Players won’t have to pay an activation fee in order to play pre-owned games on the Xbox One, according to reports by Eurogamer and MCV. The stores who sell them will. MCV cites numerous retail sources who say they have been briefed by Microsoft about how the new system will operate. Brick-and-mortar stores will be required to register a game as being ‘traded in’ by using a dedicated system offered by Microsoft. The title is then wiped from the user’s account, which could be the reason why the Xbox One needs to be connected to the Internet at least once every 24 hours. To sell the game pre-owned, the store then has to pay an activation fee. Eurogamer says Microsoft hasn’t specified what this is yet and hence much of the confusion circulating on the Internet at the moment. Regardless, the activation fee will be split in two; part of it going to Microsoft and the remainder to the publisher. Such a system sounds unnecesarily complex, but it makes sense on multiple fronts. Microsoft is looking for any additional revenue that can be sourced from trade-ins, and taking a cut from second-hand games seems a good place to start. Meanwhile, publishers are worried that they’re losing vital business as crowdfunding platforms such as Kickstarter continue to grow, as well as direct digital distribution on PC by indie studio. Taking a cut on pre-owned, physical games will help to fill the gap left by changing consumer and developer behavior. How will this affect me, the gamer? If true, the effect of such a system is two-fold. By handing a cut to Microsoft and the publishers, retailers will be forced to increase the price of pre-owned games. Consumers, as a result, will still pay some form of activation fee, albeit indirectly. The higher price-point for pre-owned games will also cause sales of such products to slow. Players will buy less of them, choose to pay for a new edition, or simply wait until a new copy drops to a price that they’re comfortable paying. All of this plays into Microsoft’s hands. Hardware manufacturers and publishers want to kill the pre-owned market as quickly as possible; or find a way to earn a share of the profits. It also means that Microsoft will likely be able to change the cost of the activation fee depending on its impact. After all, Microsoft would be wise not to choke a valuable source of revenue for brick-and-mortar stores. Doing so might jeopardise their very existence and as a result, reduce the opportunities for consumers to buy new copies of their latest console and games.
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News-aggregation is a pretty busy space as things stand, with the likes of Flipboard and Pulse leading the way, and other emerging social platforms such as Njuice showing promise. There’s always room for one more though, right? Right. Fireplug for iOS has been quietly plugging away in the background for several months already, but in light of a handful of recent tweaks and updates, we thought we’d take a quick look under the hood. We’ve heard good things. How it works When you first launch the app, you’ll be invited to create a new account – you can do so via Facebook or email.     Before you’ve lifted a finger, the app already serves up a slew of stories in your personal stream – this covers business, technology, sport and everything in between. But given this isn’t tailored, there’s a fair chance it won’t be to your liking – for my stream it had a slew of American sports for example. This is why you set about building your own streams.     It’s also worth adding here, if you choose to connect your Facebook account you’ll see an additional ‘Social Stream’ menu option which reels in articles shared by your Facebook Friends. But that may not be for you. For each publication within each category, you simply hit the ‘Plus’ button and select which Stream you wish to add it to – you can choose to create a new stream at this point too.     If you don’t see a publication of your choice, you can hit ‘Search’ instead and chances are, if it has a website, it will show up.     You can share or bookmark any article simply by long-pressing it and selecting your desired action.     It’s very easy to delete publications from a specific stream too, by pulling down the little tab in the top-right – this also lets you delete an entire stream if you wish.     Things start to get really interesting in the ‘My Profile’ section, however. Fireplug essentially tracks every article you read, and serves up stats based on your history. This includes articles you’ve read and shared, as well as the number of different sources you’ve used.     Fireplug also draws on a gamification aspect, letting you become a subject-matter master – the more you read on a particular subject, the more credit you get. Your credit score is then categorized based on the contents of the articles you’re reading. This is a great idea, but isn’t without its flaws – just because you’ve accessed a Web page, this doesn’t mean you’ve read it properly and retained all the information. But I guess the idea here is more of a signifier – if you’ve read 1,000 articles on Apple’s upcoming court case, for example, chances are you’re not blagging it. This competitive element does have a slightly gimmicky air to it, but the stats page and the overall ‘become an expert’ concept is sound. It would genuinely be interesting to know over the course of a year what I’ve read about most and which publications I always keep coming back to. While Fireplug may not be quite as slick or ‘visual’ to browse as Flipboard, it is still a very well constructed app. In many ways, it’s actually easier to personalize than its peers and it’s incredibly intuitive to use – if you’re looking for an alternative news-aggregrator, Fireplug is worth your time. Finally, Fireplug has also just launched a Chrome extension, which syncs your PC-based reading with your mobile endeavors. So all we need now is an Android app and we’re ready to roll. Fireplug for iPhone/iPod touch is available to download for free now. ➤ Fireplug | iOS Disclosure: This article contains an affiliate link. While we only ever write about products we think deserve to be on the pages of our site, The Next Web may earn a small commission if you click through and buy the product in question. For more information, please see our Terms of Service Feature Image Credit – Thinkstock
