China Looking to AMD and VIA for Netbooks Larger than 12 Inches

Some manufacturers are trying their best to blur the line that separates netbooks from notebooks. According to a Commercial Times report, white-box netbook manufacturers in China have also turned their attention to producing netbooks with large displays. They are said to be manufacturing netbooks, with screen sizes in excess of 12 inches, based on AMD and VIA processors. According to the report, they are deliberately avoiding using Intel processors as the chip maker has placed restrictions on the screen size of Atom-toting netbooks. Besides, they are helped in making their choice by the fact that VIA processors are much cheaper than their Intel counterparts.

DDO DDE-layed

Dungeons & Dragons Online: Eberron Unlimited’s been delayed. Honestly, though, we’re not all that impressed. After BioShock 2, Max Payne 3, Splinter Cell: Conviction, and Dark Void all closed their eyes, held their breath, and made the leap into 2010, DDO’s month-long delay seems, well, anticlimactic. September 9? That’s, like, tomorrow.

“While we are very pleased with the performance of the game and are excited about the response from the players, we are committed to delivering a high-quality experience. We feel that more time is needed to deliver on this commitment,” said Fernando Paiz, Executive Producer of DDO Unlimited, in a press release.

“We feel that more time is needed to deliver on this commitment. As a result, we are delaying our launch to ensure that we can support the massive increase in players that we are expecting and deliver them a free to play experience like none other.”

The free update was originally set to go live on August 4. Now it’s not. Really though, this delay’s nothing. If you want something to do in the meantime, go check out our preview of the game. By the time you’re done reading, the update will probably have landed, settled down, and started a family in a scenic rural area. Wake us when a game gets pushed into 2011. Then we’ll talk

Asus Cancels the World First USB 3.0 Motherboard

USB 2.0 rated at 480Mbit/s sounded great when it was released back in April 2000, but more than 9 years later its becoming pretty easy to saturate with our never-ending collection of high speed external drives. USB 3.0 clocks in at a much more respectable 4.8 Gbit/s, but those patiently awaiting hardware will have to cool their heels just a bit longer.

According to the Inquirer, Asus is cancelling what would have been the world’s first USB 3.0 motherboard the P6X58. The company hasn’t given any specific comment on it’s reason for the cancellation, but I would surmise it has something to do with the fact that you still can’t find any devices to pair up with it yet.

Speculation aside, I’m sure Asus still has USB 3.0 on it’s roadmap, but we still have no idea when the first motherboards / devices will hit the market. Want to learn more about the new standard? Make sure to take a look at our comprehensive guide to all things USB 3.0.

MySpace Offers Email & Instantly Becomes the 4th Largest Provider in the World

The market for free email service providers has become a bit over saturated lately, but when a heavyweight like My Space enters the arena people take notice. The social networking site has been struggling in recent years to hold its ground against arch rival Facebook, but now finally has a unique feature that might help set it apart. Facebook allows users to send messages back and forth, but this is limited to friends on your contact list and lacks many of the features you would expect from a traditional email account.

What makes the My Space offering so unique is the sheer number of users that that is brings to the table. With over 130 million accounts world wide, it instantly becomes the 4th largest email provider in the world and is second in the U.S. only to Yahoo. Google’s Gmail by comparison ranks a distant 5th. My space users will automatically be assigned an email address based on the vanity URL they occupy and changing the email address will also shift the URL of the profile page.

Feature wise it holds up well against the traditional providers, but unfortunately it doesn’t offer any type of POP/IMAP support. For some this isn’t a problem, but I’m personally not a huge fan of closed email services that don’t allow me to export my data. Should My Space choose to shut down the service somewhere down the road, your emails will be trapped.

Anyone plan on switching over to @myspace.com?

Browser Ballot Screen Won’t be Limited to Windows 7

Last week we reported on the new concessions Microsoft was proposing to the EU in the hopes of quelling it’s ongoing antitrust battles in Europe. The solution was a simple ballot screen pushed out as a “high priority” Windows Update, but what we didn’t know at the time is that it will also be sent out to computers running Windows XP and Vista as well.

The exact lineup of browsers hasn’t been finalized yet, but it is said to include 10 of “the most widely-used web browsers that run on Windows with a usage share of equal to or more than 0.5% in the European Economic Area”. Oddly enough, it’s still not even clear if Opera meets these requirements and given that they are the ones responsible for the antitrust woes facing Microsoft, would be bitter justice.

Opera officials overjoyed with the concessions, but never resting on their laurels, are said to now be pushing for an “icon-less ballot screen”. I suppose they are concerned that many users associate the “blue E” icon with “internet” and it still gives an unfair advantage to Microsoft. They are also said to be asking that this browser ballot be pushed out worldwide, but I somehow doubt Microsoft will take this approach. The browser ballot screen will include two links, one to the manufacturers website where they can learn more and an extra link directly to a download server.

Given the amazing amount of concessions being made by Microsoft, is Opera being unreasonable by asking for more?

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Sony Plugs Google's Library into E-Reader

SAN FRANCISCO - Sony Corp said on Wednesday it has made available over 1 million public domain books on its electronic readers via Google Inc's Books project, which digitizes classic titles not protected by copyright.

Sony, Amazon.com, Barnes & Noble Inc and others are racing to beef up their offerings to meet growing demand for digital books on electronic readers: tablet-like devices where whole books can be stored and read.

Although the devices do not appeal to all readers, due to their cost and technical issues yet to be fully resolved, the companies are trying establish a toehold in a market they believe will eventually become a profit driver.

Sony said the addition of Google's library gives it the largest, most comprehensive array of electronic books available in the market.

