Yearly Archives: 2011

Nokia is to drop its Ovi Music Unlimited Service, previously known as Comes with Music in most countries.

The service was introduced as a competitor to Apple’s iTunes, Comes with Music launched in 2008 and was bundled with various Nokia handsets.

In a press release, Nokia said: “”There will be no disruption to the service for our existing customers in these markets or anyone who in the future purchases an Ovi Music Unlimited-edition device from stores while stocks last — they can continue to enjoy unlimited downloads for the duration of their original Ovi Music Unlimited subscription and keep those tracks forever.”

Facebook has announced that developers of Facebook apps can now gather personal contact information from their users.

“User Address and Mobile Phone Number
We are now making a user’s address and mobile phone number accessible as part of the User Graph object. Because this is sensitive information, we have created the new user_address and user_mobile_phone permissions. These permissions must be explicitly granted to your application by the user via our standard permissions dialogs.

Please note that these permissions only provide access to a user’s address and mobile phone number, not their friend’s addresses or mobile phone numbers.”

The article on the Facebook developers blog goes onto post JavaScript SDK code to enable this.

Security firm Sophos describes it as ‘a move that could herald a new level of danger for Facebook users’ and advises users to remove their home address and phone numbers from the network immediately.”

Facebook post: http://developers.facebook.com/blog/post/446

Graham Cluley writing on naked security says:

“Facebook is already plagued by rogue applications that post spam links to users’ walls, and point users to survey scams that earn them commission – and even sometimes trick users into handing over their cellphone numbers to sign them up for a premium rate service.

Now, shady app developers will find it easier than ever before to gather even more personal information from users. You can imagine, for instance, that bad guys could set up a rogue app that collects mobile phone numbers and then uses that information for the purposes of SMS spamming or sells on the data to cold-calling companies.

The ability to access users’ home addresses will also open up more opportunities for identity theft, combined with the other data that can already be extracted from Facebook users’ profiles.”

Full article: http://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2011/01/16/rogue-facebook-apps-access-your-home-address-mobile-phone-number/

Facebook is now reported to be worth $70+ Billion after shares hit $28.26 each, reports TechCrunch.

The rise in price seems to have been triggered by the Goldman Sachs $500m investment announced earlier this month.

Joined by the Russian tech investment firm Digital Sky, which put $50m into the deal, Goldman has structured it as a new investment product. Clients can buy a chunk of Facebook equity by investing at least $2m, and have to agree not to sell shares until 2013 and not to trade in secondary stock markets.

The securities and exchange commission (SEC) is checking these trades, they say firms with more than 499 shareholders must go public, though Facebook won an exemption from this ruling in November 2008 by saying most of its shareholders were staff.

Pushnote is a browser add-on tool that lets users of Firefox, Chrome and Internet Explorer comment on any Website without the involvement of the owner of that site, comments made through Pushnote are rated, ranked and moderated only by the audience.

Visit Pushnote, sign up and download the add-on for your browser The Pushnote button will then appear in your browser bar.

Author and Tweeter Stephen Fry is supporting Pushnote.

Pushnote website: http://www.pushnote.com/user/register

Pushnote article at: http://www.pcworld.com/businesscenter/article/216821/what_stephen_fry_pushnote_means_for_you.html

Minister for the Cabinet Office Francis Maude and Business Minister Edward Davey have outlined plans for a new Public Data Corporation.

The Corporation will, for the first time, bring together Government bodies and data into one organisation and provide an unprecedented level of easily accessible public information and drive further efficiency in the delivery of public services.

Supporting the Government’s growth agenda, it will open up opportunities for innovative developers, businesses and members of the public to generate social and economic growth through the use of data.

The Corporation will also have the potential to attract investment, reinforcing and accelerating the development of these world class assets and their contribution to the knowledge economy.

By bringing valuable Government data together, governed by a consistent set of principles around data collection, maintenance, production and charging, the Government can share best practice, drive efficiencies and create innovative public services for citizens and businesses. The Public Data Corporation will also provide real value for the taxpayer.

Francis Maude said:

We have entered a new era of transparency in Government and have already made an unprecedented level of data available. But we want to go further and faster, this agenda is more important than ever.

“Public sector information underpins a growing part of the economy. The technology that is around today allows people to use and re-use this information in new and different ways. The role of Government is to help maximise the benefits of these developments. At present many state agencies face a conflict between maximising revenues from the sale of data and making the data freely available to be exploited for social and economic gain. Creating the PDC will enable the conflicts at the least to be managed consistently with a view to opening up access, and at best to be eliminated.”

“A Public Data Corporation will bring benefits in three areas. Firstly and most importantly it will allow us to make data freely available, and where charging for data is appropriate to do so on a consistent basis. It will be a centre where developers, businesses and members of the public can access data and use it to develop internet applications, inform their business decisions or identify ways to run public services more efficiently. Some of this work is already taking place but there is huge potential to do more. Secondly, it will be a centre of excellence where expertise in collecting, managing, storing and distributing data can be brought together. This will enable substantial operational synergies. Thirdly, it can be a vehicle which will attract private investment.”