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App.news is a social news reader app for iOS that uses App.net, an ad-free social network that recently hit 100,000 registered users, to serve up interesting articles and original journalism. It’s easy to compare App.net with Twitter, given that both services encourage users to create an account using an @username and post short messages – 140 characters for Twitter, 256 for App.net – for followers to read in real-time. App.net offers a social feed and API, however, that other developers can leverage to prioritize individual aspects of the service, such as online file-storage and photo-sharing. App.news, however, sets out to give users a streamlined news reading experience by stripping out any multimedia content contained within articles, similar to Flipboard and Pocket. How it works Launching the app will immediately show a stream of messages posted by various news publications on App.net. Users aren’t required to log-in at this point; literally anyone can download the app and start trawling the service for an interesting story. Headlines are shown as brief messages, alongside a tiny profile picture on the left hand-side and a URL on the right. The design isn’t much to look at, but it’s clean and refreshingly simple to navigate. This is a bare-bones experience, in short, with little thought given to aesthetics or visual flair. A quick tap will show an excerpt from the piece, combined with the original App.net post underneath. Users can then hit the eye icon above to see the original article on the mobile Web, or tap the page symbol to see a clean text-only version, similar to Pocket. The reading experience While looking at an excerpt, it’s also possible to flip to a new article simply by swiping from left-to-right, or vice versa, across the screen at anytime. As mentioned previously, it’s perfectly functional but lacks the polish and design enjoyed by similar services. It’s not a deal-breaker, but it certainly detracts from the overall reading experience. As with physical newspapers and magazines, part of the enjoyment that stems from reading articles is attributed to the layout and design. Creative and thoughtful design can make a huge difference when wondering whether to read a feature to the very end. App.net integration The connectivity with App.net means that users can also log-in with their dedicated account and see a stream of articles that have been shared through the individual accounts they’re following. It works in the exact same way as the global stream, but helps tailor and restrict the sheer quantity of articles being posted to the service. Through the stream, users can also reply and repost stories that they like, or choose to share by email, Twitter or Facebook. It’s not particularly innovative, but does provide a touch-point and help remind users that they’re directly interacting with App.net. Tapping the menu icon in the top left-hand corner of the screen also reveals an area where the user can search for specific stories using a hashtag. Previous hashtags appear in a list below; an accessible way to track ongoing or breaking stories. The bottom line App.news is one of the only dedicated news reader apps on iOS that showcases stories shared through App.net. It’s a robust and compelling proposition, but one that falls short due to a bland interface and design. If Information Addicts can find a way to reinvigorate the app’s image, this could be one of the most useful and compelling apps for App.net. However, it’s also worth noting that App.news displays ads along the bottom of the screen – something which goes against the philosophy of App.net – but offers an ad-free version via an $2.99 in-app purchase. “Even though App.net has promised to be an ad-free platform, we have always been open to apps using this business model and think that there is a place for them in the ADN app ecosystem,” Aaron Blyth, Marketing Manager at App.net said. ➤ App.news | iOS Disclosure: This article contains an affiliate link. While we only ever write about products we think deserve to be on the pages of our site, The Next Web may earn a small commission if you click through and buy the product in question. For more information, please see our Terms of Service. Image Credit: FRED DUFOUR/AFP/Getty Images
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On June 28 2012, Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation confirmed it was to split its publishing and media and entertainment businesses into 2 publicly traded entities. On June 28 2013, this move will finally come to fruition. News Corp. issued a statement earlier today, confirming that its board had greenlighted the split, and both new companies will be led by the current head honcho – Rupert Murdoch. However, the News Corporation brand will live on, and will continue to serve as the main publishing company, while 21st Century Fox will be spun off as the entertainment arm. So why is News Corp. doing this? Here’s a quick recap. The road to ruin? July 7, 2011, was a momentous day in the history of Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation. Why? Well, this was the day the plug was pulled on News International’s (News Corp.’s UK news publishing division) News of the World Sunday tabloid, over the bribery and phone-hacking allegations it couldn’t shake off. It was a pretty sudden and dismal end for the 168-year old publication. Rupert Murdoch was hardly a popular man before the phone-hacking scandal came along, but he held a lot of power and generally got his way in most matters. When he killed The News of the World, here was a man on the back-foot. The balance of power had shifted. Thus far, the scandal has pretty much remained on the UK side of the pond. But it was no surprise when we learned last year that News Corporation was considering this split. It had been obvious for a long time that the damage caused by one UK newspaper could spread throughout his empire, so the need to create two separate entities, distinct from each other, became part of his plan. He didn’t want happenings in one part of his businesses affecting a perfectly healthy and more lucrative element elsewhere. Welcome to News Corp. 2.0 The ‘new’ News Corp will remain an independent public company, and will still operate the likes of the Wall Street Journal, the Sun and the Times newspapers. 21st Century Fox, on the other hand, will take on Fox News and, of course, 20th Century Fox film studio. “Today’s announcement is a significant step in creating two independent companies with the world’s leading portfolios of publishing and media and entertainment assets,” said Rupert Murdoch, who will become Chairman and CEO 21st Century Fox, and Executive Chairman of the new News Corporation. “We continue to believe that the separation will unlock the true value of both companies and their distinct assets, enabling investors to benefit from the separate strategic opportunities resulting from more focused management of each division.” Rupert Murdoch’s sons, James and Lachlan Murdoch, will be on the board of both new companies too. Feature Image Credit – James Knowler/Getty Images
