Several recent IPOs and eBay’s $800 million cash offer for payments startup BrainTree this week highlight what looks like a burgeoning market for tech initial public offerings and mergers and acquisitions. On Friday, for example, Violin Memory, a flash storage maker, and RingCentral, a provider of cloud-business communications products, both went public. Last week, Benefitfocus, a provider of cloud-based benefits software solutions, and FireEye, which offers a virtual machine-based security platform, went public. Meanwhile, Twitter announced that it plans to go public, and Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba Group will also pursue an IPO in the U.S. On the M&A front, following to enhance parent company PayPal’s mobile capabilities.
. about an ambitious new project he was embarking on. ”Free Unix!” began the missive. ”Starting this Thanksgiving I am going to write a complete Unix-compatible software system called GNU (for Gnu’s Not Unix), and give it away free to everyone who can use it. Contributions of time, money, programs and equipment are greatly needed,” he wrote.
Shares of solid-state storage vendor Violin Memory plunged more than 17 percent on the company’s first day of trading Friday, but analysts said the market for flash storage remains hot. Violin raised just over $160 million in an initial public offering (IPO) on the New York Stock Exchange, which the company will use primarily to expand its global sales and marketing capabilities. But the shares, which the company had priced at $9 per share, started trading far below that and closed at $7.11, down $1.89, or 21 percent. The weak result came on a gloomy day overall, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average and the tech-heavy Nasdaq both down. The market’s lukewarm response to Violin’s IPO doesn’t spell gloom for flash storage, which is still a young and fast-growing technology, industry analysts said. Enterprises are buying flash to speed up access to their data, and the price premium for the solid-state media versus spinning disks is shrinking. Violin makes all-flash arrays for enterprises, designed to accelerate applications such as databases and online transaction processing. The market for those products is growing by about 60 percent per year, IDC analyst Jeff Janukowicz said.
Facebook wants to make its ads less annoying to users by only showing them what they want to see, even if it means a dip in ad exposure for some marketers. The company is changing its ads algorithms to provide users with advertisements that are more relevant, and desirable, to them, it said Friday. Facebook already takes information both from marketers and end users into account when deciding how to place advertisements. But the social network will now put more emphasis on feedback from users to decide which ads to show them. .
You're done with the hashtags and retweets, and it's time to go for good.
A looming U.S. government shutdown could mean smaller paychecks for some government IT workers and contractors, as well as renegotiated contracts for some IT vendors. The possible shutdown is scheduled to happen next Tuesday unless President Barack Obama and congressional leaders can agree on a continuing budget resolution to keep agencies open. Many congressional Republicans want to cut funding for the huge health-care program known as Obamacare and approved in the 2010 , in exchange for passing a government funding bill, but Obama has refused to negotiate. With little time for Congress to avoid a government shutdown, some IT workers should prepare to be furloughed, said Trey Hodgkins, senior vice president for global public sector government affairs at TechAmerica, a large tech trade group. Many government IT systems will continue to run during a shutdown, and systems administrators will likely need to continue to work, but some IT workers, such as desktop support staff, may have an unpaid vacation during a shutdown, he said. IT workers who install new desktops won’t be needed if there aren’t many workers on the job, he said. “Those things can probably wait for a week” until the issues surrounding a shutdown are resolved, Hodgkins said.
One of the easiest ways to speed up your computer is to add a solid state drive (SSD). Though expensive, an SSD quickly pays for itself by greatly improving your efficiency and productivity. But what you gain in speed, you lose in storage because the 128GB or 256GB capacities of the more affordable SSDs just don't cut it for today’s storage requirements. But don’t fret. Below are some low cost ways to free additional space on your SSD (or even hard disk drive) to maximize its use. The most obvious method to maximize space on your SSD is taking advantage of cloud storage. Archiving old documents and files in the cloud can free precious space on your SSD, while allowing them to be easily accessed from anywhere with an Internet connection when necessary. .
