Many long-standing legal rules of engagement between publishers and consumers tilted the playing field in unexpected ways in the first quarter. The period also saw a major expansion in the amount and quality of original productions for web-based video platforms and a major move by chipmaker Intel to stake a claim in the digital living room. Read more »
The mobile platform wars escalated once again in the first quarter of 2012 as BlackBerry finally took the wraps off its much-anticipated new operating system. Meanwhile Android continued to build on its dominance both worldwide and in the U.S., cementing a two-horse race with Apple. Read more »
Cloud computing is finally starting to add value to business, as those in charge of cloud within enterprises are moving from talking to doing. That much was very evident in the first quarter of 2013. Read more »
These are the companies, startups and giants alike, that are changing or could potentially change the mobile landscape in the most profound ways. Read more »
While cloud, mobility, social, and analytics have been driving demand for IT products and services in 2012, the worldwide IT spending picture has become dimmer as the year has progressed: We’re looking at 5.1 percent worldwide IT spending growth in 2012. Read more at GigaOM Pro »
Already, workplaces are changing because of trends like BYOD and gamification. But other emerging technologies are also altering what our workspace looks like and how we collaborate. Read more at GigaOM Pro »
Twitter seems to be at a crossroads, and according to a recent GigaOM survey, its prospects for the next five years are promising. Key challenges in the near future will be establishing a revenue model and survive the backlash from developers. Read more at GigaOM Pro »
Data centers consume around 1.5 percent of total electricity demand, a figure that’s expected to increase significantly. To cut power and costs tech titans like Google, Apple, and Facebook are cutting electricity use by greening their data centers. But do energy-efficiency gains justify huge capital outlays? Read more at GigaOM Pro »
Smartphones can enable an amazing level of connectivity, but they can also allow that activity to be monitored and used in controversial ways. But for mobile marketing to realize its full potential, consumers may need to sacrifice their privacy to one degree or another. Read more at GigaOM Pro »
Despite its current decline, RIM is a different firm today than it was in 2007, with new management, a full awareness of its shaky position, an upcoming OS release and a number of lingering advantages that can still be leveraged. Here’s how it just might survive. Read more at GigaOM Pro »
With the growth of sensors and microelectronics, the potential uses of wearable-computing technologies now reach to health and fitness, gaming, fashion, disabilities and augmented reality. Most importantly, the widespread adoption of wearables will drive the form function and market for mobiles in vital ways. Read more at GigaOM Pro »
Tablets featured prominently in the connected consumer space, both as a product category and as a component of broader platform strategies by major OS providers Microsoft, Google and Apple. Meanwhile Facebook began laying the groundwork to add payment processing to its platform. Read more at GigaOM Pro »
Apple and Google still dominate the smartphone space, but look out for Microsoft, which finally has some muscle behind its mobile strategy. Meanwhile mobile-browser developers went head-to-head with native apps, and Facebook continued to buy mobile expertise via acquisition. Read more at GigaOM Pro »
Social TV is any application, website or software that allows viewers to interact with television programming and share that interaction with others. Startups in this space hope to combine ubiquitous second-screen technology with well-established audience behavior to drive new value around shows. Read more at GigaOM Pro »
Cloud-based storage and cross-device syncing of media content are two of the most competitive areas in consumer IT. Apple, Google and Amazon see cloud-based media services both as a way to increase attachment to their platforms and a means to extend and amplify their broader strategic goals. Read more at GigaOM Pro »
Overall, between 2012 and 2017, more than 900,000 light-duty PEVs will be sold in the United States. But there remain hefty inhibitors to mainstream plug-in electric vehicle (PEV) use, including limited vehicle driving range and large battery packs, not to mention steep prices. Read more at GigaOM Pro »
Communications-as-a-Service (CaaS) technology brings together business applications, the Internet and the world’s public-switched telephone network (PSTN) to provide businesses with new ways of enabling communication. Here’s how to leverage this new technology. Read more at GigaOM Pro »
Anecdotal evidence suggests over-the-top video is a booming trend. But it takes technical skill, state-of-the-art broadband connections and the willingness to shell out money for both bandwidth and content subscriptions to fully integrate OTT into a household, much less consider trying to use it to cord cut. Read more at GigaOM Pro »
Social virtual goods revenues will grow from $2.1 billion in 2010 to $4.1 billion in 2016. Leading this growth are disruptive factors such as mobile, regulatory changes and alternatives to the traditional OS. But the most important disruption vector will be increasing the universality of virtual currencies. Read more at GigaOM Pro »
