Why You Should Buy A Chromebook

Chromebooks now are on sale online at Best Buy and Amazon.com. Samsung and Acer are the first suppliers to build them.

The launch will be greeted by some skepticism, given the rise of tablets and the decline of netbooks. See Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/google-chromebook-launch-2011-6#ixzz1PLw7vKDo.

Despite negative media attention, the Chromebooks show a lot of potential for some users, some would argue. Why You Should Buy A Chromebook.

FCC Report on LightSquared Might Not Settle Much

A report by engineers studying interference issues betweeen LightSquared and GPS and other interests is due to be released June 15, 2011. But the study might only point out the need for further tests, as observers say LightSquared and other companies cannot agree on whether the problem actually can be fixed by using new filters or other methods of preventing interference.

'Where government and private GPS Users and LightSquared will disagree is on the potential for a technical solution,' said Jim Kirkland, vice president and general counsel of Trimble Navigation Limited, a GPS technology company.

The Federal Communications Commission will have to referee the growing disagreement between LightSquared and GPS makers and users, including the Defense Department and Federal Aviation Administration, which is planning to upgrade the U.S.'s existing air traffic control system to one that relies on GPS technologies.

Report to FCC Will Find LightSquared Interferes with GPS - WSJ.com (subscription required)

DOJ Clears Google's Bid for Nortel Patents

U.S. antitrust enforcers have given Google clearance to pursue its $900 million opening bid for some 6,000 patents being sold next week by defunct Canadian telecommunications-equipment maker Nortel Networks Corp., the Wall Street Journal reports.

After an antitrust review, the Justice Department concluded that Google's potential ownership of the patents wouldn't raise any major competitive concerns, these people said.

The clearance could give Google a leg-up against rivals in its bid for the patents, part of its effort to acquire an arsenal of patents that could help it ward off lawsuits by competitors.

Difference Between Apple and Google Cloud Approaches

For many of us, who are just end users, it probably doesn't matter that Google and Apple take arguably different approaches to how applications execute in the cloud and on the device. Developers, architects and geeks think it is more important.

At a high level, some might summarize the difference as Google viewing matters as "cloud and web." For Apple, cloud computing means "cloud and software."

All of the cloud computing services Google offers to consumers, like email, word processing and spreadsheets, happen within the browser. To Google, the point of cloud computing is to replace desktop software with the web. Apple is said to prefer execution within an app.

And of course, many will argue that there are many nuances. Some might say that Google tends to work with the browser are the frame, while Apple tends to work with the screen as the frame, for example. We dumb end users might have our own preferences. But I suspect most end users will appreciate elements of both approaches.

Daring Fireball: It's All Software

After Google Instant, Now Instant Pages

After Google Instant, which guesses at what a user is going to type next when conducting a search, Google now is adding "Instant Pages" that do the same thing for whole web pages. Instant Pages fetches the top search result and keeps it ready in the background while a user is choosing which link to click, saving perhaps two to five seconds on typical searches.

Let’s say you’re searching for information about the Smithsonian Folklife Festival, so you search for "dc folklife festival." As a user scans the results, deciding which one to choose, Google is already prerendering the top search result. That way when the user clicks, the page loads instantly.

Instant Pages will prerender results when we’re confident you’re going to click them.

Official Google Blog: Knocking down barriers to knowledge

Google Introduces Speech Search for Images

Searching with speech recognition started first on mobile, and so did searching with computer vision, Google says. Google Goggles has enabled you to search by snapping a photo on your mobile phone since 2009 and now Google is introducing "Search by Image" on the desktop.

Next to the microphone on images.google.com, you’ll also see a little camera for the new "Search by Image" feature. If you click the camera, you can upload any picture or plug in an image URL from the web and ask Google to figure out what it is.

Official Google Blog: Knocking down barriers to knowledge

Google Adds Speech Driven Search for PCs and Chrome Browsers

Google has been supporting voice search on Android devices for a year or so. Now Google has added speech recognition into search on desktop for Chrome users. If you’re using Chrome, you’ll start to see a little microphone in every Google search box.

Simply click the microphone, and you can speak your search. This can be particularly useful for hard-to-spell searches like "bolognese sauce" or complex searches like "translate to spanish 'where can I buy a hamburger'".

Voice Search on desktop is rolling out now on google.com in English.

Official Google Blog: Knocking down barriers to knowledge

Netflix Streams Putting Pressure on Premium Cable Channels

According to The Diffusion Group’s (TDG’s) latest analysis of Netflix Streamers, people who stream Netflix content to their net-connected devices, the inclination to downgrade PayTV services has doubled in just the last 12 months.

In March 2011, TDG queried a random sample of adult broadband users that subscribe to cable, satellite, or telcoTV service as to the likelihood they would downgrade their PayTV service in the next six months.

In general, the percentage of Netflix streamers likely to downgrade their PayTV service increased from 16 percent in 2010 to 32 percent in 2011.

That should make sense. Netflix primarily is a source of movie content. What do premium channels provide? Primarily movies.

TDG: Proclivity to Downgrade PayTV Services Increasing among Netflix Streamers

U.S. Wireless Consumers Get Best Rates

Some of us can remember when mobile phones were the size of bricks and cost four figures. Likewise, there was a time when the United States trailed most other developed nations in wireless service penetration. That isn't the case anymore, of course.

