Texas Authority probes Google Search Engine Results Ranking

The Texas attorney general has opened an antitrust investigation into how Google ranks search results, the first United States case to strike at the heart of the company’s main search business.

The issue at hand — referred to as search neutrality — is whether Google manipulates results to thwart competitors and advance its own businesses. Some companies worry that Google has the power to discriminate against them by lowering their listings in search results or charging higher fees for their paid search ads.

“This whole issue of how Google treats these vertical competitors, that’s a big issue now,” said Gary L. Reback, a lawyer at Carr & Ferrell in Palo Alto, Calif., who has advised small companies that have brought antitrust cases against Google.

Google announced the inquiry by the Texas attorney general, Greg Abbott, on Friday after Search Engine Land, an industry blog, reported on it. Lauri Saathoff, a spokeswoman for Mr. Abbott, confirmed the existence of the investigation but declined to give more information because the review was not complete.

Don Harrison, Google’s deputy general counsel, wrote in a company blog post that Google’s responsibility is to its users, not to Web sites, and that the company’s priority was to “provide the most useful, relevant search results and ads for users.”

“Given that not every Web site can be at the top of the results, or even appear on the first page of our results, it’s unsurprising that some less relevant, lower-quality Web sites will be unhappy with their ranking,” Mr. Harrison wrote.

In his post, he said the Texas attorney general asked the company for information about a number of companies. It listed three — Foundem, a British shopping comparison site; SourceTool, a business search directory; and myTriggers, which collects shopping links.

Foundem is involved in the European Commission’s antitrust investigation of Google. The other two sites have each brought private suits against Google; a federal judge dismissed SourceTool’s suit this year.

In the blog post, Mr. Harrison also suggested the three companies were connected to Microsoft. He pointed out that Foundem belonged to the Initiative for a Competitive Online Marketplace, a European group co-founded by Microsoft, and that SourceTool and myTriggers were clients of Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft, the law firm that represented Microsoft on antitrust issues.

Industry analysts expect Google to continue to attract broader and deeper antitrust scrutiny as it dominates the Web search business and expands into new areas.

“We’ve got an investigation in Europe, and now we’ve got an investigation by one of our biggest state enforcement agencies,” Mr. Reback said. “The next question is, why isn’t the Department of Justice investigating this?”

There may be other companies involved in the Texas investigation, and the Department of Justice is looking at issues of search fairness related to Google’s acquisition of ITA, the flight information company. The company has also faced antitrust inquiries over advertising deals.

Google was contacted by the Texas attorney general in August, said Adam Kovacevich, a Google spokesman on policy issues. (source: The New York Times)

Google's VoIP is a Challenge to Skype

Google unveiled a new VOIP service on Wednesday that integrates directly into Gmail. The feature is quite simple and allows users to place free calls to phones in the United States and Canada. For now, few folks have been able to fully test out the service, so there's no telling if there are any bugs that could cause some users to switch to an alternative. But at first glance, with some basic use, placing calls in Gmail provides a robust experience.

Going forward, Gmail's new phone service is undoubtedly taking aim at Skype, the leader in the VOIP market. And although some might say that Gmail won't be able to match Skype just yet, some see it a different way. Phone calling on Gmail might not be perfect right now, but it effectively puts Skype on notice that Google is ready to steal market share. Take a look at the ways Gmail's VOIP service poses a huge challenge to Skype's Internet phone service.

1. It's readily available

One of the issues facing Skype now that Gmail has VOIP is that it's no longer the only readily available solution on the market. Every Gmail user now has the ability to place calls by clicking one option and dialing. They don't need to open a special program or wait for a service to load after downloading the plug-in. They need only to click the phone option and call someone. That convenience could hurt Skype.

2. It's coming to more places

Google Voice is quickly making its way to more and more platforms. Having it available on the Google Voice page and on Gmail is one thing, but now that users can place calls on the iPhone, BlackBerry and Android-based devices, it doesn't bode well for Skype. Admittedly, the VOIP company does have several mobile options available to customers as well, but Google has far more clout among users. And the more places its service is available, the worse it is for Skype.

3. Google Voice offers more options

Google Voice delivers far more options to users than Skype. At first glance, it might just be a service that allows folks to place calls, but it can also provide voicemail-transcription service, free text messages and the ability to work on several phones with a single number. Gmail phone integration isn't that advanced, but if it gets users thinking about Google Voice, the search giant will already find itself in the lead.

