Hadoop is a great platform for storing and processing data, but it needs applications to make it truly valuable. At Structure:Data, Cloudera CEO Mike Olson discussed the dearth of pro analytics apps using Hadoop, and invited the startups building them to come to him for money. Read more »
Vectoring, a technology that eliminates crosstalk on a DSL line can boost speeds on existing copper to up to 100 Mbps. And apparently service providers are interested in testing it out, according to Telebyte, which launched the first gear capable of testing how vectored lines perform. Read more »
The idea of software defined networking enabled by the open-source OpenFlow protocol is under threat from corporations intent on using the OpenFlow name and the promise of software defined networking to lock buyers into their gear, according to a Big Switch Networks executive. Read more »
You should have come down for SXSW. I know it’s too big and it was cold. Sure it was overrun by startups pitching me-too apps and corporate brands, but it was also a celebration about what makes the web awesome, if you looked for it. Read more »
An open data standard for food has emerged on the web. This way restaurants, food apps, grocery stores, the government and other interested parties can tell that arugula is also rocket salad, no matter where on the web it occurs. Read more »
If there were an Olympics of pushing the broadband envelope, Verzon would consistently take the gold, because the carrier is always testing out new superfast broadband in its labs and in its test networks. Today’s speed record is 21.7 terabits per second in field trials. Read more »
I’ve seen a lot of things at South by Southwest, but no mobile payments. I haven’t seen a single person pay for something using their phone, nor a merchant who accepts it. No one is even talking about it. But there are plenty of demos. Read more »
Among the attendees of SXSW are a smattering of homeless people wearing T-shirts that proclaim “Human Hotspot,” and for a user donation one of them will stand next to you while you check your email or do whatever else you need with the connection. Outrage has ensued. Read more »
The files J. Edgar Hoover kept are nothing compared to the data collected by the Republican and Democratic campaigns in the coming 2012 elections. Thanks to tools such as Hadoop and Hive, campaigns can now predict how to target their campaigns. What’s next? Read more »
Smartphones have utterly captured SXSW, and while there are certainly tablets and laptops to be seen, the outlets are ruled by dying smartphones. Why? Batteries still have a long way to go, and the conference environment can be uniquely stressful for handsets. Read more »
Tech toys used to refer to fancy gadgets, but the phrase now describes actual toys. At SXSW I stumbled (quite literally) across Sphero, a ball that contains a gyroscope, an accelerometer, Bluetooth and an array of lights controlled by a smartphone or tablet. Read more »
To improve medicine, we need a big heaping dose of data. That’s the takeaway from a conversation with Aneesh Chopra, the former U.S. CTO, at SXSW in Austin on Friday. He discussed where startups interested in this space should focus on as well as privacy. Read more »
When building chips, designers have to trade energy efficiency for performance. But Cyclos can help designers boost clock speeds while shaving 10 to 30 percent off the power required by the chip. As mobile devices need more gigahertz, this will be a big deal. Read more »
It has become increasingly clear to corporations that their networks can’t handle the many devices that employees are bringing into their offices. And this iPad has more elements that could make it a hit in the enterprise, such as a higher-resolution screen for video. Read more »
Entrepreneurs who build a product for their own use are likely to build a successful company around it, according to a study out from the Kauffman Foundation. The survey found that such “user entrepreneurs” have created about half of startups that last five years or more. Read more »
Apple’s latest iPad has been revealed, and it has Retina display, a faster chip and all sorts of goodies, but for the network crowd only three letters mattered: LTE. And yes, the new iPad has LTE delivering up to 73 Mbps down. Wait — what? 73? Read more »
IBM’s Jeopardy-playing supercomputer Watson is now getting a gig in the retail banking sector as part of an IBM partnership with Citi. The many careers of Watson illustrate a very big technological and business opportunity — the rendering of big data into human scale. Read more »
We have Facebook. Daily deal sites. Racks of computers learning our preferences and countless apps to connect us. And yet, the pinnacle of advertising appears to be the 21st-century equivalent of the Tupperware party. That’s right, pitch your friends and get a discount. Read more »
The slow death of DSL will cause the rapid rise of expensive broadband if Verizon’s Fusion service is any indication. Verizon launched home-broadband powered by its wireless network — letting consumers trade unlimited slow broadband from a wire for faster, capped and more expensive service. Read more »
I’ve never been to the World Economic Forum in Davos, but Nick Paumgarten from the New Yorker has, and in the most recent issue he laid out his view of the world’s most famous executive conference. And you know what? It sounds a lot like SXSWi. Read more »