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In a nod towards the modding community and hackers in general, Google has released the first factory system image and rooted bootloader for the latest version, XE5, of Google Glass. Nevertheless, the company is at the same time warning that using these downloads will result in a voided warranty for the experimental device. The two files, weighing in at 331MB and 4.4MB respectively, are in a new factory images download section, as first spotted by Android Police. The downloads are listed in a table that would suggest Google will be releasing system images and rooted bootloaders for every (or almost every) Google Glass software update. Nevertheless, the new section has the following highlighted message above the download links: Warning: Rooting, unlocking, or flashing your Glass voids your warranty and can leave your device in an irrecoverable state. You will no longer receive OTA updates if you unlock or root your GLass. There is no guarantee that you will receive OTA updates even after flashing back to factory specifications. Proceed at your own risk. Google also clearly wanted to share the commands for rooting Glass, but forgot to do so: At the same time, the page includes a section about the kernel source code, which Google has been offering for a few weeks via its corporate GitHub at android.googlesource.com. Instructions at source.android.com explain how to download the source and a prebuilt gcc, as well as build the actual kernel. Google Glass system images have been available via unofficial channels for some time now thanks to the hard work of the modding community. Yet the company has apparently decided to make life easier for the hackers involved, so they could focus on the arguably more exciting part of pushing Glass’ limits. See also – Google Glass update adds Google+ notifications, saves on resources by limiting background downloads and Facebook, Twitter, CNN, Elle, Evernote and Tumblr apps now on Google Glass Top Image Credit: DPA/Getty Images
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Technology holds the key to automating many of the repetitive and arduous tasks associated with housekeeping. It’s why products such as Nest, an intelligent thermostat that automatically adjusts the temperature in your home, have proven so popular. The next phase, it would seem, is building a human interface based on voice commands. Being able to simply walk through the front door and say, “turn the sprinklers on outside” would be pretty useful, but what if your house could also talk back? Tom Coates has taken the first step to realizing this utopia by building a Twitter feed for his San Francisco home. The ‘House of Coates’ account now posts regular tweets based on the temperature, lighting and weather, or if a plant needs watering outside. Just so you know, the Bedroom Light is now on. — House of Coates (@houseofcoates) May 24, 2013   It even mentions Tom when action needs to be taken. One example includes the line: “Hey @tomcoates, I just noticed some movement in the sitting room. Is that you?” Now, this setup isn’t designed to give Coates the ability to issue new commands and tasks. Instead, it’s just a rather novel way of receiving notifications about the state of his home, or chores that need to be completed. What’s really clever is that it uses conversational language; something that anyone can understand and interact with. It’s just hit 68 inside – that’s rather lovely. I’m pretty sure Tom will be happy about that.#Twine — House of Coates (@houseofcoates) May 23, 2013   Coates has a number of sensors scattered around his home to help identify and track all of this information. These include several Belkin WeMo switches to help control the lights, as well as a Twine device to track temperature and moisture. He then programmed all of these gadgets to trigger automated online actions using If This Then That (IFTTT), a free Web tool that can react on Facebook, Evernote, LinkedIn and a whole host of other services based on rules pre-set by the user. It’s not just brilliant, but a great bit of fun too. Even if you dislike the idea of having your own personal Jarvis from Iron Man, the Twitter feed is well worth checking out. We promise it’ll put a smile on your face. Image Credit: JUSTIN TALLIS/AFP/Getty Images
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At the time of writing, Daft Punk’s mega-hit Get Lucky has been streamed on Spotify more than 28 million times around the world, a figure we know because the music-streaming service recently started displaying song play counts. Indeed, Get Lucky was breaking streaming records from its very first day of launch back in April. The album it appears on, Random Access Memories, is following suit (as expected) and is already breaking streaming records since it was made available on Spotify on Monday. Though the new Daft Punk album actually started streaming (legally) on iTunes a couple of weeks ago ahead of its full launch, it has already set the record for the most streamed Spotify album on its first day ever – this includes the US, UK, France, Sweden, Finland, Norway, Germany, the Netherlands, Hong Kong, Singapore and Mexico. Now, Spotify has revealed it is on track (if you’ll pardon the pun) to have the biggest first week for an album in Spotify’s 5-year history. If the current trajectory holds firm, Daft Punk’s new album will surpass Mumford & Sons ‘Babel’ as the most streamed album ever in the first week of release, though it says this is in the US only. Mumford & Son’s Babel blew past 8 million streams in its first seven days Stateside last year, so Daft Punk has a few days left to smash it. Given the success it saw on its first day in many countries, it’s difficult not to see this coming out tops in other territories too.
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The BBC has decided to abandon its Digital Media Initiative, after spending £98.4 million (roughly $148 million USD) to try to create a more integrated and digital workflow for its employees. The decision follows an operational review of the project, launched in October last year, which found that the project was failing to achieve its current targets. Tony Hall, Director-General for the BBC, said the Digital Media Initiative had wasted “a huge amount of Licence Fee payers money.” “I saw no reason to allow that to continue which is why I have closed it,” he said. “I have serious concerns about how we managed this project and the review that has been set up is designed to find out what went wrong and what lessons can be learned. “Ambitious technology projects like this always carry a risk of failure, it does not mean we should not attempt them but we have a responsibility to keep them under much greater control than we did here.” What went wrong? The project was set up in 2008 to bring the BBC up to speed with modern technology and television production processes. The original work was contracted out to Siemens and would help move the BBC to an all-digital, tapeless system. The estimated cost was £81.7 million, although the BBC suggested it would save them roughly £18 million overall. The BBC terminated its contract with Siemens in 2009 following rising costs and was later criticized by the National Audit Office for the way that it handled the project. The Digital Media Initiative was then used to develop a new system called Fabric, which would give employees access to archived BBC footage through a “seamless digital chain.” The project will live on An email sent out by Hall to BBC employees, obtained by The Drum, sheds further light on what went wrong. “It’s struggled to keep pace with new developments and requirements both within the BBC and the wider broadcasting industry,” he said. “There are now standard off-the-shelf products that provide the kind of digital production tools that simply didn’t exist five years ago.” Hall added that the BBC’s need to produce content digitally “hasn’t gone away” and that the Fabric database would continue to be used throughout the company. “However, we will stop developing our own in-house production tools, and instead use the industry-standard production systems that are now available,” he said. Image Credit: NICOLAS ASFOURI/AFP/GettyImages