It may be the world's largest PC vendor, but Lenovo isn't exactly a household name in the U.S. That could change over the next few years as the company builds up its brand and sells more product to U.S. consumers. But in its home market of China, Lenovo long ago finished the task of making its name known, and is reaping the benefits.In the U.S., you won't find one single Lenovo store. But walk around anywhere in China, and chances are you'll come across one of its 18,000 retail outlets in the country.The company's presence can especially be felt in Beijing, where Lenovo shops and company advertisements can be easily found across the city.
Google faces financial sanctions in France after failing to comply with an order to alter how it stores and shares user data to conform to the nation's privacy laws. , said Friday on its website. Google was ordered in June by the CNIL to comply with French data protection laws within three months. But Google had not changed its policies to comply with French laws by a deadline on Friday, because the company said that France's data protection laws did not apply to users of certain Google services in France, the CNIL said. The company "has not implemented the requested changes," the CNIL said.
I'll confess, I'm no RTS savant; my strategy generally involves surrounding my base with defense turrets and sending wave after wave of disposable units at foes until I lose or, well, I lose. But that didn't stop me from donning my commander fez when some of the minds behind classics like came to Kickstarter and pitched a brand new real-time strategy game, involving massive armies and a few large robots causing a ruckus. Oh how time flies—Planetary Annihilation is here (in Beta form), available to Kickstarter backers and through Steam’s Early Access program. If you didn’t back it on Kickstarter, getting in early will set you back $60. Sixty bucks. For a beta. Yikes. The early access release will give you a fairly solid impression of what’s coming down the pipe, with plenty of explosions and resources to gather and scads of tanks and robots charging across barren wastelands spitting rockets and the like. But the controls are a bit confusing, documentation is non-existent, and the occasional graphical and unit selection glitches can be a bit of a bother. There’s no single-player campaign, which leaves the action to online multiplayer matches—playing against AI opponents is possible, though the AI isn’t firing on all cylinders yet and can make for a subpar experience. Paying for early access nets you a few perks and this is shaping up to be an awesome game, but… sixty bucks, to essentially be a playtester on an unfinished product. Hrmm. So Planetary Annihilation: it pretty much does what it says on the tin. There isn’t much in the way of lore yet, but that’s never really been especially necessary in the RTS genre. You’ll start by picking a landing site for your massive Commander robot. These guys are special, being the only units in the game capable of building things and fighting. But lose them and you’ll lose the match, so bringing their firepower to bear will likely be restricted to the extremely skilled (or desperate). Things unfold in typical RTS fashion: send your Commander out to build metal extractors on metal nodes and plop down some power plants to get the resources flowing in. Then build your first factory, and fabrication units—these little tykes can take over construction tasks, so your sluggish Commander doesn’t have to trudge around so much. There are Air, Ground, and Sea variants for military and fabrication units, each with their respective merits and drawbacks—loading up on Air fabricators will let you cover more ground, by even rookies like myself will have scout planes buzzing the map, using their anti-air capabilities to pick off fragile, unescorted units.
Google finally zapped a scary and disconcerting glitch that caused its IM apps to route messages to the incorrect recipients. Although Google said it repaired the delivery malfunction early Thursday morning, the company didn’t declare the problem fully solved until Friday at 2 p.m. EDT, more than 36 hours after the bug struck users of Talk, Chat, and Hangouts. It’s not clear how many people were affected, but the bug is chilling because of its potential for personal and professional embarrassment and harm to people’s privacy. posted to the Apps Status site, Google stated simply: “The problem with Google Talk should be resolved. We apologize for the inconvenience and thank you for your patience and continued support.”
! Feel free to print out this article and use it as a handkerchief to cry in, all you Half-Life 3 faithful. Okay, now that you’re over your disappointment, let’s talk about what this thing is. While Microsoft and Sony’s upcoming consoles use refined versions of their previous dual-analog stick controllers, the “Steam Controller” looks to be a completely different experience. Rather than sticks for movement and camera control, Valve’s gamepad employs dual high-precision trackpads. “Steam gamers, who are used to the input associated with PCs, will appreciate that the Steam Controller’s resolution approaches that of a desktop mouse,” says Valve’s announcement page.
