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From Walworth County Today | The city of Harvard is angling to become a test site for Google’s ultra-high speed Internet project, hoping the upgrade would spur interest in the 1.5 million-square-foot former Motorola plant that once employed more than 5,000 people before closing in 2003.
Get the full story: walworthcountytoday.com
By Michael Oneal | Groupon, the Chicago-based coupon Web site, launched a new iPhone application Thursday.
The app will allow Groupon users to tap the site’s daily offerings of
deals on local goods, services and cultural events from their iPhone or
iPod touch, the company said in a release.
From PC World | Motorola will start loading Microsoft’s Bing search and map services onto its Android smartphones in China, bringing more non-Google services to the phones amid a row between Google and China.
Motorola will start pre-loading Microsoft’s Bing search and map services on its Android smartphones in China this quarter, or use updates to add them to phones already on the market. Motorola said the deal is a global one, though
Get the full story: pcworld.com
Associated Press | Google Inc. will sell the online services of
other business software makers in an effort to fill its own product
gaps and persuade more companies to rely on applications piped over the
Internet.
The online store that was announced late Tuesday marks another step in
Google’s crusade to convert the world to “cloud computing,” the idea of
running applications in Web browsers instead of installing them on
individual hard drives. The information entered in the programs also is
stored in data centers run by third parties such as Google.
Associated Press | Microsoft is rolling out the new design for its MSN Web portal in the U.S.
The software maker is saying goodbye to MSN.com’s blue background and its blocks of text links. Instead, starting Tuesday, the site is sporting more white space and fewer categories.
Associated Press | YouTube is adding captions to millions of Internet videos. The feature expands upon speech-recognition technology that YouTube began using to make captions available on a limited number of videos late last year.
YouTube’s audience will be able to request captions at the press of a
button. Video producers will also be able to download the automated
captions and improve upon them.
Associated Press | Online travel retailer Orbitz Worldwide Inc.
said Thursday that it has named Martin Brand and Brad Gerstner to its
board of directors, effective immediately.
Brand is a managing director in the private equity group at The
Blackstone Group, which held more than half of Orbitz shares as of the
end of 2009, according to filings. He is also on the board at
Travelport Limited, Performance Food Group and Bayview Asset Management
LLC.
By The Problem Solver | A
law firm filed a class action lawsuit against Groupon Tuesday, alleging
that the company imposes illegal post-contractual terms on its
expiration dates.
Groupon’s CEO and founder, Andrew Mason, is
fighting back. He wrote a blog post yesterday saying that because
Groupon thinks this is so ridiculous and stands by its liberal and
generous customer satisfaction policy, that the company is filing a
class action suit against itself.
Get the full story: The Problem Solver
Associated Press | Authorities have smashed one of the world’s biggest networks of
virus-infected computers. It was a data vacuum that stole credit cards
and online banking credentials from as many as 12.7 million poisoned
PCs.
The “botnet” of infected computers included PCs inside more than half
of the Fortune 1,000 companies. More than 40 major banks were
infiltrated, according to investigators.
Associated Press | Just over a quarter of American adults now read news on their cell phones, according to a new report from the Pew Research Center.
The survey results being released by the group Monday offer another sign of how people are changing they way they get information. Technology has been reshaping the news business and the way consumers relate to it for more than a decade. The latest shift is being driven by the exploding popularity of phones that can easily access the Internet.
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel | A high school student from Waukesha, Wis., was sentenced on Feb. 24 to 15 years in prison and another 13 years of extended supervision for using Facebook to deceive and coerce fellow other students into sexual acts with him in 2008.
Waukesha County Circuit Judge J. Mac Davis said the student, Anthony
Stancl, had proven he was manipulative, excessively self-centered and
could still be dangerous. Stancl, 19, of New Berlin, Wis., posed as a
female on Facebook and persuaded at least 31 boys to send him naked
pictures of themselves. He then used the pictures to blackmail at least
seven boys, ages 15 to 17, into performing sex acts.
Stancl must register as a sex offender and cannot use the Internet except with permission of his supervisor.
Get the full story: jsonline.com.
From the NYT Bits blog | A class-action lawsuit filed in federal court in Los Angeles accuses online business review service Yelp! or extorting monthly payments from business owners in exchange for editing or removing bad reviews.
Get the full story: bits.blogs.nytimes.com
Tribune staff report | Shares in Chicago-based travel Web company Orbitz Worldwide Inc. dropped more than 17 percent in morning trading after the company reported it had swung to a loss in the fourth-quarter.
Orbitz lost losing $18 million, or 21 cents per share compared to a profit of $8 million, or 10 cents per share, in the same period a year ago.
The Wall Street Journal | U.S. investigators are focusing on a prominent Asian hacking group that is likely Chinese as the probable perpetrator of the recent attacks on Google. The group used sophisticated data-masking techniques to hack into the search giant’s computer systems. It is still unclear whether the hacking group has any connections to the Chinese government.
Get the full story: wsj.com.