Last week, U.S. bookseller Barnes & Noble announced what it touted as the world's largest online bookstore, with more than 700,000 titles. That selection includes more than half a million public domain books from Google.

Amazon's Kindle store offers over 300,000 titles. The Seattle-based online retailer said it would not comment on whether it planned to include Google's titles as well.

Sony was the first to market with its Sony Reader in 2006 and now sells two versions of the device. The launch of the Sony Reader was eclipsed a year later when Amazon entered the market with its Kindle, now also sold in two formats.

Privately owned Plastic Logic plans to enter the market early next year with its own e-reader, and Barnes & Noble said it will be that device's exclusive provider of digital books.

One major issue impeding consumer adoption of digital readers is the closed system of sharing.

In Amazon's case, titles purchased through the Kindle Store can be read on the Kindle and Apple Inc's iPhone or iPod Touch, but not on the Sony Reader. Barnes & Noble's titles, meanwhile, are accessible on Apple devices and Research in Motion Ltd's Blackberry, but not on the Kindle or Sony Reader.

Similarly, titles purchased from Sony's store can only be played on the company's reader.

EBay Says No Change to Skype IPO Plans

SAN FRANCISCO - EBay Inc shrugged off speculation on Thursday that its planned spinoff of Skype could be in danger, given an ongoing dispute over the technology used in the online telephone unit and new plans to develop proprietary software.

"Our plans to separate Skype have not changed," the company said in a statement. EBay said it would not comment beyond a regulatory filing it made on Wednesday.

EBay wrote in the quarterly filing that it recognized that pending litigation over the technology behind Skype could ultimately have an "adverse result," so it had begun to develop alternative software to the technology it licenses from Joltid Ltd for Skype.

The filing cast some doubt on an initial public offering or spinoff of Skype, which is scheduled for next year.

Earlier this year, Skype filed a claim in the United Kingdom against Swedish company Joltid, which is controlled by Skype co-founders Niklas Zennstrom and Janus Friis. Skype sought resolution on a dispute over a software licensing agreement between the parties that Joltid was seeking to terminate.

Joltid brought a counterclaim, reiterating that it holds the rights to the peer-to-peer technology and that Skype is in violation of the original agreement.

The trial is expected to take place in early 2010 in the United Kingdom.

In its filing, eBay acknowledged that the new software it was working on had no guarantee of success.

"Skype has begun to develop alternative software to that licensed through Joltid. However, such software development may not be successful, may result in loss of functionality or customers even if successful, and will in any event be expensive," eBay said.

It added that if the new software did not work or if eBay lost the right to use the original software, "the continued operation of Skype's business as currently conducted would likely not be possible."

EBay announced in April that it would spin off Skype through an IPO, saying the timing would depend on market conditions.

Executives acknowledged that the unit, while fast-growing, did not mesh well with eBay's core marketplaces division or its online payments system PayPal. Former Chief Executive Meg Whitman paid $2.6 billion for Skype in 2005.

Shares of eBay closed up 1.2 percent to $21.66 on the Nasdaq.

Extraterrestrial Platinum Was 'Stirred' Into Earth

A research program aimed at using platinum as an exploration guide for nickel has for the first time been able to put a time scale on the planet’s large-scale convection processes.

Report author CSIRO Minerals Down Under Flagship researcher Dr Stephen Barnes said the study group collected a large body of data on the platinum content of lava flows called komatiites, which host some of the world’s major nickel deposits.

“We found that the oldest komatiites have the lowest platinum content,” Dr Barnes said.

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“The platinum content gradually increases from about 3.5 billion years to 2.9 billion years ago.

“This tells us that the deep source where the komatiite came from, down near the boundary between the Earth’s core and mantle, was gradually gaining platinum over time”.

The paper’s authors now think they know why.

“When the Earth’s core formed, it took all the available platinum with it, leaving the mantle and crust with none,” Dr Barnes said.

“Following that, a steady rain of meteorites created the so-called Late Veneer – a thin surface layer of meteorite debris rich in platinum.”

With time through large-scale convection processes, which now cause plate tectonics, this material was stirred down into the interior of the Earth.

We are seeing the signal of that stirring, which took about 1.5 billion years to occur.

This is the first time a time scale has been put on the stirring, which has important implications for the people who study the dynamics of mantle processes and the mechanisms that cause plate tectonics, earthquakes and volcanoes.

Combined with some other work by the researchers on sister elements to platinum, iridium and osmium, we also now have a new framework for understanding the variations in isotopic ratios of osmium with time.

Osmium isotopes are widely used as tracers of mantle processes, but there has been a mismatch between signals from osmium and from other important isotopic tracer systems which has eluded explanation until now.

Microsoft Acknowledges Mobile Mishaps

Microsoft had a tough year gaining traction in the mobile space, but the software giant is hoping that a new strategy centered on the release of Windows Mobile 6.5 will help it gain up to 60 percent market share, executives said Thursday.

"It was a tough year on succeeding in phones," Microsoft chief executive Steve Ballmer said at the company's annual financial analyst meeting. "Mostly our own issues; and really driving our execution the right way at the right speed, [but] we've readjusted some of our plans."

Robbie Bach, president of Microsoft's entertainment and devices division, provided some more color on what those plans entail, including: the inclusion of Windows Mobile on a broader selection of phones; a shift from a business to consumer focus; cloud services; building up the Windows Phone brand; and building better relationships with hardware manufacturers.

"I still very much believe in the opportunity to be a for-profit software-only player in the phone business," Ballmer said. "I think that's the winning approach. I think it's the right niche. I think it is the right way to get 50–60 percent kind of market share, maybe the only way."