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Kim Dotcom, the Internet entrepreneur behind file-sharing service Megaupload and its successor, simply titled MEGA, has released a new single from his upcoming album today. Reports of a full-length studio record date back as far as January 2012, but details of the release have been pretty scarce since then. Dotcom released the first song from the album in August last year, called ‘Party Amplifier’, on SoundCloud and YouTube. In the video description for the latter, Dotcom said he loved the band The Prodigy and that this had “inspired me to do this song.” Dotcom tweeted his latest effort, titled ‘Dance’, earlier today. As the name suggests, the track is clearly aimed at the dance floor and includes a number of electronic loops, beats and vocal samples. At the time of writing, the track has received almost 9,000 plays on SoundCloud and has been met with some pretty positive reviews in the comments section underneath. Dotcom first expressed his musical prowess in December 2011 with the ‘Megaupload Song’, which to date has surpassed 14 million plays on YouTube. It was also notable for featuring cameo performances by Kanye West, Alicia Keys and will.i.am. Musical endeavors aside, Dotcom is still involved in a legal dispute regarding his previous Internet company, Megaupload. The Internet entrepreneur published a white paper last month co-authored by two lawyers, Robert Amsterdam and Ira P. Rothken, criticizing the way the case was carried out by the United States government. Image Credit: Phil Walter/Getty Images
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Back in December we reported on Pixplit, which we noted was like an Instagram for social photo collages, adding that it’s a lot more fun than you might think. Since then, Pixplit has landed on Android, and this week both versions of the app have received a bit of a makeover. Just to recap, Pixplit allows you to choose a split-frame layout, fill one of the slots with a photograph, add an optional filter and publish it to the ‘Playground’ section of the app. Here, your Pixplit followers can add photos to other parts of the layout to make the picture complete, so to speak. It is actually a lot of fun and you can end up with something that looks a little bit like this – we wonder what Darwin would have to say about it. Pixplit 2.0 Besides the usual bug fixes and performance tweaks, Pixplit 2.0 brings a handful of updates. Now, you can create private splits and instant-message (in private too, obviously) with friends and other chosen contacts. Previously, everything was done in the open. Now, you can take things behind closed doors, and the new private feature doesn’t enable sharing across the social sphere.     As such, there’s a brand new inbox through which all your private chats are siloed. Also, Pixplit now lets users ‘go solo’, creating and completing their own split – so they no longer have to collaborate. Simply click ‘New Split’, your chosen frame layout and you’re good to go.     Additionally, the capture and edit screens have been redesigned to create more room for the split and clear access to filters and borders. Pixplit is available to download for free now, on Android and iOS, and is localized for 15 different languages. ➤ Pixplit – Android | iOS Disclosure: This article contains an affiliate link. While we only ever write about products we think deserve to be on the pages of our site, The Next Web may earn a small commission if you click through and buy the product in question. For more information, please see our Terms of Service
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Billed as an “anti to-do list” application, today sees the launch of Mentor for iOS, which aims to become your platform of choice for keeping track of what you want to do (as opposed to what you have to do). It wants to achieve that by using what the Factory Berlin startup behind the app says is the same “failproof mechanic” that makes us meet our deadlines and be on time at work: social context. Mentor basically aims to help people achieve whatever they choose to achieve, whether that means adopting a healthier diet, reading more books, exercising more often or picking up a new language. The service harnesses social context for personal goals by creating a community of people that ‘mentor’ one another. While users keep track of their various activities and share their progress, others can engage and make sure they reach their goals. A team of six has been building the Mentor app, which is similar to the services offered by US-based rivals like Lift and Everest, since January 2012 and gathered over a thousand testers from 22 countries to date. During the three-month beta phase, Mentor says its community created over 600 different activities, which were accomplished over 5,000 times and ‘applauded’ with more than 30,000 likes and 5,000 comments. The iOS app is today making its formal debut in the App Store, backed by a six-figure seed funding round from investors such as Felix Petersen (Plazes, Amen), Matthias Spiess (Spreadshirt), JMES Investments and others. Is it an app you can see yourself using? Why (not)? ➤ Mentor for iOS Image credit: Thinkstock
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Sony’s next generation video game console, the PlayStation 4, will arrive in the United Kingdom before the year’s end, an advert published today in the Metro newspaper has revealed. The company said it was aiming for a ‘holiday 2013’ launch window when it officially unveiled the system at a New York press conference back in February. Sony didn’t confirm, however, whether this would include a simultaneous international release, or a gradual roll-out for its most important territories; Japan, North America and Europe. A 2013 release in the United States is almost certain, but Europe is known to get a bit of raw deal when it comes to video games and the release of new systems. The PlayStation 3, for instance, was originally slated for a release in all three regions in November 2006; the PAL (European) version was delayed until the following March, however, due to a shortage of materials needed to build the Blue-ray drive. Missing Christmas would be a huge blow for gamers in the United Kingdom, but it seems Sony has learned from its mistakes and will be shooting for a near-simultaneous release with the PlayStation 4. The advert published today is also undoubtedly a response to the unveiling of the Xbox One, the new next-generation console from Microsoft, earlier this week.