Nearly $2 million in funding. An ex-Cisco executive team. The promise of networking technology that could unite compute and networking under one configuration scheme. Cumulus Networks is a startup that has it all. It’s stealthy, but here’s what we know. Read more »
Pack up the robots, your Apple gear and the Red Bull because it’s almost time for South by Southwest in lovely Austin, Texas. Each year I’ve tried to showcase 10 hot startups in the city for visiting VCs, executives and job seekers. Here they are. Read more »
Alcatel-Lucent took home the Oscars of the infrastructure industry. Its LightRadio technology has won it customers. Plus, Alca-Lu also worked with Telefonica to light up the LTE network in Barcelona. So here’s what is sees as the keys to success for the telco industry. Read more »
Like some hideous policy monster that won’t go away, network neutrality will hit headlines again. Verizon and Metro PCS, the two operators that sued the FCC last year over its rules forbidding ISPs from discriminating against traffic on their networks, won a victory on Thursday. Read more »
The guys at the Lamp Post Group in Chattanooga, Tenn., have an embarrassment of riches when it comes to bandwidth. The city boasts the first real gigabit speeds in the U.S., but it doesn’t have another gigabit city nearby to talk to. Anyone want to help? Read more »
When it comes to capacity on the long haul cables under the sea or surrounding cities, there’s always a need for more bandwidth. Which is why Ciena’s announcement of a chip that can deliver 17.6 terabits per second over existing fiber cables is so amazing. Read more »
Now that AMD has confirmed its purchase of low-power server maker SeaMicro, I bet its next move will be an announcement around licensing the ARM architecture. That’s right: AMD will do a deal with the company that provides the architecture for chips inside your cell phone. Read more »
GigaOM has learned that AMD is planning to announce its acquisition of low-power server maker SeaMicro according to industry sources. This would be a huge move for AMD, which has to double down in the server market since it has failed in the mobile market. Read more »
At MWC executives of two prominent operators said the industry has significant challenges in the form of over the top providers commoditizing their revenue streams without those companies putting any significant investment of their own into the network. Here’s what operators should do. Read more »
When is a gigabit not a gigabit? Perhaps when it’s Google’s gigabit network? Speaking today at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Google’s Chairman Eric Schmidt said that the company’s planned fiber to the home network will deliver sustained speeds of between 300 to 500 Mbps. Read more »
Time Warner Cable is implementing a new pricing plan in certain areas of Texas. It gives customers a break on their broadband bill if they agree to a limited plan. This is nice, because it lowers the cost of broadband, but it’s also a lousy deal. Read more »
Akamai’s latest product lets operators take over their own content delivery network, using Akamai’s software but not its boxes. This is a huge change in Akamai’s business. The shift and the reasons for it offer clues about the evolution and domestication of the web. Read more »
In Barcelona, telecom vendors, carriers and other companies are showing off devices, boxes and new industry standards. But amid the latest phones is a burgeoning class of services that show that participants understand how the connected world will play out and how they will profit from it. Read more »
AT&T doesn’t give up on trying to monetize its pipes, and thanks to a lack of network neutrality on wireless networks, limited data plans, and a hunger for bandwidth-consuming mobile apps, it may have found a way to charge developers to use its pipes. Read more »
Big data today, is what the web was in 1993. We knew the web was something and that it might get big, but few of us really understood what “big” meant. Today, I believe we aren’t even scratching the surface of the big data opportunity. Read more »
Cisco hit the skids 18 months ago which led to a restructuring that was completed in record time. Now Cisco is ready to roll again, and to celebrate, CEO John Chambers discussed the company’s future. Here are 3 key takeaways. Read more »
Cisco said it would buy Lightwire, a company that makes optics chips using traditional chip manufacturing in a deal valued at $271 million. This is a significant acquisition for Cisco because it stays true to its core networking business and advances it with deep technology. Read more »
Cisco, the networking company that many felt would be a great acquirer of Skype had looked at the VoIP and video company and declined because it couldn’t see a way to do a deal without upsetting its service provider customers, according to Cisco CEO John Chambers. Read more »
Several companies and nonprofit organizations filed their opposition to Verizon’s planned $4 billion buy of spectrum owned by the cable companies on Wednesday. But this isn’t an industry fight. This is a fight that should involve everyone from consumers to Internet companies. Read more »
Last week IBM launched the first third party virtual switching platform for VMware environments. This is an important development because as the first tier of network switching moves into the server, the virtual switch becomes extremely strategic real-estate and control point for emerging SDN architectures. Read more »