Windows Mobile 6.5 is set to debut in October. Microsoft first unveiled the new mobile OS, which is designed to make touch-screen phones easier to use and improve Windows phones' Web-browsing skills, in February at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.

When it does debut, Bach said, the OS will have a consumer-friendly edge.

"If I have a critique of our phones today, it's that our experiences are very good in the business case," Bach said. "But, if you're in the consumer space, and you have consumer scenarios, you want to do more browsing, you want to do more media, you want to do more video, you want to do those types of things, our experiences aren't as rich as they need to be. And starting with 6.5 and then going forward, you're going to see us expand those experiences dramatically."

Bach also pledged to work closely with handset makers like Samsung, LG, HTC, Hewlett-Packard, and Sony Ericsson to build a broad selection of phones.

"It's our view that one model, one type of phone is not going to build volume into that critical mass that we think we need to make the business successful," Bach said.

Bach also talked up MyPhone, a free service that syncs Windows Mobile 6 smartphones with a password-protected Web site that can be accessed from any PC, as a means to take advantage of the cloud. MyPhone is another product that made its debut at MWC and went into a public beta in May.

"There's a whole set of those types of services that we want to expand into, and I think those cloud-based services brought to the phone as well as to the PC and the TV are going to be quite powerful," he said.

It won't be very powerful if consumers don't know what they're buying, so Microsoft will also focus on building its brand name.

"We will invest in that with retail and we'll invest in it with our own advertising money to make sure people understand when they see those types of experiences that that's a Microsoft experience delivered on a Windows phone," Bach said.

Finally, Bach acknowledged that Microsoft has not "done as good a job as I would like in building the relationships and getting the right level of integration with our hardware OEMs." He promised a "dramatic improvement in the integration between what we do in the software and what our hardware partners do on the hardware side."

Windows 7 Beta Expires Saturday

Are you still running the original Windows 7 beta? Take note – it expires tomorrow.

Bi-hourly shutdowns of the Microsoft beta already started on July 1, but it officially goes dark on Saturday. Users should consider switching to the Windows 7 release candidate or Windows Vista, Microsoft said.

Microsoft first made the beta publicly available to those attending Microsoft Developer Conferences earlier this year. The public beta was then released in January at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas.

Microsoft also conducted an invite-only technical preview of the beta last year, and the company announced Thursday that participants in the test would receive a free copy of Windows 7 for their efforts.

The RC version of Windows 7, meanwhile, made its debut in May. Downloads of the RC end on August 20, but the program will still run.

"You will still be able to get a product key beyond that date but, downloads will not be available," Microsoft's Stephen Rose wrote in a blog post.

Global Mobile Market Bottoms, Grows Anew

SAN FRANCISCO - Global handset shipments grew nearly 5 percent in the second quarter, the first quarter-on-quarter growth in nine months, marking a reversal of course for the struggling market, researchers at iSuppli said on Friday.

Worldwide shipments of cellphones rose 4.7 percent to 265 million units in the second quarter compared with the first quarter, helped by strength in the Middle East and Latin America, according to preliminary data from iSuppli.

"The moderate increase indicates the worldwide mobile handset market is bottoming out and now is returning to growth," iSuppli analyst Tina Teng said in a statement.

Shipments for 2009 are still expected to shrink 9.9 percent year-on-year to 1.1 billion units—their first annual decline in eight years.

But iSuppli forecast an improving second half, with quarter-on-quarter increases in shipments of 6 percent in the third quarter and 8.3 percent in the fourth quarter

Microsoft Unveils Win7 Family Pack, Upgrade Pricing

Microsoft on Friday unveiled the pricing for its Windows 7 Family Pack offering, as well as pricing information for upgrades between different versions of the upcoming OS.

The Windows 7 Family Pack will retail for $149.99 for three Home Premium licenses. It will be available starting October 22 in the U.S. and other select markets.

Microsoft also provided details about upgrade versions of Windows 7, available via Windows Anytime Upgrade (WAU).

"A customer may purchase a netbook thinking they would use primarily it for e-mail. Over time, they find they are using that netbook as their primary every-day PC. That person decides they want their netbook to do more," Microsoft spokesman Brandon LeBlanc wrote in a blog post. "If the netbook is running Windows 7 Starter (or Windows 7 Home Basic in select markets), WAU makes it super easy to upgrade to Windows 7 Home Premium."

If you have Windows 7 Starter and want to upgrade to Windows 7 Home Premium, that will cost you $79.99 via WAU. Switching from Home Premium to Professional will cost $89.99 and moving from Home Premium to Ultimate will set you back $139.99.

When Windows 7 is officially released on October 22, users can purchase a retail package that contains an upgrade key for any WAU option. Those in Australia, Belgium, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the U.K., or the U.S. will be able to purchase the upgrade online from Microsoft within Windows 7.

Installation will take about 10 minutes, LeBlanc said.

Kindle Users Sue Amazon Over Deleted Orwell Book

Two Kindle users – one of them a high school student – have filed a class-action lawsuit against Amazon after the company remotely deleted copies of George Orwell's "1984" from their e-readers.

Justin Gawronski, a teenager from Michigan, and Antoine Bruguier of California, sued the online retailer in Seattle District Court on Thursday for breach of contract, intentional interference with their belongings, as well as violations of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act and the Washington Consumer Protection Act.

In late July, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos apologized to Kindle users after the company deleted Orwell's books from its Web site and users' Kindles without notice. Amazon did not have the rights to distribute Orwell's books, but it did not immediately reveal this fact to Kindle users who complained about the deletions.