Evernote is hosting its third annual Evernote Conference—aptly dubbed “EC3”—in San Francisco this week. Evernote introduced a variety of partnerships and new features yesterday, many of which are very cool, but what you get with an Evernote Premium subscription doesn’t offer nearly as much bang for the buck as an Office 365 subscription. At face value, those two things don’t go together. It seems like saying that a McDonald’s cheeseburger isn’t as good a value as a Schwinn bicycle. However, Office 365 includes Evernote’s biggest rival—OneNote—along with an array of other products and features that Evernote doesn’t offer. with licenses for up to five separate individuals or devices. .
With new DDR4 memory, computers will be faster next year but users will likely pay a premium on the price of the technology. DDR4 will first go into servers early next year and then into clients like laptops and desktops in 2015, said Mike Howard, principal analyst at IHS iSuppli. DDR4 will succeed DDR3 SDRAM, which ships with most computers today. Laptops will get longer battery life and be faster with DDR4 memory. DDR4 has 50 percent more bandwidth than its predecessor, and also provides 35 percent power savings. The voltage supplied to DDR4 memory is 1.2 volts compared to 1.5 volts for DDR3. The DDR4 bus clock speed will top out at 3200MHz, an improvement from 2400MHz for DDR3. Buyers will pay a 30 percent or higher premium for DDR4 memory compared to DDR3 next year, though the price differential is expected to decline to around 10 percent in 2015, Howard said. Starting in 2016, DDR4 shipments will outpace DDR3, which will ultimately fade away just like the older DDR2 memory.
Out of all the apps on your PC, which one would you say you use the most? If you are in the habit of making quick notes and lists, it's probably WordPad. There's nothing wrong with WordPad , but it is rather basic: You can’t open multiple documents, the find feature is weak, and coordinating and carrying your saved notes from computer to computer is a hassle. It doesn't have to be this way, though. There are plenty of Notepad alternatives that offer more features while still keeping the program small and efficient. They also offer portable versions, so you don't always have to install apps on a computer Whether you're writing code or a shopping list, there are free portable alternatives out there that can do the job better than the standard Notepad app can. They can be run from a cloud storage solution such as Dropbox or Google Drive or from a USB stick, and they offer a much wider range of features. If you'll pardon the pun, with cloud apps, the sky really is the limit.
A recently announced and yet-to-be-patched vulnerability that affects all versions of Microsoft Internet Explorer (IE) has been exploited in targeted attacks against organizations in Taiwan since the beginning of July, according to security researchers. about the vulnerability, which is identified as CVE-2013-3893, on Sept. 17 and warned users that it is "aware of targeted attacks that attempt to exploit this vulnerability in Internet Explorer 8 and Internet Explorer 9. that customers can manually download and install in order to mitigate the vulnerability. However, no patch has yet been released through Windows Update. as part of an attack campaign dubbed "Operation DeputyDog" that started on Aug. 19. They believe that this is the same group that managed to break into the computer network of security firm Bit9 as part of a different attack campaign in February and used one of its systems to digitally sign several pieces of malware.
As anti-virus solutions become more robust and Microsoft becomes better at plugging Windows vulnerabilities, malware designers have to get more creative about attacking PCs and servers. One wide-open avenue of attack: hardware components like graphics and network cards. Yes, you read that right. . Peripheral-based malware is particularly difficult to detect, because it doesn’t have to rely on a weakness in your computer’s operating system, according to Stewin. Instead, it takes advantage of the processing power already present in peripherals like graphics cards that may not be expecting an attack. Graphics cards, sound cards, and other PC components can process data using direct memory access (DMA). Instead waiting to receive data processing via a PC’s CPU, a graphics card can bypass the CPU to access and process graphical data directly from memory.
Germany's Federal Patent Court invalidated an Apple photo-management patent because Steve Jobs showed how the technology worked during a keynote months before the company applied for the patent in Europe. The Munich-based court invalidated the Apple patent Thursday, said court spokeswoman Ariane Mittenberger-Huber in an email Friday. The validity of the patent was contested by the German subsidiary's of both Google-owned Motorola Mobility and Samsung Electronics. The patent, which covers the bounce-back effect in a photo gallery, was partly annulled because the relevant priority date of the application was June 2007, after Jobs demonstrated the technology on stage in January 2007 during the first iPhone keynote, she wrote. The main part of the patent was declared invalid because of prior art, she said. Prior art is typically documentary evidence that ideas or designs for which patent protection is sought are not original.