4. Free calling in key areas

One issue with the phone-calling service in Gmail is that it doesn't provide all the international-calling options that Skype boasts. But the vast majority of users will likely only want to place calls around the United States and Canada anyway. It might not be ideal, but right now, Google is delivering a viable experience with its U.S. and Canada support for the vast majority of its customers. Those who want to chat overseas will move to Skype.

Verizon offers Droid X to counter iPhone 4

Google and US cellco Verizon Wireless has unveiled their challenger to Apple’s iPhone 4 – the Android-powered Droid X smartphone, made by Motorola.

The Droid X – which features a 4.3-inch display and can run Flash software - will cost $199.99 on a two-year contract and will be released by Verizon in the US on July 15, WSJ reports.

That’s one day after rival AT&T is due to ship pre-ordered iPhone 4 devices.

AT&T and Apple opened pre-orders for the newest iPhone last week, selling more than 600,000 iPhone 4’s by the end of the day.

Andy Rubin, vice president engineering for Android developer Google, countered by saying that 160,000 Android-powered devices are activated in some 49 countries daily.

“That’s nearly two devices every second,” Rubin said on the Google blog. “In some instances, Android devices are selling faster than they can be manufactured,” he wrote.

Rubin announced that Google is now open-sourcing its new 2.2 version of Android, called Froyo, to smartphone vendors. (Nicole McCormick - telecomasia.net)

“Customers will enjoy great new features and improved browser performance,” Rubin said on Froyo.

He said developers will benefit from new tools such as Android cloud-to-device messaging.

Fedora 13 New Enhancements

Red Hat's Fedora 13 open-source software can serve in a full gamut of Linux roles, as long as users are prepared to upgrade their systems about once a year.

Since its first version, in 2003, Red Hat's Fedora Linux has been the best place to track what's on the leading edge of Linux and open-source software. Of course, the trouble with running on the leading edge is that it's easy to get cut, and the Fedora distribution's fast development pace has required a certain amount of bug-squashing tolerance from its users.

Fedora 13, which began shipping in late May, boasts many of the leading-edge enhancements—and few of the rough spots—that I've come to expect from the popular Linux-based operating system. In particular, I appreciated the work the Fedora team has done in the area of security and permissions, with progress toward more granular rights management through Fedora's PolicyKit framework, and an implementation of the SELinux (Security-Enhanced Linux) framework that remained, for the most part, tucked away unobtrusively in the background.

In addition to serving as a sort of first look at the latest and greatest in Linux and open-source software in general—and future Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) releases in particular—Fedora 13 can serve in a full gamut of Linux roles, as long as Fedora-embracing users are prepared to upgrade their systems about once a year.

For this reason, smoother edges notwithstanding, enterprises in search of a more long-lived Linux distribution for production roles would do best to turn to RHEL, or, for organizations prepared to provide their own support, the freely available RHEL clone CentOS.

The fast-moving nature of Fedora 13 fits best with desktop and developer workstation roles, where users are most likely to appreciate the up-to-date versions of the desktop-oriented open-source software that ships with the distribution, including Version 2.30 of the GNOME desktop environment, Version 3.2 of the OpenOffice.org productivity suite and Version 3.6.3 of the Firefox Web browser.

Resource Library:

Fedora 13 is available as a free download from http://fedoraproject.org/get-fedora, with separate versions that support the x86 and x86-64 platforms. Beginning with Fedora 13, the Power PC CPU architecture has been reduced to secondary architecture status, where its ongoing development will depend on volunteer efforts.

Fedora 13 in the Lab

I tested the x86-64 version of Fedora 13 on a Lenovo ThinkPad T60 and on virtual machines running under Fedora 13's implementation of the Linux KVM (Kernel-based Virtual Machine) virtualization host.

The x86 and x86-64 versions are available as DVD or CD images that comprise the entire distribution, as well as in Live CD and Live USB images that may be used to try out Fedora without modifying your hard drive. With the Live USB images, it's possible to save data from the live sessions on USB sticks, which makes them more convenient to use than the CD images.