"Our 'solution' to the problem was stupid, thoughtless, and painfully out of line with our principles," Bezos wrote to customers. "It is wholly self-inflicted, and we deserve the criticism we've received. We will use the scar tissue from this painful mistake to help make better decisions going forward, ones that match our mission."

That apology apparently did not sit well with Gawronski and Bruguier.

Gawronski, a Kindle 2 owner, purchased "1984" in June as part of his summer reading requirements for high school English. After reading about the deletions in the news, he powered up his Kindle on July 20 and watched "1984" vanish.

His lawyers contend that in addition to losing the book itself, Gawronski also lost valuable notes. Though Amazon maintained users' notes on the book in a separate file that is still accessible, comments like "remember this paragraph for your thesis" are not helpful when you do not know what paragraph it is referencing, the suit said.

Bruguier, meanwhile, bought "1984" in April. On July 16, he received an e-mail confirming his refund for the book and, later the same day, an e-mail from Amazon that said the company had discovered a problem with the book and was issuing a refund. When Bruguier complained that he wanted to keep the book, Amazon said in a July 17 e-mail that it could not provide any insight on the deletion. Later that day, Amazon admitted in another e-mail that it pulled the book because of licensing issues.

The lawsuit contends that deleting content remotely from Kindles is a breach of contract and violation of Amazon's terms of service, which says that Kindle users have a right to keep a permanent copy of the digital content they purchase, and view it as many times as they want.

The suit contends that the Kindle is protected as a computer because it is used for interstate commerce and communication. When they remotely deleted content, Amazon accessed customers' Kindles without permission, a violation of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, and a violation of privacy.

"Unless restrained and enjoined, Amazon will continue to commit such acts," the suit said.

The practice violates Washington state's consumer protection statute, which bans unfair and deceptive acts and practices, the suit said.

Meanwhile, Amazon caused intentional interference – or trespass to chattels – to private property. "Amazon has no more right to delete e-books from consumers Kindles and iPhones than it does to retrieve from its customers' homes paper books it sells and ships to consumers," the suit said.

Gawronski and Bruguier have suffered harm because they are now forced to find another copy of the book, which will likely cost more than the $0.99 and $3.20 they paid for "1984," respectively, according to their lawyers.

Apple, Labels Stir Up Deluxe, Digital Cocktail

DENVER - Downloadable music didn't kill the album cover. The CD did.

By shrinking the size and visual impact of the recording industry's mainstay product—and then encasing it in plastic security packaging—the shiny aluminum disc marginalized the LP to a nostalgic memory. By the time the MP3 format came along, consumers shrugged off the absence of album art and liner notes.

"We were living for so long with the CD cover art space after vinyl went away that we lost that feel of a great tactile, creative experience," says Livia Tortella, Atlantic Records general manager/executive VP of marketing and creative media. "Something got lost when you had to crack open the plastic CD with all the marketing stickers on it."

Enter Cocktail: a new digital music format that Apple is developing with record labels. The format will go beyond a simple PDF file of liner notes, and instead bundle photos, videos, lyrics and other assets with an album's music. Details remain slim, but label sources confirming the effort's existence point to it as the digital version of the record sleeves of yore.

The Cocktail format would enable fans to play an album without having to open their iTunes music management software. Supported devices haven't yet been confirmed, but industry sources expect them to be limited to the more advanced iPods, such as the iPhone and the iPod Touch. There have also been rumors of a yet-to-be-announced multimedia tablet computer from Apple that would fall somewhere between an iPhone and a laptop in terms of size and functionality.

MORE REVENUE, NOT MORE SALES

Will the Cocktail format drive greater digital album sales? Probably not, but that's not what the music industry is expecting from it. Instead, label sources position it as a way to further monetize existing digital album purchases. While pricing information isn't available, Cocktail-formatted albums will almost certainly cost more than the standard album available on iTunes.

One major-label source notes that when a digital album is released as both a standard music-only download and a deluxe download with extra content, the deluxe version typically outsells the standard one by 85 percent to 90 percent in the first few weeks after its release, even though it usually costs $2 to $5 more.

"It's not about selling more albums," a label source says about Cocktail. "It's about selling more unique kinds of content. We as an industry have found that when you offer more content, there's an appetite for it. So why not continue to offer more?"

Cocktail wouldn't be the first effort by the majors to push more interactive versions of digital albums. For instance, Atlantic's Fanbase application, which it has bundled with the CDs of such artists as Rob Thomas and T.I., aggregates photos, videos and news specific to an individual artist from various online sources. Tortella says Fanbase has been downloaded more than 200,000 times and is viewed up to 4 million times per month.

Cocktail-formatted albums would include only content selected and bundled by the label, but the broader goal would be the same—to offer fans a more immersive digital music experience than they have had with MP3s and CDs.

Apple has already offered a variety of incentives at iTunes to enhance the appeal of digital album purchases. Its "Complete My Album" option allows fans who have purchased one or two songs from a record to buy the remaining tracks at a discount. Through a partnership with Ticketmaster, iTunes has bundled digital albums with the purchase of a concert ticket. And earlier this year, its new iTunes Pass format provided artists and labels with a way to sell a "subscription" that allows fans to purchase an album along with other exclusive content that is released in stages.

"Kids will either choose to buy something or not," Tortella says. "It's up to us to make it as exciting as possible to get people to want to buy. When you're dealing with different product configurations, it makes it more exciting."

FCC Asks Apple, AT&T About Google App

Read the Original Article at InformationWeek

Apple and AT&T have been targeted in an antitrust probe for allegedly denying iPhone owners access to an application made by Google, federal officials say.

WASHINGTON, Aug. 1 (UPI) -- Apple and AT&T have been targeted in an antitrust probe for allegedly denying iPhone owners access to an application made by Google, federal officials say.

