The iPhone may have passed over Android in the fourth quarter in total U.S. smartphone sales, but Google’s platform still has one key advantage: it’s attracting more mobile data newbies. New research from the NPD Group shows that 57 percent of first-time smartphone buyers last quarter chose Android handsets, while only 34 percent of new buyers purchased an iPhone.
Canadian bookselling chain Indigo Books & Music is joining Barnes & Noble and Books-A-Million in their refusal to carry any Amazon Publishing titles in their stores. But what does this boycott really mean?
It’s not clear how long these will last, or what effect (if any) they will have on Amazon’s decision-making. While Barnes & Noble’s statement did not mention e-books, the company has said in the past that it will only carry Amazon Publishing titles in its stores if it can also sell them as e-books. Books-A-Million and Indigo also did not specify whether they would end their boycotts if they were allowed to sell e-books published by Amazon, but both have minimal e-book businesses. Indigo sold its e-reader business, Kobo, to Japanese e-commerce company Rakuten last November, and at the time Indigo CEO Heather Reisman suggested the chain is moving into a “third chapter,” away from an emphasis on books and toward “products consistent with the lifestyle of our customers.”
When you read the headlines of how ubiquitous smartphones are becoming, and how in some countries the mobile device is overtaking the PC in terms of internet access, you would think that mobile internet usage would directly follow from these facts. In reality, it seems that it still lagging behind: according to StatCounter, only 8.5 percent of internet visits came from mobile devices in 2011. StatCounter’s figure, which does not include tablet usage, is still nearly double the mobile figure from 2010, when mobile devices accounted for 4.3 percent of internet usage. In 2009, mobiles accounted for only 1.6 percent of visits. It also comes as internet access via desktop PCs appears to be on the wane.
President Barack Obama announced his intent to nominate Bill Baer to be Assistant Attorney General for the Antitrust Division, Department of Justice.
Baer is the chair of the Antitrust Practice Group at Arnold and Porter LLP. He joined Arnold and Porter in 1980, becoming a partner at the firm in 1983. In his practice, Mr. Baer represents a broad range of companies in U.S. and international cartel investigations, mergers and acquisition reviews, and in antitrust litigation. From 1995 to 1999, he served as the Director for the Bureau of Competition at the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). Mr. Baer began his legal career in 1975 as a trial attorney for the Bureau of Consumer Protection at the FTC. Mr. Baer holds a B.A. from Lawrence University and a J.D. from Stanford Law School.
We all know that people are using Facebook every day for keeping up with their friends -- sharing pictures, statuses, and little finds from across the Internet. But it turns out that for the most hardcore Facebook users, the platform is more than social -- it's political.
According to a new report from Pew, the Facebook users who have the most friends, were tagged in the most photos, and received the most wall posts, were more likely than average users to attend political rallies and meetings offline. Additionally, those who used Facebook's "groups" feature were also more likely to try to convince other Facebook friends to vote for certain candidates. (In general Facebook users were more likely than average Americans to vote in an election.)
[Commentary] If Minnesotans flip on their TVs right now, they're likely to see at least one -- a political ad slinging mud at a presidential candidate. As the statewide caucuses approach, they're more likely to see many more.
Viewers in Florida reported seeing as many as 12 political ads an hour in the run-up to that state's Jan. 31 primary. The campaigns and super PACs that bought these ads have now turned their attention from Florida -- where they spent tens of millions of dollars on local media buys -- to Minnesota. These attack ads by their very nature are negative. But they can also be misleading. FactCheck.org, which tracks accuracy in political messaging, found that the "avalanche of negativity" in recent Florida ads also contained a fair share of distortions and outright lies. The problem is that viewers are not receiving enough of the antidote: the kind of hard-hitting reporting and election coverage that would help Minnesotans separate political fact from fiction before they attend caucuses.
The Federal Communications Commission has asked broadcasters to consider making the political advertising information in their "public files" available online. That's a start. By doing this, broadcasters can help viewers understand the powerful financial interests that dominate the political landscape in 2012. But voters would also benefit from more television news stories on election-year issues and campaigns. By investing some of their election-year profits in comprehensive coverage, stations can return to the community the information many need to better engage with democracy.
Interest groups representing TV and radio stations that benefit financially from political ads have also contributed millions to the campaigns of members of Congress. MapLight has conducted an analysis of campaign contributions to members of Congress by interest groups representing Commercial TV & radio stations.
Twitter connected last night on its hashtag Hail Mary. The social service set a new record for gameday activity during Super Bowl XLVI--12,233 tweets per second at the end of the game. The second highest rate came during Madonna's Caligula-inspired halftime extravaganza: 10,245. Compare that with past spikes. The Bin Laden raid topped out at 5,106 tweets per second and held steady at 4,000 sustained tweets.
Google reports that around 41% of searches related to Super Bowl ads that were made during the game came from mobile devices, up from 25% for the same time the day prior. Overall, the top trending searches on Google during the game were:
Every year in late January or early February, two teams take to the field to play a football game that's watched by tens of millions of Americans. And every year, businesses launch ad campaigns to sell a variety of products—televisions, pizzas, soda—in conjunction with the game. And the overwhelming majority of these businesses avoid calling it the "Super Bowl." Why? They're afraid of getting sued by the National Football League, which holds the trademark for the term and polices it aggressively. The NFL takes the position that no one is allowed to use the phrase "Super Bowl" in an advertisement without writing the NFL a big check first. Every year, the league sends cease-and-desist letters to businesses that stray too close to the line.
Madonna may have made it through her Super Bowl halftime show with no wardrobe malfunctions. But one of her fellow performers still managed to sneak in a gesture that may not please the Federal Communications Commission.
As confirmed by a screengrab that circulated on Twitter, M.I.A. — who joined Madonna and Nicki Minaj for the track “Give Me All Your Luvin’ ” — raised her middle finger toward the camera during her performance. M.I.A.’s simultaneous use of the s-word appeared to have been bleeped out; moments after the incident, the screen went black a beat longer than usual for a television transition, especially in so orchestrated a show. NBC and the NFL issued apologies for the incident, with an NBC spokesman characterizing the finger-flipping episode as “a spontaneous gesture that our delay system caught late.”
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