The adoption of tablets, social media and new interfaces and the changing nature of the TV itself mean the digital living room will continue on its path of rapid change, thanks to new ways of creating, viewing, bundling, distributing and selling content. Read more at GigaOM Pro »
Changes in the power market are rippling through the Internet industry, altering both the location of data centers and their sources of power. There are many factors in picking a data center location beyond the geographic location, such as how to procure energy and green-energy models. Read more at GigaOM Pro »
In this busy new world of multiple social networks and recommendations tools, the discovery process itself is being disrupted by innovation and by the changing ways in which consumers now interact online. Read more at GigaOM Pro »
What’s behind Apple’s decision to require sandboxing in OS X apps? It is not a far stretch to consider that this shift in approach might have a connection to Apple’s long-term plans to make iCloud the center of their strategy for the next decade. Read more »
Granting permission to an iOS app to use your location data also gives the app the ability to copy your address book, according to a test conducted by the New York Times. Luckily no app has been caught doing it — at least not yet. Read more »
Apple has confirmed what had been rumored for weeks: that it will be hosting one of its signature product introduction events on March 7. The invitation shows what appears to be an iPad and reads: “We have something you really have to see. And touch.” Read more »
Every now and again, Apple reminds the mobile world that developing for iOS includes going through the harrowing and sometimes mystifying App Store review process. Evi, a voice-recognition search app, thought it was a goner for coming too close to Siri until Apple changed its mind. Read more »
An out-of-work truck driver from California made headlines on Friday when he turned the tables on AT&T, and stuck it to the phone giant in small claims court over his data plan… Read more »
The legal tennis match over smartphone patents is still dragging on, and it was Apple’s turn Monday to claim victory in a dispute in Germany. A court ruled that Motorola can’t enforce an injunction that would have banned the iPhone and iPad in Germany, although Apple still faces a problem involving a different Motorola patent. Read more »
As Dropbox launches a new photo upload capability to make it easier to move digital photos from smartphones to the cloud, the debate as to whether Dropbox itself is the next big disruptor or just a feature to be acquired or co-opted flares anew. Read more »
Although some believe the death of brick-and-mortar retail is inevitable, Mark Sigal, CPO of Unicorn Labs, thinks we all have a vested interest in seeing the industry reboot itself for the modern age. He outlines three paths for physical retail stores to avoid extinction here. Read more »
Rapid adoption of OS X Mountain Lion would clearly threaten Microsoft. But after digging into Apple’s new operating system, Edward Aten of Swift.fm thinks it poses a threat to another, less obvious, company — the current leader in the consumer cloud, Facebook. Read more »
The 30-pin dock connector featured on every iPhone and iPad ever sold by Apple, as well as a huge number of iPods, may be headed for history’s dustbin. Apple is reportedly considering a move to a smaller connector on the next iPhone. Read more »
Nielsen released a study that found just about a third of smartphone users turn to their device for shopping-related activities. But the study highlights that while not everyone is using their phone in this way, many more would like to. Read more »
If the speculation is true that Microsoft is prepping Office for the iPad, it’s worth asking where it will save documents. Would Office for iPad save docs to Apple’s iCloud? Or would it use some Microsoft technology like SkyDrive, Office365 or Sharepoint servers? Read more »
Viddy has apparently been pulled from the Apple App Store, not long after quickly rising up the ranks of free video and camera applications available for the iPhone. The removal was due to concerns over adult material that was being posted on the app. Read more »
Though the App Store is still ahead of rival Android Market in discovery features, Apple clearly sees a need to ramp up and improve the way it helps consumers pick through its growing collection of apps. That’s what’s behind the acquisition of app discovery engine Chomp. Read more »
After a patent dispute in Germany between Motorola and Apple, local users of iCloud and MobileMe have now had push email functions disabled. But don’t be surprised if the same problem wings its way across the Atlantic soon. Read more »
At its annual shareholder meeting today in Cupertino, Calif., Apple did not reveal much of anything new. While it was CEO Tim Cook’s first such meeting since taking over as CEO, the biggest news was what didn’t happen: there was no dividend for shareholders announced. Read more »
Apple doesn’t count iPads as laptops when they sell them, or when they account for them to shareholders. And we don’t use iPads the same way as PCs. So why are we throwing them in the same basket? Read more »
A Shanghai court has denied a request to keep Apple’s iPad out of the city’s stores. The request for a temporary injunction had come from Proview International Holdings, a monitor company in the midst of a trademark dispute over the iPad name with Apple in China. Read more »