The Federal Communications Commission demanded in letters Friday that Apple and AT&T explain why Google's voice application has been shut out of the iPhone's applications store, a sign that the Obama administration is intent on cracking down on perceived anti-competitive activity in the high-tech and telecommunications sectors, The Washington Post reported.

The letters from FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski asserted that the agency "has a mission to foster a competitive wireless marketplace, protect and empower consumers, and promote innovation and investment. Recent news reports raise questions about practices in the mobile marketplace."

The Post said Apple declined to comment on the letters, while the newspaper said it could not reach AT&T for comment. A spokesperson for Google said the Internet giant had submitted its voice application to the Apple App store six weeks ago but alleged that Apple did not approve it.

The FCC is also probing other aspects of the wireless industry, such as exclusive agreements between handset makers and phone carriers, the Post said.

A Linux credit card

The Linux Foundation has rolled out an affinity card that will be managed by UMB Financial of Kansas City.

Affinity cards have been around for many years now. They usually bear the imprint of a tax-exempt group, like a college or charity.

The Linux card, bearing the image of Tux the penguin and now available in the U.S., will earn the Foundation $50 when it’s activated plus an unspecified share of the fees.The money will go to community technical events and travel for open source community members to technical events.

Most affinity cards are managed by either MBNA America, which pioneered the field or US Bank of Minneapolis. The Linux card, however, is managed by UMB, a Kansas City company run by Mariner Kemper.

A 2008 profile of the bank in American Banker describes UMB as a family operation — Mariner is the sixth Kemper to run it in its 95-year history — and praises the quality of its portfolio. Mariner’s brother, Alexander Kemper, was CEO of Perfect Commerce (formerly eScout), which now bills itself as a real-time spend management company.

It seems likely that the Foundation was brought the deal by CardPartner, a New York company that has launched over 100 affinity programs in the last year, all managed by UMB, and is pioneering affinity deals with smaller charities like Gilda’s Club New York and Guide Dogs for the Blind.

For those interested, the card offers a 0% teaser rate for six months, no annual fee, and a points program so you can get cash back from participating merchants.

Plus there’s that cute penguin.

Internet Explorer 8 Released Today

You will be able to download Internet Explorer 8 later on today (Noon EST, 4PM GMT) from the Microsoft website: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/Internet-explorer/download-ie.aspx "Microsoft claims that its browser blocks two to four times the malware of rival next generation browsers. While... [Read More...]

2Mbps Broadband Minimum for UK

The BBC reports that the UK government has signalled its commitment to ensure that every household in the UK has access to 2Mbps broadband minimum. A handful of areas around the country are still without broadband at all, and some users are only able to get minimum speeds of around 512Kbps. ... [Read More...]

Windows 7 RC Download

Microsoft have made the Release Candidate of Windows 7 available for download. This is hopefully the final public release in which any remaining bugs can be fixed, but it should be very close to the version we will see in the shops towards the end of the year. You can download both the 32 and 64... [Read More...]

Opera 10 Beta

Whilst Opera has not achieved the same level of success in the browser market as Internet Explorer and FireFox, it is still a popular multi-platform browser of choice for many users. The Opera 10 beta is now available to download at the following URL: http://www.opera.com/browser/next/ [Read More...]

SSD Performance in Windows 7

HardOCP have an interesting article on how SSD RAID performs in Windows 7. Although the hardware used in the article is expensive and out of bounds for all but the most serious enthusiast, it does hint towards the kind of performance we may see in a few years time. "When this article was... [Read More...]

How to make money on your news content website

Forget what you might have heard: Journalists can earn money publishing online. Here are some tips from OJR readers.

Updated: 2007-07-16 at 8:46 AM (MST) by Robert Niles
[Printer-friendly page | Previous versions]

This article is designed to help journalists learn how to make extra money, or even a full-time wage, by publishing independently online. It is not intended to provide an online revenue model for established news organizations. Heck, they've got business managers. They shouldn't need a wiki to show them what to do.

Content websites typically earn money through one of four ways:

• Commissions / Affiliate links
  
• Advertising networks
  
• Selling your own ads
  
• Paid content
  
• Sponsorships/Grants

Once you have ads on your site, you will want to compute the eCPM (effective cost per thousand impressions) of revenue that each ad type is earning for you. You calculate eCPM by taking the total amount generated by an ad (or ad type), diving it by the number of pages on which that ad (or ad type) appears, then multiplying by 1,000. Let eCPM data help you decide which advertising type, layout and position work best for you.

Commissions / Affiliate links

Affiliate programs, such as Amazon.com's Associates Program, provided the first ways for early solo and small Web publishers to make a few bucks on their websites. In these programs, an online retailer will pay you, the publisher, a percentage on sales made after customers click through from your website to the retailer's site. Links can include traditional banner ads, search forms and links to individual products.

Because you only earn money when sales are made, affiliate programs will work best for you if your site's readers are consistently looking to make high-priced purchases -- for example, if you run a product review site. If you're interested in affiliate program, browse through merchant directories like Commission Junction and LinkShare to find retailers that offer products that fit your site's topic and audience.

Once registered with a merchant's program, you can create an ad or product link on your site using a snippet of Web code downloaded from the retailer. Some merchants go further and allow you to create virtual storefronts that match the design of your site, but where the retailer still handles all the inventory and commerce. Be careful setting up such arrangements -- unless you want customers coming to you for return and refund questions instead of to the retailer.

