, teilte sein Pressebüro in Paris mit.
Nokia Siemens Networks hat bekannt gegeben, dass in München rund 2.000 Arbeitsplätze erhalten werden, nachdem die überwiegende Mehrheit der von der Restrukturierung betroffenen Mitarbeiter ihre Bereitschaft erklärt hat, in eine Transfergesellschaft zu wechseln.
Der kriselnde Handy-Weltmarktführer Nokia verliert weiter Vertrauen an den Finanzmärkten. Die Ratingagentur Moody`s senkte am Montag die Bonitätsbewertung um einen Schritt und ist auch für die Zukunft skeptisch. Mit einem Rating von „Baa3" statt zuvor „Baa2" sind Nokia-Anleihen aus Sicht von Moody`s nur noch eine Stufe vom sogenannten Ramschniveau entfernt, ab dem ein Investment grundsätzlich nicht mehr empfohlen wird.
Mips Technologies soll sich - Gerüchten zufolge - nach einem Käufer umsehen, schreibt die Nachrichtenagentur Bloomberg. Hierfür sei Goldman Sachs angeheuert worden. Man beruft sich hierbei auf nicht näher identifizierte Personen. Der in Grossbritannien ansässige Hauptkonkurrent ARM wird jedoch als potentieller Käufer ausgeschlossen.
Der Zahlungsverkehrsabwickler Wirecard setzt seine Einkaufstour fort. Zum 1. April seien wesentliche Teile der Mainzer Netrada Payment übernommen worden, teilte Wirecard in Aschheim bei München mit. Es gehe dabei vor allem um Kundenverträge aus der Modebranche.
Die Verwertungsgesellschaft Suisa will eine Kopierabgabe auf Tablet-Computer einführen. "Werden auf diese Geräte Musik oder Filme kopiert, so soll den Urhebern eine Entschädigung zustehen", sagte Suisa-Sprecher Martin Wüthrich am Sonntag auf Anfrage der sda.
An anonymous reader writes "The Next Web is reporting that Google Drive, the search giant's long anticipated cloud storage service, is set to launch next week. From the article: 'What's interesting though is that Google is planning to start everyone with 5 GB of storage. Of course you can buy more, but that trumps Dropbox's 2 GB that is included with every account. Dropbox does make it easy to get more space, including 23 GB of potential upgrades for HTC users. What's also interesting is the wording related to how the system will work. It's been long-thought that Windows integration will come easy, but that getting the Google Drive icon into the Mac a la Dropbox would be a bit harder. From what we're reading, Google Drive will work "in desktop folders" on both Mac and Windows machines, which still leaves the operation question unanswered.'"
harrymcc writes "35 years ago this week, at San Francisco's first West Coast Computer Faire, a tiny startup named Apple demonstrated its new personal computer, the Apple II. It was the company's first blockbuster product — the most important PC of its time, and, just maybe, the most important PC ever released, period."
Esther Schindler writes "An MIT professor explains why "simple" ideas require hard science and how a gemstone might be the key to an optical network. As the story begins: 'For years, the dream of an all-optical network has lain somewhere between Star Wars and a paper cup and a string. Recent successful work on the creation of an optical diode is a virtual case study in both the physics and materials sciences challenges of trying to develop all-optical networks. It is also a significant step towards their final realization.' One answer may be... garnet. Yes, the January birthstone. 'The material that Ross and others in her field use is a synthetic, lab-grown garnet film. Similar to the natural mineral, often used as a gemstone, it is transparent in the infrared part of the spectrum. This makes synthetic garnet ideal for optical communications systems, which use the near infrared. Unlike natural garnet, it's also magnetic. ... While it works, it's too big and too labor intensive for use as a commercial integrated chip. For that, you need to grow garnet on silicon. The challenge that Ross's group overcame is that garnet doesn't grow on silicon.'"