The United States wireless industry offers subscribers the lowest revenue per minute of all OECD countries. Also, according to Bank of America Merrill Lynch, average revenue per minute is nearly 70 percent lower than the averages of the other 25 countries.

Average revenue per minute is nearly 70 percent lower than the average European country.

As a result, the average wireless consumer in Europe used just 172 minutes a month compared to 793 minutes a month for the typical U.S. consumer.

The U.S. market also is the largest mobile data market and also has the most mobile Internet users, according to Nielsen Mobile."

US #1 for Wireless Industry Innovation | CTIA-The Wireless Association

Starbucks App Coming to Android

Beginning June 15, 2011, the Starbucks mobile payment app will be extended to include the Android platform.

The coffee giant also plans to add mobile payment capabilities to Starbucks shops in 1,000 Safeway stores, bringing the number of places where mobile payments work to nearly 9,000 in the U.S. That number includes 6,800 company-owned Starbucks and another 1,000 locations inside of Target stores, said Chuck Davidson, category manager for innovation on the Starbucks card.

“With the addition of Starbucks for Android to the Starbucks app line-up, a Starbucks mobile payment app may now be used on approximately 90% of smartphones currently in use,” said Adam Brotman, Starbucks’s vice president and general manager of digital ventures.

January marked the nationwide rollout of Starbucks’s mobile payment system. By the end of March — just nine weeks later — Starbucks told its shareholders that it had processed more than 3 million mobile paymentsvia its Starbucks Card Mobile application for iPhone and BlackBerry. See http://mashable.com/2011/06/14/starbucks-mobile-payments-android/#view_as_one_page-gallery_box1543

Starbucks extends smartphone payment app to Android devices - Computerworld

Digital Drives Media Futures, Hitting $555B In 2015 06/15/2011

Digital has emerged as the central driver for media companies' operating models, consumer connections and revenues, according to PwC's "Global entertainment and media outlook: 2011-2015."

Domestically, the entertainment and media market is expected to grow at 4.6 percent compound annual growth rates, reaching $555 billion in 2015, while online ad growth should average 12.2 percent annually through 2015.

Total U.S. advertising is expected to increase at a 4.2 percent CAGR, from $170 billion in 2010 to $208 billion in 2015.

PwC predicts that global entertainment and media spending will rise from $1.4 trillion in 2010 to $1.9 trillion by 2015, growing at a 5.7 percent CAGR.

MediaPost Publications Digital Drives Media Futures, Hitting $555 Billion In 2015

T-Mobile Father's Day "Free Broadband" Promotion

On June 18, T-Mobile is hooking up new and existing customers (with at least 18 months of contract tenure) with 12 months of free data ($10 a month worth) for signing a new talk, text, and data plan on a two-year contract. So if you’re looking to save Dad from all those data overage charges, perhaps the one-day-only Father’s Day sale at T-Mo is the way to go.

If you sign up for T-Mo’s 200 MByte data plan, the carrier will reimburse you every month with $10 in credit, covering the whole $120 cost of that size plan. If you opt for one of T-Mobile’s larger data packages (2GB, 5GB, or 10GB) with unlimited talk and text, T-Mobile will still offer $10 in monthly credit.

T-Mobile Offers A Year’s Worth Of Free Data For Father’s Day

Ericsson to Acquire Telcordia

Many readers will be too young to remember it, but Telcordia once was called "Bellcore," way back in the days after the breakup of the AT&T system, and designed to provide a similar function for the Regional Bell Operating Companies that Bell Laboratories traditionally had played for Western Electric and the old AT&T.

That function had changed over the years, of course. Bellcore was privatized in 1996, when it was sold to SAIC.

Did Apple Embrace the Cloud with iCloud, or Not?

Apple’s iCloud announcement can be read two different ways, it seems. Some say Apple's approach is more closed than open, more focused on device-based apps than cloud apps and actually is a private cloud, or a re-defined cloud. See iCloud and Apple’s truth.

Others disagree. "With iCloud, Apple is transforming the cloud from an almost tangible place that you visit to find your stuff, to a place that only exists in the background. It’s never seen. You never interact with it, your apps do — and you never realize it." See http://techcrunch.com/2011/06/08/apple-icloud-google-cloud/.

Apple is going after consumers who have absolutely no idea what the cloud is, and don’t care. Apple is saying they shouldn’t care.

Google seems to be aiming more for users who understand current computing paradigms and want to transition that knowledge to the future of computing, the cloud. Power users, if you will.

While the fundamentals are the same, Apple’s approach to the concept of the cloud is the opposite of their competitors. Apple’s belief is clearly that users will not and should not care how the cloud actually works.

Did Nokia Shoot Itself?

One false step and you’re dead. Or worse: You’re the walking dead. This is what awaits CEOs who mismanage a product transition and allow the existing revenue stream to run dry before the promising new product shows up.

The "Osborne Effect" is how some describe the problem. Osborne Computer Corporation in 1981 introduced a machine that was, in effect, the first commercially available portable computer, the Osborne 1. In 1983, the company announced two superior models in the works, the Executive and the Vixen.

Customers took his advice. They stopped buying the current model and waited…and waited… In 1985, the company ran out of cash and went bankrupt. Some would say Nokia is making the same mistake.

Transitions: The Nokia Way vs. The Microsoft Way | Monday Note