Nicole Lee joins us to chat about G+ reversing the real name policy and where this weird social network fits in the landscape of the Internet. Also more on IBM and Apple making friends.
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Show Notes
Read more here! Just kidding. GigaOm reports Amazon had some test pages up describing an all-you-can-read book subscription service called Kindle Unlimited. The pages listed the service as $10 a month with access to 600,000 ebooks and thousands of audiobooks. The pages have since been taken down.
BlackBerry takes another hit: The enterprise partnership between Apple and IBM is certainly a concern for Microsoft and Google as they try to encourage corporate adoption for their handsets. However, it could prove deadly for BlackBerry. The troubled Canadian company has bet a lot of its success and the strength of its enterprise management systems like BES and has been making strides toward the ability to manage multiple platforms like Android and iOS. BlackBerry CEO John Chen said, “only underscores the ongoing need for secure end-to-end enterprise mobility solutions like those BlackBerry has delivered for years.” BlackBerry stock shares took a dip in Wednesday trading.
$450M bite of Apple: Reuters reports Apple agreed to pay $450 million to settle claims the company conspired with five major book publishers to fix ebook prices. The settlement is conditional on the outcome of a pending appeal. A ruling by the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New York in Apple’s favor would either reduce the amount Apple pays to $70 million or eliminate payments altogether.
Buy It Now: or PC Mag reports Sprint and T-Mobile USA plan to jointly bid around $10 billion in next year’s FCC incentive auction of spectrum relinquished by TV broadcasters. Sprint parent company Softbank wants to acquire T-Mobile USA.
Go BlackBerry! How about some BlackBerry good news? GigaOM reports a BlackBerry Assistant app is part of the forthcoming BlackBerry 10.3 software update. BlackBerry Assistant seems to be an app-launcher and information provider similar to Apple’s Siri and Microsoft’s Cortana, but without contextual suggestions like Google Now.
Dance, Jibo, DANCE: Mashable reports on Dr. Cynthia Breazeal’s Indiegogo campaign to fund a family robot called Jibo. The robot can take photos, tell stories while showing images on its touchscreen, and of course, it can dance around and act out things. It even has touch sensors on its head. However, it is not mobile. That keeps the price down to $499. But it does recognize faces, runs on Linux and is programmed in Javascript.
No freedom fries for you, Ms. Doudet: The BBC reports Caroline Doudet has been ordered by a French judge to change the title of her blog’s restaurant review and pay €1500 damages. The post was titled “The place to avoid in Cap-Ferret: Il Giardino” and described poor service and attitude in Doudet’s opinion. The judge ruled that the post was harmful because it showed up fourth in Google search results. The entire post has been deleted.
We’re sooo busy, America: Engadget reports the U.S. Senate passed a bill legalizing cell phone unlocking in the U.0.S A similar bill passed the U.S. House with the only difference being a restriction on bulk unlocking. Once the differences are reconciled, the bill can go to the U.S. president and back-alley unlockers will be able to come out into the light of day. Also, the U.S. Congress will get to pretend it actually did something this session.
News From You:
ssnapier posted VentureBeat’s article quoting CBS head Les Moonves saying he was “willing to talk” to Aereo about a deal to carry content. Aereo has argued in its current court case it should be allowed to carry broadcast channels under a compulsory license. However broadcasters can choose to require retransmission consent and charge more if they wish.
MikePKennedy pointed out the verge post on a New York Times report that Time Warner turned down an $80 billion takeover from 21st Century Fox. The Times sources say Rupert Murdoch is determined to press for a takeover anyway. Fox would sell CNN as part of the deal to avoid conflicts with owning two major cable news channels. Time Warner is made up principally of Turner Broadcasting channels, HBO and Warner Brothers film studio.
And KAPT_Kipper posted the Verge article that Tesla Motors announced its smaller more affordable electric car will be called the Model 3. The vehicle will be 20 percent smaller than the Model S, and go more than 200 miles on a charge. Tesla plans to show off the car in 2016 and put it on sale in 2017.
Discussion Section Notes: G+
http://www.engadget.com/2014/07/15/google-plus-finally-lets-you-use-any-name-you-like/
https://plus.google.com/+googleplus/posts/V5XkYQYYJqy
https://support.google.com/plus/answer/1228271?hl=en
http://blogs.forrester.com/nate_elliott/14-03-31-why_every_marketer_should_use_google_plus
Pick of the Day: Fooducate via Charles Durst
For food shopping, I can’t buy anything without scanning it with Fooducate first.
It is a curated database of food products submitted by users and evaluated by experts.
All you have to do is scan a product’s barcode and the app will give the product a letter grade based on the ingredients and nutrition information. It will also tell you how healthy the product is relative to similar products, and it will flag any ingredients that are especially good or bad based on the current research with a link that explains why.
Sometimes the results are surprising. You wouldn’t believe how different the grades are on two different brands of hummus or other “healthy” products.
The app is free for Android [AND APPLE ] with options to report allergens, gluten or track diets with a pro subscription.
I just use the free version, and I find it a lot easier than reading all the ingredients and trying to remember which are supposed to be bad ones.
Too bad it won’t tell you whether the price is a good deal. 🙁