Thursday, December 23, 2010

A 42-Inch Android Tablet? Seriously?

Apparently this is a test of potential demand for a 42-inch-screen Android tablet. Not sure it makes much sense for most people, but I can imagine lots of point-of-sale display applications.

Best Gadgets of 2010

Gadgets matter for lots of reasons, mostly because they frequently are fun, and sometimes help us be productive. But at least in part because gadgets drive demand for communications and communications services. And, ultimately, that demand supplies the demand that allows us to keep investing in better networks.

At the end of the day, consumers decide whether advanced communications are important, by our willingness to spend on the services.

iAd Producer Makes iAd Ad Creation Easier

Apple's new "iAd Producer" will make it easier for would-be advertisers to design and assemble high-impact, interactive content for iAd. iAd Producer automatically manages the HTML5, CSS3 and JavaScript behind your iAd to make creating beautiful, motion-rich iAd content as easy as point and click, Apple says.

For advanced developers, iAd Producer offers sophisticated JavaScript editing and debugging, along with a powerful extension mechanism that enables them to create and re-use their own page templates and components.

That's going to delight, or at least appease, brands that found Apple's instance on creative control stifling.

Can Twitter Inform Stock Trades?

A hedge fund called Derwent Capital Markets says it will launch a new fund in February that will trade based in part on analysis of Twitter sentiment. This approach is built on research from the University of Manchester and Indiana University that showed how the number of emotional words on Twitter could be used to predict moves in the Dow Jones index.

http://arxiv.org/PS_cache/arxiv/pdf/1010/1010.3003v1.pdf


Researchers said they found that a change in emotions as expressed on Twitter would be followed by a move in the index between two and six days later, and that this method had greater than 87-percent accuracy.

Was Skype Outage an Attack?

The ultimate cause of the Skype global outage is still unclear (or at least Skype isn’t ready to talk about it yet), but it does not appear Skype completely rules out the possibility of an attack designed to take the network down.

Use Android to Program Google TV


FCC chair to approve Comcast-NBC merger with conditions

The chairman of the Federal Communications Commission issued a draft order approving Comcast's proposed merger with NBC Universal on Thursday, putting the deal up for vote.

Approval would come with several conditions related to Internet video distribution of NBC and Comcast content and the sharing of shows to competing cable and satellite firms. The merger would also have to ensure that competing networks get on Comcast's platform.

The Justice Department is conducting a separate review to see if the deal passes antitrust laws.

Directv-Dish Merger Fails

Directv’’s termination of its deal to merge with EchoStar, apparently because EchoStar bondholders did not approve, means EchoStar continue...