Reader Greg is switching Internet service providers, meaning he's giving up the email address he's had from that provider for many years. He wants to know how he can simplify the transition to his new address. Although that kind of move is a lot easier than moving to a new home, it can still be a hassle. Here are some suggestions for smoothing the process. For example, if you're moving from, say, SBC to Comcast, you might be tempted to use your new Comcast email address. That's fine, but what happens if you decide to switch to a different ISP again? You'll face the same hassle all over again. Instead, start using a Web-based email service you can keep forever and access regardless of who supplies your Internet service. That means Gmail, Outlook.com, Yahoo, or a similar provider.
Microsoft is reportedly getting ready to combine its Windows and Windows Phone app stores into a single entity, potentially leading to more apps and fewer headaches for users of both platforms. corroborated the story. However, there seems to be some confusion as to when the stores will combine. Foley and The Verge's Tom Warren both claim that the unified store will launch in the spring, alongside Windows Phone 8.1 and an update for Windows 8.1. Thurrott says the unified store will happen “with the next release of Windows, or what we might call Windows 9.” across all Microsoft devices. “We should have one set of developer APIs on all of our devices. And all of the apps we bring to end users should be available on all of our devices,” Myerson said during a financial analyst meeting last week.
A new Google research project has developed a hardware-free way to project your smartphone screen to a connected display.
Cisco Systems has patched 10 vulnerabilities that could impact the availability of devices using various versions of its IOS software. IOS is a multitasking operating system that combines networking and telecommunications functions and is used on many of the company's networking devices. All of the patched vulnerabilities can impact a device's availability if exploited. They affect Cisco IOS implementations of the Network Time Protocol (NTP), the Internet Key Exchange protocol, the Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP), the Resource Reservation Protocol (RSVP), the virtual fragmentation reassembly (VFR) feature for IP version 6 (IPv6), the Zone-Based Firewall (ZBFW) component, the T1/E1 driver queue and the Network Address Translation (NAT) function for DNS (Domain Name System) and PPTP (Point-to-Point Tunneling Protocol). These vulnerabilities can be exploited by remote, unauthenticated attackers by sending specifically crafted packets over the network to IOS devices that have the affected features enabled.
Despite the name, pNotes is not a notepad as such. Instead, it is the digital equivalent of yellow sticky notes, and as anyone who is addicted to using the real paper ones will tell you, these things are incredibly useful for simple lists and notes.
HTC is selling back the remainder of its stake in Beats Electronics, shedding its financial ties to the headphones vendor in a partnership that did little to help turn the smartphone maker's fortunes around. HTC on Friday said it would sell off its 25 percent skate for $265 million, according to a Taiwan stock exchange filing. In addition, the company will receive $150 million and accrued interest from Beats at a later date as part of a promissory note. The deal will close in the fourth quarter. The stake sell-back ends a partnership that lasted only two years, and was originally heavily promoted by HTC as a way to differentiate its phones from rival handsets. The U.S.-based Beats is perhaps known for its ties to rap artist Dr. Dre, who helped found the company. In August 2011, HTC bought a majority stake in Beats for $300 million. As part of the deal, HTC decided to incorporate the company's headphones and audio technology into its own handsets.
BlackBerry confirmed on Friday its $965 million net operating loss in the second quarter, following low interest in the Z10 smartphone. Revenue for the company's second quarter, which ended on Aug. 31, was approximately $1.6 billion, down 45 percent from the same period a year earlier. Both the operating loss and the revenue were in line with preliminary results released last week. The last week has been a busy one for BlackBerry CEO Thorsten Heins and his colleagues. In addition to the bombshell of its preliminary results, the company also announced around 4,500 lay-offs and cuts to the number of phone models it sells from six to four: two high-end and two entry-level phones aimed at the enterprise and "prosumer" market. Then on Monday it revealed it was preparing to sell the company to Fairfax Financial Holdings. Although Blackberry has confirmed the financial results, "There is still a great degree of uncertainty," said analyst Geoff Blaber, director of devices and platforms at CCS Insight. "There is still an awful lot to happen following the Fairfax offer. The biggest element of uncertainty is what the new private company will become. My bet is it will be an enterprise service company, and devices are unlikely to be a part of that."