You'll want to note what percentage of a sale the retailer pays back to you, as well as the length of time after a sale that you get credit for the purchase. Some retailers limit credit to sales made on the initial click-through, but others will give credit for any sales made within a day or so. Also, some retailers will pay a commission on purchases you personally make after clicking your own links; others may kick you out of the program for doing that. Check a retailer's affiliate agreement and shop around for what you consider the best deal before putting links on your site.

Many publishers have found that links to individual products return more commissions than banner ads going to a retailer's home page. But the additional money those links earn might not be enough to justify the extra time that selecting and maintaining them requires.

Advertising networks

Most news websites earn the bulk of their money through advertising. But you don't need a sales staff to attract advertisers to your site. Ad networks can handle the sale and display of ads on your site. All you need do is drop a few lines of code into your Web pages where you want the ads to appear.

The most popular ad network for independent publishers is Google's AdSense program. AdSense is a "pay per click" (PPC) program, where you earn money each time one of your readers clicks on a Google-served ad. Since you earn money on clicks, rather than completed sales, PPC ad networks can provide a more reliable source of income for sites whose readers are not looking to make a purchase right away. Other notable PPC ad networks include the Yahoo! Publisher Network and Ad Voyager.

Most PPC ads are text, but some PPC networks also sell image and Flash ads. Ads are sold and displayed based on an auction system, where advertisers bid on selected keywords and phrases that appear on network websites. The ad network looks for webpages displaying its ad code, then matches what it determines the content of a webpage to be with the most appropriate keywords and phrases that advertisers have bid upon. The network then automatically weighs several factors in determining which ads to serve on the page, including the value of those bids; advertisers' remaining budgets for those bids; what percentage of readers have clicked on those ads in the past; and, in Google's case, the percentage of those readers who have made a purchase or read a designated number of pages on the advertiser's site.

Google's "Smart Pricing" program will adjust the amount paid to you for each click based on your readers' track record of making a purchase, or viewing a certain number of pages, on that particular advertiser's website. So if your site attracts motivated buyers, you remain in the best position to earn money.

Whatever you do, do not even think about clicking the ads on your site, or encouraging your readers to do the same. All PPC ad networks prohibit click fraud, and will boot from their program any publisher found to be inflating their number of clicks. Even well-intentioned discussion board participants can get a publisher booted from the program by encouraging other readers to click the ads to support the site. Google, for example, has suggested publishers concerned about their readers' conduct add this disclaimer to their site:

"Your postings to this site may not include incentives of any kind for other users to click on ads which are displayed on the site. This includes encouraging other readers to click on the ads or to visit the advertisers' sites, as well as drawing any undue attention to the ads. This activity is strictly prohibited in order to avoid potential inflation of advertiser costs."

If you don't think PPC ad networks will work for you because your site's target audience is defined by demographics, such as geography or a religious or political affiliation -- don't worry. Traditional ad networks such as BlogAds provide an alternative to the PPC networks. BlogAds sells its ads on a more traditional site-targeted model. Advertisers do not bid on keywords or phrases, but instead pay for their ads to be displayed a certain number of times on selected websites or groups of websites. BlogAds has become especially popular on political blogs, where advertisers can buy across a group of liberal or conservative weblogs.

Design to maximize online ad revenue

Since PPC ad networks target their ads primarily by topic, rather than geography or demographics, that makes these networks work better with niche topic websites than with sites that target their readers by geography or other demographics, such as gender, education, income or political affiliation.

For the system to work well for you, the PPC network's spiders must be able to determine a topic for each of your webpages and then must match keywords or phrases that advertisers have bid upon. That means the advantage goes to websites where each page covers a distinct and easily identifiable subject. So if you have a blog that covers a mishmash of topics on a single URL, you won't elicit the targeted ads that lead to high-paying clicks.

If you want to use PPC ad networks, organize your content to limit individual URLs to a specific topic. Break long blogs into individual entries. Archive old posts and stories by subject matter, not just by date and author. Stay active on discussion boards, keeping threads on topic and directing folks to more relevant pages should they stray toward other subjects. Use keywords in headlines, decks and URLs whenever possible. And spell out keywords, phrases and proper names on first reference, rather than using acronyms throughout the piece. (See, old fashioned copy editing rules *can* help you make money!)

Well-organized pages on individual topics also show up better in search engine results, attracting Web surfers curious about a specific keyword, who are more likely to click on a targeted ad. Publishers who create evergreen articles that are likely to attract a high number of links and clicks over time will do best in attracting search engine traffic to their ad-supported webpages. If you publish time-sensitive articles, which are not likely to have a long-enough shelf life to attract significant search engine traffic, consider swapping out or archiving articles on the same topic to a single URL, so that URL can get linked to and picked up in search results.

Where you place ads on a page affects how many of your users see them, and click. According to recent Google research, top performing ad formats include:

• Large box ads placed in the middle of your main content column;
  
• Skyscraper ads placed in a left-side column;
  
• Leaderboard ads placed at the top and the bottom of the main content column.

Customize the ads' colors to match the background, type and navigational colors of your site, too, to eliminate "banner blindness" and maximize their visibility to your readers.

Then keep an eye on your ads to make sure that they remain relevant to your site. To a reader, ads -- like anything else on your pages -- are part of the content of your website. If an ad network fails to deliver consistently relevant ads, dump it and try something else. Respect your readers by not bombarding them with irrelevant advertising and they will respect you by continuing to read your site.

Think twice before installing pop-up, pop-under and screen "take-over" ads, too. Many readers steer clear of sites that block their access to the content they're looking for with aggressive advertising. Keep your website a safe haven for these ad-weary readers and you can build its audience over time.

How much traffic do you need?

With advertising, the more readers you have and page views you serve, the more money you can make. But how much traffic do you need to make a living from your website?