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Beijing-based online retailer LightInTheBox has set its IPO terms in a filing to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on Thursday, as it moves closer to becoming the first Chinese company to list in the U.S. this year. The firm will offer 8.3 million American Depositary Shares in the IPO, and has set a guidance of $8.50-$10.50 per ADS, which could see it raise up to $87 million. At the midpoint price of $9.50 per ADS, however, the firm will only raise $79 million. LightInTheBox had in April filed for an IPO with a proposed deal size of $86 million. It plans to list on the NYSE under the symbol LITB. The deal is reportedly scheduled to price on June 5 and the company is expected to start trading on June 6. Reuters says there has been a two-year listings lull after a series of accounting scandals and fraud allegations, with only 17 Chinese companies joining U.S. stock markets compared with 41 in 2010 alone. LightInTheBox said it plans to use proceeds from the IPO to invest in technology infrastructure, expand its product offerings, build up its customer base, pay debt and for other general corporate purposes. It recorded $73.3 million in net revenue for the three months ended March 31, 2013, almost double the figure from the first quarter of 2012, which stood at $36.9 million. LightInTheBox offers lifestyle products for sale on its site, including items for home improvement, fashion and electronics. It was founded in June 2007 and primarily conducts its operations through its Hong Kong subsidiary, Light In The Box Limited and subsidiary in mainland China, Lanting Jishi. The number of its customers had increased from about 36,000 in 2008 to around 2.5 million in 2012. Headline image via Thinkstock
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Yahoo gave its photo hosting site Flickr a major revamp this past Monday, but already — four days later — the service has suffered its first significant outage after going down at 22:00 PDT, 06:00 BST (as spotted by Hacker News user zan2434). That was over two hours ago, at the time of writing. The redesigned Flickr sports an entirely overhauled user interface, has a new Android app and — perhaps most notably – 1TB of free storage was made available for all users. But it seems there was more, as Yahoo also introduced a Fail Panda which is making its first public appearance for today’s outage. The cute photo (below) actually comes courtesy of a Flickr user – toyokazu — but that doesn’t wash over the fact that the site is already experiencing issues keeping itself online. Given that Yahoo has moved away from the freemium model, it is now competing more evenly with Facebook and others for your photos, so keeping the service online is an absolute must. While Flickr holds a key advantage, in that it stores photos at their original resolution (sans compression), thist doesn’t amount to much if users can’t get into the service for sustained periods of time. We hope these are just early teething problems that don’t manifest into anything regular. Headline image via Getty Images
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Editor’s note: This article originally appeared on East-West Digital News, a leading English-language resource on Russian digital industries and related venture activity. Luxoft, a major offshore software developer headquartered in Moscow, announced yesterday that it has filed a registration statement for a proposed initial public offering of its Class A ordinary shares. The book-running managers in the operation will be UBS Limited, Credit Suisse, J.P. Morgan, VTB Capital, and Cowen and Company. According to the filing, Luxoft is expecting to raise $80 million during the IPO – although this number may change closer to the offering date. In the fiscal year that ended on March 31, 2013, the company posted $314.6 million in revenue, showing 16 percent year-to-year growth. Founded in 2000, Luxoft is part of the IBS Group, where it accounts for 87 percent of the group’s valuation – some $519 million, according to an analysis conducted last year by Uralsib Capital. The company currently employs more than 5,900 people in development offices in Russia, Ukraine, the UK, Vietnam, Romania, Germany and Poland, as well as in marketing offices in the US and on Cyprus. Luxoft recently expanded its US presence by acquiring the open-source solutions of Freedom OSS for an undisclosed sum. Beyond software outsourcing, Luxoft’s strong points include human-machine interfaces (HMI) for next-gen automotive solutions. In its December 2012 review of the auto sector’s most far-reaching trends, Gartner named Luxoft among the world’s four key providers of connected vehicle technology and services, including such important functional areas as telematics, advanced driver assistance systems (ADASs), infotainment, and mobility services. “One of the strengths of this company lies in its human resource assets: they have attracted the cream of the crop of Russian IT specialists,” said industry veteran Nikolai Puntikov in an exchange with East West Digital News. “However, Luxoft still faces the challenge of translating this into more tangible and protectable IP assets.” “This IPO will be good news for Russia’s IT industry,” Puntikov added. “It will reinforce the international image of Russian programmers and companies, and it’s this kind of success story that may stimulate the interest of entrepreneurs and financiers in this sector.” Russian tech companies go West Over the last few years several Russian tech companies have sought introduction on Western stock exchanges, where the volume of available funding is far more significant than on the still little developed local capital markets. In October 2010 Mail.Ru Group, one of the leading players on the Russian Internet scene, was introduced on the London Stock Exchange. In May 2011 the search giant Yandex raised $1.3 billion during its NASDAQ IPO. At the beginning of 2012 EPAM Systems, a CEE-oriented offshore software developer and one of Luxoft’s rivals, also launched a NASDAQ IPO. The results, however, were lower than the company had expected: instead of the forecast valuation of $650 to $730 million, EPAM Systems was valued at about $490 million. The trend of going public on Western stock exchanges was also supported by Russian mobile operator Megafon, which raised $1.7 billion in November 2012 by trading approximately 15 percent of its shares on the London and Moscow stock exchanges simultaneously. A more recent example is the $212 million NASDAQ IPO by the payment operator Qiwi earlier this month. There are also players on the Russian market who have already announced IPO plans but have not yet filed official statements. Among these are online fashion shopping club KupiVip.ru, which has one more year to live up to its IPO promise, and airline ticket booking site OneTwoTrip, with a Western IPO planned for 2014. Some Russian companies have not succumbed to the tempting prospects of public offering, however. Kaspersky Lab’s CEO Eugene Kaspersky announced in February that in order to remain as flexible as possible the company had abandoned IPO ambitions and would buy back a 20 percent stake sold to a private equity investor in 2012. Last year Vontakte.ru (VK.com), the biggest Russian social network, postponed its IPO indefinitely; as CEO Pavel Durov put it, “Facebook’s IPO has destroyed the trust of many individual investors in social networks.” However, the UCP fund, a new major Vkontakte shareholder, stated recently that it an IPO could take place after “three or four years of development of the company and an increase of its valuation.”   Image credit: Getty Images
