3 - 2011 | Lcolm Net

Bing Becomes Number Two Search Engine

Internet

The Bing search engine overtook Yahoo! for the first time worldwide in January and increased its lead in February according to web analytics company, StatCounter. Its research arm StatCounter Global Stats finds that globally Bing reached 4.37% in February ahead of Yahoo! at 3.93%. Both trail far behind Google’s 89.94% of the global search engine market.

In the United States Yahoo! at 9.74% still retains its lead over Bing at 9.03%. Google’s share in the US is 79.63%. In July 2009 Microsoft announced an agreement whereby Bing would power the Yahoo! search technology. This has been implemented in the US, Canada, Australia, Brazil and Mexico.

“It is significant that Bing overtook Yahoo! globally for the first time on a monthly basis but it remains a tough battle to claw back Google’s market share,” commented Aodhan Cullen, CEO, StatCounter. “Although Google dipped below the 90% mark in February worldwide for the first time since August 2009 it shows little sign of losing its global dominance any time soon.”

StatCounter, which specialises in website visitor analysis for organisations and bloggers, provides free lifetime stats and free detailed analysis on the latest 500 hits. Members can upgrade to access more detailed stats from $5 a month.

StatCounter Global Stats are based on aggregate data collected on a sample of over 15 billion page views per month from across the StatCounter network of more than three million websites.

StatCounter, which provides free website traffic information, publishes search engine stats in its StatCounter Global Stats, a free online research tool. It also monitors internet market share battles including browsers, Social Media and operating systems including mobile.

EU Regulators Raids Digital eBook Book Sellers

News

EU competition regulators have carried out unannounced inspections into various companies that sell online digital books. The companies, in several different European countries, were not identified.

The biggest business in the global digital book market include Amazon, Google’s eBooks and Apple’s iBooks.

European Union competition law is one of the areas of authority of the European Union. Competition law, or antitrust as it is known in the United States, regulates the exercise of market power by large companies, governments or other economic entities. In the EU, it is an important part of ensuring the completion of the internal market, meaning the free flow of working people, goods, services and capital in a borderless Europe.

Google Apps Announces User Managed Storage

Internet

Google has announced that they will be making User Managed Storage available to Google Apps customers at prices ranging from $5 to $256 per year for 20GB up to 1TB.

User Managed Storage is a service that has allowed users to purchase more storage space when they fill the allotted quota on their personal Google Accounts. This service will be rolled out for users of Google Apps accounts as well, allowing the purchase of extra storage for Google Docs, Picasa Web Albums, and photos from Blogger.

Any of these products that is over its storage quota can use the extra storage on a first-come, first-served basis. Users that upload lots of files to Google Docs, sync their Office documents to the cloud using Google Cloud Connect for Microsoft Office, or store and share pictures using Picasa or Blogger can now expand the storage space available for these files.

User Managed Storage can be enabled by your domain administrator from the Google Apps Control Panel at https://www.google.com/a/[your_domain.com] (replace [your_domain.com] with your actual domain name). Note that the Google Checkout service must also be enabled to allow end users to purchase additional storage. If your organization isn’t using Google Apps yet, you can learn more and sign up today at http://www.google.com/apps/more.

More info: http://googleenterprise.blogspot.com/2011/03/now-available-with-google-apps-user.html

Ofcom Finds UK Broadband Under Half Advertised Speed

Internet

Ofcom, the UK communications regulator, recently took a thorough look at 11 broadband packages, which collectively account for over 90 percent of all British broadband subscriptions, and found that actual download throughput was less than half (only 45 percent) of the advertised “up to” speed, reports Engadget.

The worst offenders were resellers of BT’s ADSL lines, with Orange dipping below 3Mbit on its 8Mbit lines and TalkTalk occasionally offering only 7.5Mbit to users paying for a 24Mbit connection, while Virgin’s cable connectivity won out by sticking most loyally to its listed rating.

Full story: http://www.engadget.com/2011/03/02/shocker-uk-regulator-finds-average-broadband-speeds-are-less-t/

Android Apps Dropped Due to Malware

Technology

Many apps(21) have been pulled from the Android Market because they have been infected with malware, reports Venturebeat.

Google removed the apps after being notified by Android Police bloggers, the apps in question have already been downloaded by at least 50,000 Android users.

“The infection is one of the worst to hit the mobile market, which has been relatively safe from malware attacks compared to the constant barrage of infections on PCs.

The malware attack shows that Android’s big advantage — the openness that gives it an edge over Apple’s closed mobile ecosystem — is also Android’s biggest disadvantage when it comes to protecting users against cyberattacks. While Apple screens its apps, Google allows just about anybody to upload apps into the Android Market.”

Users who have downloaded the infected apps may have had their data compromised.

Full Story: http://venturebeat.com/2011/03/02/dozens-of-android-apps-pulled-from-market-due-to-malware-infections/