Business Minister, Edward Davey, said:

Britain has always been a leader in the global knowledge economy, but our public sector does not always share its data, skills and capabilities to benefit Government and businesses as well as it could.

“A Public Data Corporation is a global first and will help make this information much easier to access and understand. It will provide stability and certainty for businesses and entrepreneurs, attracting the investment these operations need to maintain their capabilities and drive growth in the economy. It will also give better value for the taxpayer by driving down costs and making the process more efficient”.

Examples of the benefits the Public Data Corporation could provide:

a more consistent approach towards access to and accessibility of public sector information;
make more data free at the point of use, where this is appropriate and consistent with ensuring value for taxpayers’ money. This would create more opportunities for citizens, social enterprises and businesses to use public sector data in new and innovative ways;
create a centre of excellence for collecting, holding and managing public data, driving further efficiencies and improving productivity across the public sector;
identifying how data Government already holds can be used more effectively to provide better and cheaper public services; and
create more certainty and predictability – encouraging businesses to invest in and develop new and innovative products and applications based on data. It will also provide opportunities for private investment in the corporation.
In some cases data is already being used in innovative ways and the Public Data Corporation will open up more opportunities.

For example, airTEXT is an air quality information service for people who live or work in London and who suffer from asthma, emphysema, bronchitis, heart disease or angina. airTEXT is designed to alert users to pollution so that they can take some of the simple steps that help reduce the likelihood of any impacts. When air pollution levels are predicted to reach moderate or higher levels over more than one tenth of someone’s zone, they send their users a free SMS message, a voice mail or an email, to warn them that pollution may be elevated. Their partners include ESA, Defra, GLA, and twenty London councils.

The Government aims to establish the Public Data Corporation in 2011. Further work is being undertaken across Government to determine what the Public Data Corporation might look like, including which bodies and datasets should be included within it.

Today’s announcement builds on the Growth review launched by the Government on 29 November. In developing the Public Data Corporation the Government will consider if data held by public bodies could be used in an innovative or entrepreneurial way and whether it could then, in future, be made available to the public.

There is to be a global trial of IPv6 on 8 June, World IPv6 Day, Google, Facebook, Akamai and Yahoo have committed to taking part in the test.

“The good news is that internet users don’t need to do anything special to prepare for World IPv6 Day,” said Lorenzo Colitti, a network engineer at Google in a blog post.

On World IPv6 Day, we’ll be taking the next big step. Together with major web companies such as Facebook and Yahoo!, we will enable IPv6 on our main websites for 24 hours. This is a crucial phase in the transition, because while IPv6 is widely deployed in many networks, it’s never been used at such a large scale before. We hope that by working together with a common focus, we can help the industry prepare for the new protocol, find and resolve any unexpected issues, and pave the way for global deployment.

Net firms are being encouraged to switch to IPv6 as addresses in the old scheme will run out by November 2011.

The World IPv6 Day is being co-ordinated by the Internet Society, a non-profit group which educates people and companies about net issues. It has provided a webpage through which people can test their Ipv6 readiness.

Test your IPv6 connectivity at: http://test-ipv6.com/

BT has announced the 41 market towns that will benefit from the next phase of BT’s super-fast fibre broadband deployment, serving around 300,000 businesses and consumers across these areas (see list below). Customers in these areas will be able to access super-fast broadband speeds of up to 40Mb/s from Spring 2012

This follows last month’s news that, for the first time, BT would include a number of market towns in the next phase of its £2.5 billion fibre broadband roll-out. This is in response to customer demand for super-fast speeds in these areas and as part of BT’s commitment to deliver faster broadband speeds to more rural parts of the country.

By adapting its deployment model for fibre, BT has been able to create a commercial case for rolling out fibre to selected market towns in rural areas where the premises and cabinets are suitably clustered.

Because of the typical topography of market towns BT estimates that a large number of premises in these towns will be able to access fibre-based broadband; it is however likely that a minority will not initially be able to receive services due to a combination of technical and economic reasons. However, Openreach is very keen to engage in discussions with local council representatives to see if agreement can be reached to include the small minority of premises that will not be included.

The list of market towns join the 785 exchange locations across the country that BT has already revealed under its fibre roll-out plan to date. These locations serve around eight million premises in total, around half of BT’s total fibre roll-out plan.

BT is investing up to £2.5 billion to deliver fibre broadband to up to two thirds of UK homes and businesses, subject to an acceptable environment for investment. It’s the largest single commercial investment in fibre-based broadband ever undertaken in the UK, and is currently one of the biggest civil engineering projects running in Europe.