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British national daily newspaper The Guardian has unveiled plans to create a new global online identity, one that will serve as a home for its various digital properties around the world. The Guardian’s publisher, Guardian News & Media, announced it is to introduce a single portal on TheGuardian.com, which will host Guardian.co.uk, GuardianNews.com – which launched for the US market back in 2011 – and its upcoming Australian edition, which is scheduled to go live later this year. The Guardian was founded in 1821, but it was known as ‘The Manchester Guardian’ until 1959. Although it was slightly behind other publications in terms of launching an online presence, Guardian.co.uk finally landed in January 1999. This online portal hosted the whole Guardian Unlimited network of sites, which included News Unlimited, Football Unlimited, Cricket Unlimited and Jobs Unlimited. Later additions to the network include Film Unlimited, Education, Books, Shopping and Money. Then, in 2008, the Guardian Unlimited brand was replaced simply by Guardian.co.uk, which also served as the domain for its Sunday title The Observer. Tanya Cordrey, Chief Digital Officer at Guardian News & Media, made the announcement off the back of another record month for Guardian.co.uk, with ABC figures showing it secured 81 million uniquer browsers in April. This was the third straight record-traffic month for the publication. It seems the Guardian is looking to adapt its online model to mirror something like UK tabloid The Daily Mail, which operates MailOnline – a single-identity .co.uk website that lays claim to being the world’s highest-trafficed newspaper website. That’s not to say it will be looking to replicate the Daily Mail’s content, however, but it will be interesting to see how a new global identity will reflect the kinds of stories it publishes. Going global Though the Guardian is primarily a UK newspaper, only a third of its online visitors are now based in the UK which is why it’s looking to capitalize on its international presence. Indeed, it’s an easy-win for a publication looking to increase click-through-rates (CTRs) – there’s an online population of billions, but only 60 million in the UK. “This may be a small URL change but it marks a big step for the Guardian and reflects our evolution from a much-respected national print newspaper based only in the UK – reaching hundreds of thousands of people once a day – to a leading global news and media brand, with offices around the world, and an ever-growing worldwide audience accessing Guardian journalism every minute of every day,” said Cordrey. “Our move to theguardian.com will only strengthen our global presence and is a loud signal of our status as a leading digital news provider and of the breadth and depth of our content,” she added. From the Guardian’s perspective, centralizing everything makes a lot of sense in terms of creating a single, simplified brand against which it can attract more advertisers and other commercial opportunities from more countries. That’s the main appeal of a .com domain, but its content will also have to reflect this. No precise timeframe has been giving for porting all the content over to the new site, but it should all come together by the end of this year. “Over the coming months ahead of the move, our in-house digital team, working closely with the team at Yoast.com, will be working on this ambitious and challenging project,” continues Cordrey. “The Guardian websites involve millions of URLs and around 15 years’ worth of content, so it will take some time.”
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Google will reportedly use Samsung’s organic light-emitting diode technology (OLED) in Google Glass – a wearable computer that should be available for consumers by the end of this year. A Korea Times report cited sources as saying that the company’s top management recently approved a proposal by Samsung Display, which would enable the South Korean company’s OLED displays to be used on Google Glass. “Samsung will supply its high-end OLED screens for Google Glass. This is a really big thing because its means that Google shares confidential data with Samsung on its futuristic projects,” an executive at one of Samsung Display’s local parts suppliers said in the report. Google CEO Larry Page is said to have recently inspected Samsung Display’s OLED production lines in Tangjeong and received a brief about details of the business. In a key note speech on Thursday at the Society for Information Display forum in Canada, Samsung Display CEO Kim Ki-nam also hinted that OLED on silicon could be used for glasses-type, augmented-reality devices much like Google Glass, according to the report. There have been reports that Google is concerned over Samsung’s dominance, but that was dismissed by Sundar Pichai, the new head of Android. Samsung’s Galaxy S4 recently passed 10 million channel sales within one month of its launch, becoming the company’s fastest-selling phone ever. Earlier this month, a report by Strategy Analytics said Samsung was the “undisputed king of the global Android smartphone industry” for now, and that it believed Samsung generates more revenue and profit from the Android platform than Google. In a sign of closer cooperation, Google recently took the step of announcing a new version of S4 running stock Android (version 4.2.2), which will be available on Google Play starting June 26. Google’s Nexus 10 tablet is also manufactured by Samsung. Image Credit: Justin Sullivan via Getty Images
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Sony posted its first positive financial results since 2008 this month, and next stage of its financial rebuilding sees it seek to raise 150 billion yen (around $1.5 billion) in order to pay off maturing debts and invest in technology and equipment. The electronics and entertainment giant aims to raise the capital by selling bonds to Japanese retail investors. The bonds have a five-year maturity rate and are priced to to yield 0.8 percent to 1.4 percent growth over the period, according to a filing [PDF] and details reported by Bloomberg. The bonds will be issued on June 19 in what is the first time that Sony has targeted individual investors. The initiative follows a similar strategy from operator SoftBank, which is raising capital as it waits to close out a deal to acquire Sprint in the US. Both strategies are aimed at capitalizing on favorable exchange rates. Sony raised the same amount — 150 billion yen — when it last sold notes in November 2012, and today’s announcement comes as the firm continues to push its rebuilding process forward, having streamlined its business considerably since Kazuo Hirai took up the reins as CEO last year. Initiatives undertaken to cut costs include: decoupling its Sony Ericsson joint venture; selling off its chemical products businesses for $730 million and offices in Tokyo for $1.2 billion and New York for $1.1 billion; divesting shareholdings in a number of companies — including a 13% stake in DeNA for $470 million— and cutting employee head count by 10,000 worldwide, 1,000 of which were in Japan. Headline image via Toshifumi Kitamura / Getty Images