Employees of the U.S. National Security Agency spied on "unfaithful" husbands, boyfriends and girlfriends using surveillance technology of the agency, according to a letter from the NSA to a U.S. Senator. from NSA Inspector General George Ellard, released Thursday by Senator Charles E. Grassley, cites 12 "substantiated instances" of the intentional misuse of the signals intelligence (SIGINT) powers of the NSA. The misuse of NSA authorities for romantic purposes, popularly known as Loveint, was cited in various media reports as an instance of widespread compromise of people's privacy by the NSA. The Wall Street Journal reported in August that NSA officers had used the agency's "enormous eavesdropping power to spy on love interests." But General Keith Alexander, director of the NSA, on Thursday described the "claimed evidence of thousands of privacy violations" as false and misleading.
A U.S. federal judge allowed a class-action suit against Google to proceed, saying the company's terms of service are unclear when describing how it scans Gmail content in order to deliver advertisements. Google had filed a motion to dismiss the suit, which alleges that the company intercepted and read email while in transit in order to deliver advertisements and create user profiles and models since 2008. The plaintiffs alleged the company violated federal and state wiretapping laws. The suit, which is being heard in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, further contends non-Gmail users who sent email to Gmail users were also subject to illegal interception. Thursday, U.S. District Judge Lucy H. Koh wrote that Google's terms of service and privacy policies do not explicitly say that the company intercepts users' email to create user profiles or deliver targeted advertising.
Outlast, the new horror game from Red Barrels, puts you in the shoes of journalist Miles Upshur as he investigates the old Mount Massive Asylum, an abandoned facility in Colorado. Armed only with your faithful handheld video camera, you quickly find out Mount Massive is not nearly as abandoned as it seems and OH MY GOD IS THAT MAN TALKING TO ME WHILE IMPALED ON A GIGANTIC SPIKE? except actually scary (sorry Blair Witch fans). Whereas most found footage films are made out of necessity, in an attempt to disguise low budgets with a heaping dose of shaky cam and crude lighting, Outlast adapts those characteristics into actual game mechanics. You’re ostensibly “recording” your time at Mount Massive, with the commitment of a journalist who has absolutely no self-preservation instincts. Even in the creepiest moments of the game, you’re rarely forced to put your camera down. I can only imagine you whispering to yourself, “Just keep rolling, Upshur. Keep rolling. You got this. This is going to snag you that daytime Emmy.” Up in the top left of the screen, the timecode ticks by. One hour recorded. Two hours recorded. Upshur must have a very patient editor. The camera is more than an aesthetic choice, though; it's a makeshift scope. You can use it to zoom in and out at any time or toggle the night vision mode. Night vision is essential, as it’s the only way for your character to see in the darkened ruins of Mount Massive—apparently nobody’s bothered replacing light bulbs in a while.
may have gotten all the attention at the company’s GPU 2014 event this week, but in the long run, a somewhat boring new technical addition may end up meaning more for AMD and PC gaming itself: the company’s newly announced “Mantle” application programming interface (API). We have to get the technical details out of the way before I can describe Mantle’s potential bounties. I’ll keep it brief! leap in performance. Just as impressively, that programming language carries over across consoles and PCs alike—assuming said PCs are running GCN-based Radeon graphics. In short, Mantle is a clever (and aggressive) way for AMD to leverage its next-gen console wins.
Google has added a new filter tool and comparisons as the search giant continues to expand its Knowledge Graph search results. The new tools aim to help searchers drill down deeper into topics or compare some key facts about two things side-by-side.
Google pushed out several updates to the Google Search app for Android 4.1+ users this week. The company also revealed plans for a new version of the Google Search app for iPhone and iPad users and announced a new "look and feel" on mobile devices.
Bing has a redesigned interface and an instant search result set without clicking or leaving the search box. Now Bing is the web search back-end for Apple's Siri. Is it time to optimize for Page Zero and Bing?