Openreach, BT’s local network business, is responsible for the deployment of fibre to these areas. The technology will be available on an open, wholesale basis to all companies providing broadband services.

Steve Robertson, CEO of Openreach said: “We want to extend the fibre footprint and the benefits the technology brings to more rural areas. So we’re constantly evolving our deployment model to make sure we can bring the benefits of the technology to the maximum number of people within the scope of our commercial deployment. The inclusion of 41 market towns in our roll-out plan firmly demonstrates our commitment to finding solutions for local communities. However, in many cases, this will require a collective effort. An infrastructure project on this scale – arguably as important to the future of the UK as the road or rail networks – can only be done in partnership. We’re keen to talk to public and private sector organisations about how this can be achieved.

“Many factors are taken into account when making decisions about where to focus our investment, and we’re working on ways to give people more of an opportunity to demonstrate where demand for next generation fibre broadband is the greatest,” he added.

Super-fast broadband, using fibre to street cabinets (FTTC), offers much faster download speeds of up to 40Mb/s, potentially rising to 60Mb/s, and upstream speeds of 10Mb/s, which could rise to 15Mb/s in the future. BT is also trialling fibre to the premises (FTTP) broadband services, at download speeds of up to 100Mb/s.

List of exchanges: Exchange Name RDA County ALFRETON East Midlands Derbyshire BALDOCK East of England Hertfordshire BATHGATE Scotland Lothian BILLINGE North West Merseyside BISHOP AUCKLAND North East Durham BLANDFORD South West Dorset DALKEITH Scotland Lothian DARTMOUTH South West Devon DEREHAM East of England Norfolk DEVIZES South West Wiltshire DORKING South East Surrey EDINBURGH MUSSELBURGH Scotland Lothian EPPING East of England Essex FAVERSHAM South East Kent FILEY Yorkshire and The Humber North Yorkshire FRINTON- ON-SEA East of England Essex GREAT DUNMOW East of England Essex HALSTEAD East of England Essex HUNGERFORD South East Berkshire KIDLINGTON South East Oxfordshire KNUTSFORD North West Cheshire MIRFIELD Yorkshire and The Humber West Yorkshire MONTROSE Scotland Tayside MORPETH North East Northumberland NANTWICH North West Cheshire NEWMARKET East of England Suffolk OSWESTRY West Midlands Shropshire PENRITH North West Cumbria PONTYCYMMER Wales Mid Glamorgan RAINFORD North West Merseyside RIPLEY East Midlands Derbyshire ROYSTON, SOUTH YORKSHIRE Yorkshire and The Humber South Yorkshire SANDWICH South East Kent SHEERNESS South East Kent SHERINGHAM East of England Norfolk STOCKSBRIDGE Yorkshire and The Humber South Yorkshire STOURPORT West Midlands Hereford & Worcester WALLINGFORD South East Oxfordshire WENDOVER South East Buckinghamshire WESTBURY South West Wiltshire WIMBORNE South West Dorset

Google has announced it is dropping support for H.264 In Chrome in the next couple months.

Writing on the Chromium Blog Mike Jazayeri says:

“We expect even more rapid innovation in the web media platform in the coming year and are focusing our investments in those technologies that are developed and licensed based on open web principles. To that end, we are changing Chrome’s HTML5 support to make it consistent with the codecs already supported by the open Chromium project. Specifically, we are supporting the WebM (VP8) and Theora video codecs, and will consider adding support for other high-quality open codecs in the future. Though H.264 plays an important role in video, as our goal is to enable open innovation, support for the codec will be removed and our resources directed towards completely open codec technologies.”

The results from 491 respondents to ISPreview.co.uk’s latest survey have revealed that 45% of UK consumers are unhappy with their current Internet Service Provider, with almost one third (31%) planning to switch ISPs in 2011 (another 32.5% were undecided).

Most of the problems appear to stem from displeasure at broadband speeds and support quality, with 36% rating their provider’s internet connection speed as “Poor” and 26% giving the same verdict for Customer Support. Just 36% of consumers said they had no plans to switch ISPs this year.

“It’s deeply disappointing to see that consumer satisfaction with mainstream ISPs is still so extremely low,” remarked ISPreview.co.uk’s Founder, Mark Jackson. “Just 37% felt that their broadband speed was ‘Good’ and an even lower 35% gave the same opinion for ‘Customer Support.’ Clearly ISPs need to work a lot harder to keep customers happy and combat churn. We predict that the situation will improve as faster and more reliable superfast broadband services slowly become widely available between now and 2015.

“However the advertising of so-called ‘unlimited’ usage deals will face tighter regulation this year, as should broadband speeds. ISPs will also be required to adapt to a raft of new laws (e.g. to combat unlawful file sharing). The result of all these changes could cause some prices to climb in 2011, which would be an unwelcome but perhaps unavoidable move on top of the current VAT hike,” concluded Jackson.