An anonymous reader writes "With North Korea's failed missile launch Friday, it is clear many nations around the globe are attempting to acquire missiles that can carry larger payloads and go further. Such moves have made the United States and its allies very nervous. Missile defense has been debated since the 1980's with such debate back once again the headlines. Most missile defense platforms have technical issues and are very expensive. One idea: use drones instead. '... a high-speed (~3.5 to 5.0 km/s), two-stage, hit-to-kill interceptor missile, launched from a Predator-type UAV can defeat many of these ballistic missile threats in their boost phase.' Could a Drone really take down a North Korea missile? 'A physics-based simulator can estimate the capabilities of a high-altitude, long endurance UAV-launched boost-phase interceptor (HALE BPI) launched from an altitude of approximately 60,000 feet. Enabled by the revolution in UAVs, this proposed boost-phase interceptor, based on off-the-shelf technology, can be deployed in operationally feasible stations on the periphery of North Korea.'"
MrSeb writes "Hot on the heels of the most successful storage mediums of all time — MiniDisc and Zip disks — Sony has announced the Optical Disc Archive, a system that seems to cram up to 30 Blu-ray discs into a single, one-inch-thick plastic cassette, which will have a capacity of between 300GB and 1.5TB. As far as I can tell, the main selling point of the Optical Disc Archive is, just like MiniDisc, the ruggedness of the cassettes. Optical discs themselves are fairly resistant to changes in temperature and humidity, and the cassettes are dust and water resistant. What is the use case for these 1.5TB MiniDiscs, though? In terms of pure storage capacity, tape drives are still far superior (you can store up to 5TB on a tape!) In terms of speed and flexibility, hard drives are better. If you're looking for ruggedness, flash-based storage is smaller, lighter, and can easily survive a dip in the ocean. The Optical Disc Archive might be good as extensible storage for TV PVRs, like TiVo and Sky+ — but as yet, we don't even know the cost of the system or the cassettes, and I doubt either will be cheap."
An anonymous reader writes "I designed this CPU clock to help people learn about how a CPU works. The Mechanical CPU Clock shows the basic building blocks of a CPU (ALU, buses ,RAM ,registers, and a Control Unit). It executes a set of instructions which will emulate a simple wall clock. A detailed build/explanation is available on instructables.com."
AstroPhilosopher writes "The U.S. Supreme Court will hear an appeal from a Thai student who was fined $600,000 for re-selling textbooks. Trying to make ends meet, the student had family members in Thailand mail him textbooks that were made and purchased abroad, which he then resold in the U.S. It's a method many retailers practice every day. 'Discount sellers like Costco and Target and Internet giants eBay and Amazon help form an estimated $63 billion annual market for goods that are purchased abroad, then imported and resold without the permission of the manufacturer. The U.S.-based sellers, and consumers, benefit from the common practice of manufacturers to price items more cheaply abroad than in the United States. This phenomenon is sometimes called a parallel market or grey market.'"
imac.usr writes "The Virginia Supreme Court will hear arguments today on a case brought by a Fairfax County resident alleging that the county's school board members violated the state's Freedom of Information Act. The suit alleges that board members colluded to close an elementary school in the county through rapid exchange of emails with each other. The state's FOIA rules stipulate that such exchanges can not constitute 'virtually simultaneous interaction' and that any assemblage of three or more members constitutes a formal meeting which must be announced. The article notes similar suits are popping up across the country, highlighting one of the difficulties governments face in balancing communication with transparency."
Weezul writes "Paramount's 'Worldwide VP of Content Protection and Outreach' Al Perry has insinuated that Louis CK making $1 million in 12 days means he isn't monetizing. Al Perry asserted that 'copyright law gives creators the right to monetize their creations, and that even if people like Louis C.K. decide not to do so, that's a choice and not a requirement.' Bonus, Slashdot favorite Jonathan Coulton apparently grossed almost half a million last year."
An anonymous reader writes "The Guardian newspaper has teamed up with Mozilla to research the monitoring of online behavior through cookies and other web trackers. After downloading the Collusion add-on for Firefox, you can generate a visual representation of all the cookies that have been downloaded which are linked to the sites you have visited. This shows quite an interesting picture. The Guardian staff then want the data from Collusion to be uploaded to their site, after which they say 'we can build up a picture of this unseen world. When we've found the biggest players, we'll start tracking them back — finding out what data are they monitoring, and why.'"