To make $36,500 a year, you'd need to earn $100 a day on your site (plus whatever expenses you incur). Let's assume your site is attractive to advertisers and earns $10 in ad revenue for every thousand page views. That would mean you'd need to serve 10,000 page views a day to meet this target. (And more if your site earns less than $10 per thousand page views.)

How can you attract that much traffic? If you are writing one article a day on subjects that will be out of date within 24 hours, it's going to be tough. You'll need to attract nearly 10,000 views each day for that's day article, since few people will bother reading your old, out-of-date work. If you write a fair number of "evergreen" features, which keep attracting page views long after they are written, you'll find the task much easier. If your site naturally deals with "perishable" news content, at least publish each day's new news to the same URL, overwriting or pushing down the old content, so that URL can build the in-bound links and search engine traffic that will help you attract new readers you need each day.

Reader-contributed content can also help you meet your page view goals. Well-managed, thoughtfully organized discussion boards and wikis can add dozens of new content pages a day to your site, with much less effort on your part than writing that many original articles.

Selling your own ads

If you don't want to share your ad revenue with a network, or if your site isn't the type to do well with PPC ads, you might consider selling space directly to advertisers.

First, you will need solid information about your site's visitors. Ultimately, what you are selling to advertisers is access to your readers, so you'd better know how many, and who, they are. A traffic tracking service like Google Analytics can provide accurate trafiic data that filters out hon-human traffic like search engine spiders and automated robots (which can account for up to 90 percent of a site's overall traffic). Make Money also provides reader tracking, along with some crude demographic information about your site's readers.

You should also consider conducting a survey of your readers, to get more detailed information about their demographics and behavior. SurveyMonkey provides easy-to-use tools to set up such surveys.

Once you have advertisers, you will need a system to serve and manage ads, such as OpenAds, as well as system to invoice your advertisers, such as Blinksale or PayPal. (PayPal's invoicing system does not require your advertisers to have a PayPal account, just a credit card.)

Set up a page on your site, linked from the header or footer, that provides data about your site's traffic and visitors, as well as a list of available ad packages. You might also provide a well-designed PDF version of the same data, as decision-makers often prefer "hard copy" versions of this information. (If you need free software to convert Word documents to PDFs, OpenOffice does this with a single mouse click.)

If your advertising page does not generate enough leads to support your site, you'll need to make cold calls to potential advertisers, via e-mail, phone or in person. You'll have the best luck with smaller businesses that do not place ads through agencies, but where the owner makes his or her own ad decisions.

Paid content

Given the variety and depth of information available on the Web, you have to provide truly unique content of high value to specific readers to get those readers to pay for it. The fact that a paid journalist wrote an article for you does not mean it's worth paying for to a reader. Detail-oriented publications such as Consumer Reports and Cook's Illustrated have had success selling the results of their independent testing online. And, of course, porn sites have been earning big bucks from paid content since the Web's earliest days. But general-interest publications, such as the Los Angeles Times, have found that walling off content to paid subscribers has generated less revenue than the company could have earned by selling advertising on freely available pages.

If you are certain that your content is unique and valuable enough that readers would be willing to pay for it, you'll need to select a way to handle payments from your readers. The system could be as easy as asking readers mail you a check in exchange for your putting them on e-mail content distribution list -- a method which offers the advantage of not requiring any advanced Web server security set-up. Or you could restrict access to certain folders on your website to readers whom you assign log-ins after they buy a subscription. Such restrictions are relatively easy to set up on Apache webservers. Payment can be handled manually via postal mail or phone, or automatically through an e-commerce storefront. (Many Web hosting packages include e-commerce storefronts.)

Sponsorships/Grants

Supporting a website through sponsorship or grants requires the least technical skill of these options, but the most interpersonal skills. You'll need to play the role of a salesperson, in addition to journalist and editor, in convincing a individual or organization to give you money to put up your site.

In either case, you'll need to identify individuals, or individuals within organizations, who might be willing to commit their money, or their organization's money, to your site. You'll need to make a written proposal, and often, an in-person pitch, and follow through until you secure your funding. Grants typically require a more structured application process than sponsorships, which can be sold through a formal solicitation or over drinks at the dinner table, depending upon whom you are working with.

The University of Iowa provides some guidance and a collection of links on grant writing in general, including links to many organizations which grant funds to researchers and publishers.

Microsoft closing YouTube rival

Microsoft company information - ( Microsoft News )
Google company information - ( Google News )
news.cnet.com -- Microsoft is closing Soapbox, its onetime video-sharing rival to Google's YouTube, the company said Tuesday.

Last month, Microsoft told CNET News it planned to significantly scale back Soapbox. Now it turns out Soapbox will be scaled all the way down to nothing. See the complete story here.

100,000 users to get Google Wave this fall

Google company information - ( Google News )
news.cnet.com -- Waiting to get your grubby mitts on Google Wave? You'll have to wait just a little bit longer.

While about 6,000 developers got their hands on Wave Monday, a post on the Google Wave developer blog says the company isn't planning to open it up to everyday users until September 30th. At that time, some 100,000 users will be let into the program. To be a part of that first run, users will have had to have signed up to use the service on Google's invite page. See the complete story here

DiggBar Changes Permanent - No Longer A Short URL Service

techcrunch.com -- Those changes to the DiggBar that we noted on Sunday are, apparently, permanent. We expect Digg to make an announcement about those changes later today.

We first heard about the DiggBar in February, and the product launched in April. At that time Digg was calling it a short URL service, meaning users could convert long URLs into short ones that are better suited to services like Twitter and Facebook. Unlike other services, Digg kept their own toolbar at the top of the page with Digg stats on the story as well. The underlying URL was shown in an iframe. See the complete story here.