Now when you search Google for hashtags, Google will add related Google+ posts to the right of regular search results, as long as they have been shared publicly or directly with you, and provide links to search hashtags on other sites.
Salvaging a few quality links can be a quick win – especially at the start of a link building campaign, when you're establishing trust and confidence. Here are a couple different methods to find 404'd pages that potentially have inbound links.
The 5S and 5C sold more than 9 million units on opening weekend, so rumors of Apple’s demise clearly have been exaggerated. Let’s look at nine points to ponder about the new iPhone, both pros and cons, and what they might mean for us consumers.
Do photos or video perform better on Instagram? When is the best day and time to post? Do hashtags work? Here are some insights and tips for brands, both big and small, that want to see success on Instagram like the top-performing Fortune 500s.
Google officially turns 15 today. For the first time, the search giant is wishing itself a happy birthday with a playable Google Doodle in which you play as the lowercase "g" in Google's name and whack a piñata to score as much candy as possible.
To celebrate its 15th birthday, Google decided to share a neat Easter egg showing how Google used to look in 1998. To see it for yourself, simply search for "google in 1998" (without the quotes). Sadly, you can't do an actual search on 1998 Google.
Google quietly made a huge change to its core search technology in the past month, one that affects about 90 percent of searches worldwide. Calling it Hummingbird, the technological update of Google search is designed to handle more complex queries.
It's easy to make a mistake when trying to create perfect HTML code that validates correctly every time. So how important is valid HTML when it comes to your Google organic search rankings? Not very, at least for right now, says Google's Matt Cutts.
Remarketing Lists for Search Ads opens up a lot of potential strategies for AdWords advertisers. Here are some of the most common strategies evolving for different types of advertisers to give you an idea of what could work for each one.
Regardless of your product or service offering, you should start reviewing, planning, organizing, and optimizing for Q4 right now. Here's a checklist of strategies and things to think about now to end the year the on a triumphant note.
Voice search can be more convenient, quicker, and it continues to gain popularity worldwide. Marketers must adapt new search strategies to optimize for local search, large brands or global enterprises, and conversational or long-tail queries.
When you think search, no doubt you think Google. But there are other popular major search engines (e.g., Bing, Yahoo, Yandex, and Baidu) that you can turn when searching for information, images, maps, videos, products, or something local.
YouTube has announced the launch of Audio Library. The YouTube Audio Library is available to all users and offers those creating and uploading videos a selection of 150 royalty-free tracks that can be used to accompany their footage.
YouTube comments that are more relevant will move to the top of the comments list instead of the most recent. Google said this means that comments from people you care about will rise so you can see them and there will be no more anonymous comments.
If a website gets hit by Google Panda, small fixes won't be effective. Panda absolutely can strike again, and if it does, webmasters might find themselves in a long yo-yo battle. Learn how to avoid this situation by making the right SEO decisions.
Trying to clean up your backlink profile? If your site has sunk in Google's search results due to a large number of unnatural links point to inner pages, you can quickly remove links by removing these pages. Here's how to do it correctly.
By understanding who your audience is, you're able to offer them a targeted message. While your personas and triggers may vary slightly, here are common distinctions in the consumer buying cycle and specific content types that work well for each.
Forty-eight percent of consumers trust ads in search engine results, online video, and social networks. That's according to a recent report from Nielsen, Trust In Advertising 2013, which found that consumer trust in online advertising is increasing.
The next time you just gotta gawk at your favorite celeb, take caution; McAfee exposed the top celebrity searches that put users at the highest risk of malware attacks. Topping the list is Lily Collins, Avril Lavigne, and Sandra Bullock.
Whether someone is searching on their mobile device for a restaurant, a local service, or a car rental, the presence of a click to call button increases click-through rates and brand perception, according to new Google/Ipsos research.
Dominating your niche on Google can be very profitable. Ranking well for keywords related to your specific niche helps drive higher quality traffic to your site and differentiates your brand. Follow these five steps to dominate your niche.
Ready to ignite a sincerely user-centric mobile plan? When it comes to your mobile SEO strategy, it's critical to identify user intent and motivation, find and optimize mobile-specific keywords, and focus on context rather than "killer content."