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Android users who are avid video viewers now have cause for cheer – the interactive video platform Videogram, which even Jennifer Lopez took to releasing her new music video on earlier this week, has launched on Google Play. The startup behind Videogram, Tokyo-headquartered Cinemacraft, has introduced the Android version following closely after its iOS launch last month. However, Videogram for Android doesn’t have the same functionality as the iOS app. Cinemacraft CEO and founder Sandeep Casi said this is so the company can “launch these features exclusively in the near future with telcos.” “This will provide differentiation from what is available on Google Play versus telco-controlled Android stores,” he said. The 500 startups-backed firm started its Videogram service last November, and has since collaborated with Sony Pictures to promote Battle of the Year, a movie due in cinemas September 13. Besides J-Lo, other celebrities including Christian Milian, have also caught on to using Videogram. The video platform breaks content up into clickable and embeddable pictorial summaries, and users can share specific clips to social networks including Pinterest, Tumblr, Twitter, Google+ and Facebook. (See J-Lo’s “Live It Up” music video below.) Headline image via Thinkstock
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Exactly one year (to the day) after it began offering music content, global video streaming site Viki has announced a deal with Universal Music that will see it offer the label’s entire worldwide music video collection in South Korea and nine markets in Southeast Asia. Viki made its debut streaming movie and TV shows from a diverse range of countries and global broadcasters, including NBCU. It makes the content accessible to global audiences thanks to its unique, crowdsourced translations, which are managed and translated entirely by its community. Last year, the Singapore-based company landed deals to stream music videos from Warner Music, SEED Music Group of Taiwan and Korea’s LOEN worldwide. Now, users in South Korea, Indonesia, Singapore, Malaysia, Laos, Cambodia, The Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam will gain access to 7,500 music videos from Universal Music’s global roster. That includes US artists like Jay-Z, Ne-Yo and Lady Gaga, as well as those from Korea, other parts of Asia and worldwide. Razmig Hovaghimian, CEO and co-founder of Viki, tells TNW that the move to expand its music catalogue makes perfect sense since it “cross-pollinated” its TV and movie content in many markets, such as Korea, where a number of music artists also act or appear in TV shows. Not to mention that it will bring music videos from truly global stars in a number of markets in Asia that are not served by streaming services. Hovaghimian says Viki in the process of introducing new content to its global markets after it took time to review and analyse how its content was being consumed. Interestingly, he says that there are some unusual patterns emerging, for example Korean dramas are particularly popular in Saudi Arabia — thanks to the subtitles — while Bollywood is popular worldwide. That opportunity to search new audience segments that, without Viki’s subtitles, would struggle to consume content in their native language is attractive for music companies, which can broaden their reach using the service. That’s the message from Loo Yew Ming, VP of Digital & Business Development in Southeast Asia for Universal Music Group International, who comments thusly: We see a lot of potential in Asia and Viki offers an interesting and innovative way for our artists to engage fans who don’t speak their language. At the same time, translations help fans discover new music from artists they’ve never connected with before. Hovaghimian also reveals that mobile is becoming a prominent platform for Viki, with video consumption from phones and tablets overtaking that of desktops in a number if markets, including Singapore. That is, he says, in part due to a deal that sees the Viki service bundle on the Samsung Galaxy S4. For now, that deal is operative in Singapore only, but Viki is in talks to expand it to other “significant markets”, Hovaghimian explains. Viki fans in the selected countries can access the following initial 10 channels as of now, the remainder of Universal Music’s collection will follow very soon: B2ST Black Eyed Peas Maroon 5 Psy Rihanna Taylor Swift Demi Lovato Lady Gaga Ne-Yo Carly Jae Repsen Headline image via piitaaraq / Flickr
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Just a day after launching the stable version of Chrome 27 for Android, Google has announced the release of Chrome 28 beta for Android. The new features include a built-in Google Translate bar, fullscreen support on tablets, and new mobile-friendly error pages. You can download version 28.0.1500.21 right now directly from Google Play. Remember: since this is a beta release, you won’t find it via the store’s search function; you’ll need to use the link. The biggest addition here is undoubtedly Google Translate support. When you come across a page written in a language that isn’t the default language on your phone or tablet, just tap the “Translate” button: For those that use Chrome on the desktop, this is the same built-in translation bar you’re already used to for quickly skimming a web page you otherwise wouldn’t understand at all. Now you can use it while you’re on the go as well. Next up is fullscreen support on tablets: as you scroll, the top toolbar disappears so you can see more web page content. The feature was first introduced in Chrome 27 for Android on phones, which have now also gained a “+” in the toolbar for creating tabs. Last but certainly not least, Google is still experimenting with the data savings feature it introduced in Chrome 26 beta. As of Chrome 27 beta, you no longer need to enable it under chrome://flags and can see your data savings by just going to “Bandwidth Management” in Settings and enabling “Reduce Data Usage.” In Chrome 28 beta, you’ll also get a spiffy graph that shows your estimated bandwidth savings: For reference, here’s the official Chrome 27 beta for Android changelog: Google Translate: When you come across a page written in a language that isn’t in the same language as your phone or tablet, look for the translation bar. Fullscreen on tablets: Simply scroll the page to dismiss the toolbar. Support for fullscreen API. New graph showing your estimated bandwidth savings when you use the experimental data compression feature. Mobile friendly error pages. Chrome 28 could arrive as soon as June, but we wouldn’t be surprised if it was pushed back to July. This is a big release for Google, as it will be the first to ship with Blink instead of WebKit. Top Image Credit: T. Al Nakib
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DISH Network has secured $9 billion in “committed financing” as part of its $25.5 billion bid for Sprint. The company hopes it will help persuade the telecommunication company to rethink selling 70 percent of itself to Japanese corporation SoftBank. The announcement comes quickly following SoftBank and Sprint completing the US state regulatory review process for a potential sale. ALERT: $DISH secures $9 billion in committed financing for Sprint bid – DJ $S — CNBC (@CNBC) May 23, 2013 CNBC reported that DISH has acquired the funds. To bolster its chances, DISH has been running a campaign with a national security fear-mongering theme. The company has a website that argues that “the sale of wireless and wireline infrastructure with national strategic importance to a foreign company will weaken the security of the United States.” DISH has also secured support from US Senator John McCain, who wrote a letter to acting FCC Chairwoman Mignon Clyburn: As I am sure the Commission is aware, Sprint holds strategic assets, such as its wireless spectrum and fiber network, and has extensive and ongoing relationships throughout the whole government. With all other relevant facts and circumstances surrounding Softbank’s proposed acquisition of Sprint, I hope the Commission duly considers these facts when reviewing this matter. To help allay such fears, SoftBank has