New Barnes & Noble multi-format e-books dog Amazon

Sony company information - ( Sony News )
tech.yahoo.com -- Barnes & Noble Inc. on Monday stepped up its fight in the small but highly competitive market for electronic books with the launch of a new e-bookstore offering titles to be read on a variety of devices.

Barnes & Noble will sell books that shoppers can read on the iPhone, iPod Touch, BlackBerry and most personal computers, whereas competitors have sold devices designed solely for reading electronic books, such as Amazon.com's Kindle or Sony Corp.'s Sony Reader. See the complete story here.

Chinese Web sites close amid tightening controls

tech.yahoo.com -- Two more Web sites dedicated to social networking went offline in China on Tuesday amid tightening controls that have blocked Facebook, Twitter and other popular sites that offered many Chinese a rare taste of free expression.

China's crackdown on social networking sites began in March, when Chinese Web users found they could no longer visit YouTube shortly after video appeared on the site purporting to show Chinese security officials mistreating Tibetans. See the complete story here.

Yahoo to Acquire Xoopit for About $20 Million

Yahoo company information - ( Yahoo News )
current.com -- Yahoo plans on announcing Thursday that it has bought Xoopit for a price in the $20 million range, according to several sources, one of its first acquisitions in a long while.

Reached late this afternoon by BoomTown, a Yahoo (YHOO) spokeswoman declined to comment about the acquisition. Xoopit did not respond to emails earlier today. See the complete story here.

Windows 7 Passes The Test, Is Ready For Manufacturing

techcrunch.com -- Microsoft’s newest version of its operating system, Windows 7, is finally in the release-to-manufacturing (RTM) stage, so the OS will soon be preloaded on new computers. Though not officially released yet, Windows 7 is expected to be a hit. For instance, after just eight hours on Amazon UK, Windows 7 pre-orders outpaced the total number of pre-orders for Vista over a period of 17 weeks. See the complete story here.

Intel chief: Computer attacker still a mystery

Intel company information - ( Intel News )
google.com -- The U.S. still has not figured out who was behind the July 4 cyberattacks that took down a series of government Web sites, National Intelligence Director Dennis Blair said Wednesday.

After an address to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, Blair also told the crowd he is trying to patch up the relationship between Congress and the intelligence agencies, which was badly strained by a secretive Bush administration and flared up again with revelations this month that the CIA had hidden from the intelligence committees word of a program to develop secret hit teams. See the complete story here.

World of Warcraft movie: from computer screen to big screen

nydailynews.com -- The man behind the "Spider-Man" movies is ready for war.

Sam Raimi, director of the top-grossing "Spider-Man" films, has signed on to direct a film adaptation of the wildly popular videogame "World of Warcraft," Variety.com reports. See the complete story here.

Amazon to acquire retailer Zappos

news.cnet.com -- Whoa. This was unexpected: Amazon has agreed to a stock takeover of Zappos, a Las Vegas-based online retailer that has become famous for its unusual corporate culture. While Zappos started out selling only shoes, it has since expanded to other products. See the complete story here.

Best Buy lists well-equipped Acer laptop for $299

news.cnet.com -- Best Buy has listed a 15-inch Acer laptop with relatively robust specifications for $299. But try getting your hands on one.

Though listed among the "new arrivals" on Best Buy's Web site, it is currently not available at stores or online. But there is anecdotal evidence of its existence. Very-recent user comments indicate that people have purchased the laptop and other stores, such as Wal-Mart Stores and Amazon (which shows it in stock), list it at a higher price. See the complete story here.

Exposed: Repair Shops Hack Your Laptops

news.sky.com -- Some computer repair shops are illegally accessing personal data on customers' hard drives - and even trying to hack their bank accounts, a Sky News investigation has found. See the complete story here

Facebook at Age Five

newsweek.com -- The social networking site now boasts 250 million users, but has yet to make a single dollar in profit. Five years after its inception, a look at whether it can last another five. See the complete story here.

Microsoft confirms Windows 7 family pack

Microsoft company information - ( Microsoft News )
news.cnet.com -- Microsoft on Tuesday confirmed that it does plan to offer a "family pack" for Windows 7 that can be used on up to three PCs.

The software maker acknowledged the move as part of a blog entry Tuesday afternoon. However, it still isn't saying how much it will charge for the family pack, which allows three installations of the home premium version of Windows 7. See the complete story here.

Seven-Month Investigation Turns up 15 Incidents of Fiery iPods

wired.com -- For seven months, a reporter fought Apple’s lawyers to obtain documents concerning iPod media players. The end result? An 800-page report including 15 burn and fire-related incidents with iPods. See the complete story here.

Artificial brain '10 years away'

news.bbc.co.uk -- A detailed, functional artificial human brain can be built within the next 10 years, a leading scientist has claimed.

Henry Markram, director of the Blue Brain Project, has already simulated elements of a rat brain. See the complete story here.

Updated: Intel formally appeals $1.45 billion antitrust fine

Intel company information - ( Intel News )
AMD company information - ( AMD News )
tgdaily.com -- Intel has formally appealed a $1.45 billion fine imposed by the EU (European Union) in response to various antitrust violations. The EU leveled the hefty fine in May after ruling that the Santa Clara-based company had abused its dominant market position against AMD (Advanced Micro Devices). See the complete story here.

MySpace set to launch webmail service

MySpace company information - ( MySpace News )
neowin.net -- The social networking website MySpace is set to launch a new email service
this week, offering users their own @myspace.com email address. Just what you always wanted, eh? See the complete story here.