• Gavin O'Malley, Apr 27, 2010, 9:26 AM
  • Google Quiet On FCC Broadband Authority Washington Post Google will refrain from debating how the Federal Communications Commission should ensure its ability to regulate broadband services, reports The Washington Post. In a blog post Monday, media counsel Rick Whitt explained that Google is more concerned about net-neutrality policies at the FCC than questions over the agency's legal maneuvering to ensure its authority over broadband.

    "That authority was cast into doubt after a federal appeals court sided with Comcast, saying the FCC overreached when it sanctioned the cable giant for net-neutrality violations," writes WaPo. "To us, this has never been about regulatory rigidity but about protecting consumers and keeping the Internet open for innovators," Whitt said in the blog post. "So while we're not wed to any particular legal theory to justify the FCC's jurisdiction, we do believe some minimal oversight over broadband networks is essential." Whitt added that the FCC has "ample legal authority," while Google "supports whatever jurisdictional fix is 'most sustainable legally.' Read the whole story...
  • Latest Google Acquisition Jab At Apple? TheMarker, Reuters et al. Another day, another -- you guessed it -- Google acquisition. Google has picked up widget maker LabPixies for $25 million, according to Israeli financial news website TheMarker.

    LabPixies, which develops gadgets ranging from calendars, news feeds and to-do lists to entertainment and games, was one of the first developers of personalized Web gadgets for Google's iGoogle and Android software applications, as well as for the iPhone.

    "The deal is Google's first acquisition of an Israeli start-up," according to Reuters.

    "Google loves to build platforms on which programs run -- Android, App Engine, iGoogle, and in the biggest picture, the Web itself," writes CNet's Deep Tech blog. "But platforms are of no use, and aren't much fun, without applications on top, so Google often also kick-starts development with applications of its own."

    "Over the years, we worked closely together on a variety of projects, including the launch of a number of global OpenSocial based gadgets," iGoogle team member Don Loeb said in the blog post regarding LabPixies. "Recently, we decided that we could do more if we were part of the same team."

    After joining the Google team, Mashable notes that LabPixies will help expand iGoogle across Europe, the Middle East, and Africa. "As far as LabPixies' current products go, there are no planned changes to them, but the folks at LabPixies say they 'will continue to evaluate this over time.'"

    Though a bit player, the fact that LabPixies develops personalized Web gadgets for the iPhone won't be lost on some analysts who've speculated that Google buys companies just to annoy Apple.

    Just last week, for instance, Google acquired chip maker Agnilux, which was founded by some ex-Apple engineers who helped create the company's A4 chip, i.e., iPad's processing engine.

    Read the whole story...
  • Can Foursquare Give Journal A Boost? GigaOm On the heels of The Wall Street Journal's partnership with Foursquare, GigaOm asks if the location-based social network can give The Journal the local boost it's looking for. "It seems like an interesting extension of the Journal's core mandate to deliver news and information, but the important question is whether it will help the paper in any tangible way," the blog writes.

    This isn't the first partnership Foursquare has formed with a news outlet. Earlier this year, it signed a deal with Metro News International to provide news items related to local venues in Toronto, and more recently it did a deal with the Financial Times to offer points to students who check in at specific locations -- Harvard, the London School of Economics, etc. -- which can later be redeemed for access to articles behind the paper's paywall. "The Journal's experiment with Foursquare is worth applauding, if only because there is so little experimentation coming from some traditional media outlets ... But it's still an open question as to whether it will have tangible results for the WSJ." Read the whole story...
  • Mail.com Nabs Boy Genius Blog MediaMemo Mail.com just acquired respected mobile new bogs Boy Genius Report, which was founded by one Jonathan Geller. Geller's three-and-a-half year-old site reportedly averages around a million visitors per month. Terms of the deal weren't disclosed, but Geller tells Media Memo it was worth "multiple millions."

    To date, Mail.com owner Jay Penske has demonstrated a proclivity for media mavericks, having already brought Hollywood power blogger Nikki Finke and celebrity editrix Bonnie Fuller into his company's fold. "I assume the terms include an upfront payment, equity in Penske's company and payouts triggered by traffic and/or revenue goals, so there's likely a good deal of wiggle room in the deal," suggests Media Memo's Peter Kafka. "In any case, it's a nice bit of validation for a 23-year-old who never made it to college ... Geller dropped out of Greenwich High School in Greenwich, Conn., presumably because he was too busy contributing posts to tech kingpin Engadget." Geller launched Boy Genius in October 2006. Read the whole story...
  • Data Breaches Hit Hundreds Of Millions Techdirt Since 2005, there have been a least 358.4 million digital data breaches that resulted in the loss of U.S. consumers' personal information, according to new research from The Privacy Rights Clearinghouse. Keep in mind that 358.4 million is just a minimum, since there are plenty of leaks that have lost an unknown number of records (like the one from a closed-down Hollywood Video store in Nevada, where customer records were thrown in a dumpster then scattered by the wind)," notes Tech Dirt.

    So why don't we hear as much about record-breaking data breaches these days. "That's not because they've stopped," says the blog. "It's just that they happen so often, they're really not all that newsworthy any more ... A lot of lip service gets paid to clamping down on fraud, but it really doesn't seem like much goes on to stop data leaks, since the penalties for the leaks are toothless and are cheaper than any real prevention." Read the whole story...
  • Spotify Takes On iTunes From Afar The Financial Times (UK) Spotify, the U.S. bound digital music service, is making what The Financial Times (UK) calls "an ambitious challenge to Apple's iTunes" with an important upgrade to its technology. Since launching in 2008, Spotify's application has been used by more than 7 million people across Europe to access its online music library. New features will now allow Spotify to "absorb" a user's existing digital music collection within the same interface, and synchronize it with mobile devices running its app, reports The Times.

    The new software will allow Spotify users to dispense completely with iTunes for the first time. Still, larger and better funded companies (Microsoft, Napster) have failed to challenge iTunes. Meanwhile, plans to launch in the U.S. this year have been held up, partly because of some music companies' concerns that too few Spotify users were upgrading to its premium service. Read the whole story...