taken the extra step of giving the US the right to approve or veto a nominee to Sprint’s board of directors. This government-approved director would be responsible for monitoring national-security issues relating to Softbank’s takeover. While SoftBank’s offer has completed state regulatory reviews, it also faces extensive reviews by the US Department of Justice, the FCC, and the Committee on Foreign Investment. Last April, DISH entered the Sprint saga with a bid $25.5 billion for the telecom company, reportedly 13 percent higher than SoftBank’s bid. At that time, DISH Chairman Charles Ergen called his company’s bid to be “a superior alternative” to SoftBank’s: Sprint shareholders will benefit from a higher price with more cash while also creating the opportunity to participate more meaningfully in a combined DISH/Sprint with a significantly-enhanced strategic position and substantial synergies that are not attainable through the pending SoftBank proposal. Amid all the back and forth and merger games, at the end of April, Sprint received a waiver to begin discussions with DISH from SoftBank — but it didn’t permit negotiations to begin. At the close of trading today, shares in DISH were up 0.18 percent at $39.39. Sprint was trading up 0.14 percent at $7.31 while SoftBank down 7.16 percent at 5,320 yen Photo credit: Scott Olson/Getty Images
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Speaking on stage at Internet Week New York, Digg CEO Andrew McLaughlin revealed that his company’s upcoming Google Reader replacement will not be a separate app, and will simply be called “Digg Reader.” McLaughlin made it clear that users will ”have one download, which is Digg, and the current Digg will have added onto it reader capabilities.” Unsurprisingly, McLaughlin says Digg is “aiming to build something that’s very clean, very simple and very fast.” He called the upcoming Digg Reader a “production tool,” which will offer ways to ”sort and rank” content (an alternative to a relentless chronological scroll) so you can quickly look at the top things and move on. Digg will meet its goal of launching Digg Reader by the end of June More specifically, the upcoming service will include features like the ability to sort by popularity, but will not focus on discovery or social features for now. According to McLaughlin, users know which feeds they want to follow. Digg Reader will let you manage those feeds and read them in “a really clean, uncluttered way, with a lot of speed and performance.” As for Reader’s development progress thus far, McLaughlin shared that his company moved Digg Reader onto production servers this past Monday and that Digg will meet its goal of launching it by the end of June. In reference to the challenge of building such a tool, McLaughlin says ”the amount of computing power that you have to throw at it is pretty daunting.” Digg’s engineers spoke to Google Reader’s former developers and Bloglovin’s programmers to prepare themselves for this development sprint. McLaughlin appears to be focusing his team’s efforts on iOS and the Web, but the company is “doing Android off to the side.” McLaughlin also shared that Digg and the recently acquired Instapaper will not be combined, at least for the moment; he argued that the notion of reading something later serves a separate function. The talk, dubbed “Life After Google Reader” also featured Bloglovin CEO Mattias Swenson, Buzzfeed’s Rob Fishman, and yours truly as moderator. When asked if Digg Reader will compete with services like Bloglovin, McLaughlin said it was possible, but that the target demographics are very different. This made the talk quite interesting, as Bloglovin and Digg are tied closely together through Betaworks.
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Foursquare and Gnip on Thursday together announced a partnership that will see the former’s check-in data distributed to the latter’s clients. Foursquare is giving Gnip a real-time feed of the places where its users are checking in, which will naturally be anonymized for privacy purposes. So what data exactly will Foursquare give to Gnip? Three separate pieces: Each check-in’s location (for instance, Stop & Shop). The time and date of the check-in (April 30, 2013 at 11:03pm GMT) . The gender of the person checking in (male). Again, the check-ins are not tied to individual users. The technical-looking output looks like this: Foursquare says it regularly gets requests from people who want to use its data for research. The company has worked with select academic institutions and press outlets on data research projects in the past, which it says have “shed new insight and to effect positive change in how the real world works.” The Gnip partnership goes further. For those who don’t kow, Gnip is an aggregation company that provides data from dozens of social media websites via one API. Foursquare will be joining Gnip’s growing list of premium publishers, including Twitter, Tumblr, WordPress, Disqus, IntenseDebate, StockTwits, and Estimize. Gnip says it is offering both the full firehose and filtered access of Foursquare’s data. Foursquare envisions market research companies using it to get a realtime pulse on holiday shopping trends, and social media marketing agencies tracking the impact of a national chain’s Super Bowl campaign. Gnip says retailers will be able to study the results of local advertising campaigns, financial analysts will have another valuable data point to forecast seasonal sales, and real estate development groups will be able to better understand where they should develop new locations. Researchers will be able to use it for various purposes, including, according to Foursquare, “better understanding a neighborhood’s evolution as the types and popularity of local businesses change.” That’s the type of findings we’d love to hear more about. “We are capturing this amazing signal about what millions of people are doing in the real world at every moment of the day in cities all around the globe,” Blake Shaw, Foursquare’s data scientist, told Gnip. “We have seen that when we aggregate check-in patterns across many individuals, we can measure features of cities at a higher resolution than was ever possible before. I think this data can act almost like a ‘microscope for cities.’” It’s thus no surprise Gnip seems quite positive about the partnership: “With more than 35 million registered users, nearly 4 billion total check-ins, and over 75 million API calls a day, Foursquare is the location layer for the Internet, helping to connect people with places around the world.” Top Image Credit: Andrew Beierle
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Storify, a service that helps users curate social media posts around a particular topic, has partnered with Adobe’s Typekit. This move helps Storify users better customize their stories so that they blend in with the look and feel of the site where it will be embedded. To implement the service, users can input their Typekit Kit ID into their Storify account in the Embed Style settings screen. Once done, they will have access to Typekit’s complete library of fonts to manage what’s displayed for headlines and body text. It’s important to note that not everyone will have access to this feature. Storify says that users must be signed up for a Business account, a plan it launched last month. Geared towards journalists, agencies, and bloggers, it’s not surprising that the company integrated with Adobe’s service. After all, these users are perhaps more likely to be interested in aggregating content to share. Among Storify’s customers are CNN, The New York Times, and The Washington Post. Photo credit: Thinkstock
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