Fedora 13 ships with a new, optional user management utility, called AccountsDialog, which will eventually replace Red Hat's system-config-users tool. The new tool puts a graphical face on some of the work that Red Hat has been doing to whittle away at the all-powerful superuser account in favor of more granularly parcelled permissions. For instance, where the existing utility runs as the root user from the get-go, the new tool launches without requiring administrator rights and asks for rights elevation as needed.

Red Hat has been moving in this direction over its past few releases, removing the requirement for administrative applications to run entirely with superuser rights, and tapping the PolicyKit framework to handle the permission-granting. What caught my eye in the new user tool is the option to configure users as Standard, Administrator or Supervised, with the unfamiliar-looking Supervised bucket as the default.

While the primary user account I'd created remained in the Supervised bucket, applications that supported the PolicyKit framework would ask for my system's root password when they required rights elevation. When I shifted my account to the Administrator class, the system asked instead for my account password. This change in permissions management sets the stage to give certain administrative rights to certain users, thereby allowing for finer-grained control over the system.

The move toward embracing PolicyKit within Fedora is still going on, and many tools still require root permissions. I used a command line utility, pkexec, to elevate my permissions to run some of these applications, but this tool does not work with graphical applications. For more information on the changes involving the user management tool and PolicyKit, see this mailing list thread: tinyurl.com/23d8xxq.

Elsewhere in the release, I was pleased to find that Red Hat's handy network management framework, cleverly known as NetworkManager, has picked up a command line interface to go along with the graphical tools to which it's been limited so far. The new utility, called cnetworkmanager, should be a welcome sight for those who work with headless Fedora servers and would like to use the same network configuration tool they've become accustomed to on GUI-based systems.

Another cool Fedora 13 feature that caught my eye was BFO, a Fedora take on the BKO (boot.kernel.org) project that enables administrators to boot a machine from a very small disc image and run or install Fedora from the network. I installed one of my test VMs using a svelte 626KB BFO image and found the process more streamlined than with previous Fedora network installation attempts. I recommend editing the boot command from the GRUB (Grand Unified Bootloader) screen to point to a nearby mirror of Fedora. I typically opt for the kernel.org mirror here in San Francisco.

I mentioned at the top of this review that my tests using Fedora 13 were nearly free of SELinux issues: The mandatory access control framework, which comes enabled on Fedora, typically gives me some trouble during tests. This time around, all was smooth until I hit Bug 566332 while connecting to my BlackBerry 8330 phone via Bluetooth. On the bright side, this snag gave me the opportunity to see Fedora's new SELinux trobuleshooter panel icon, which is modeled after an automobile's check engine light. (source: Jason Brooks - eweeks.com)

Kindle and Nook eBook Device Price cut as a result of iPad Success

The extraordinary success of the iPad has forced specialist ebook readers Kindle and Nook to cut their prices.

Barnes & Noble, the producer of the Nook, yesterday offered the 3G version of the device at $189, $70 off its previous price, and unveiled a Wi-Fi only reader for $149.

Rival Amazon responded hours later by also knocking $70 off the price of the Kindle to $189.

Other makers of e-readers, like Sony Electronics, may also have to cut their prices, a Standard & Poors analyst told Reuters.

However, by playing both the software and hardware sides of the street, Amazon’s Kindle, the original e-book reader, looks the strongest-placed in the market.

As with Barnes & Noble, Amazon’s e-readers sales are just a tiny fragment of its total business. But it has also created a Kindle e-reader app for the iPad, the iPhone and Android platforms, which is driving sales from its digital bookstore.

GigaOm’s Om Malik blogged: “Unlike Amazon’s Kindle store, iBooks is going to be limited to the iPad/iPhone platform — which is not good enough for me. I like the flexibility of the Kindle app, even if it offers books to me in somewhat of a less attractive format. In other words, Amazon should be thinking about Kindle as a platform that leverages other people’s hardware.”

Apple has sold more than 2 million iPads since the lightweight multimedia tablet was launched in early April. It is expected to go on sale in Hong Kong and Singapore next month.
(source: David Clark - telecomasia.net)

Aircel India considers TD-LTE for 2.3GHz Band

Aircel considers TD-LTE for 2.3GHz

(Nicole McCormick telecomasia.net)

Indian GSM cellco Aircel could launch TD-LTE in the eight circles where it recently won 2.3GHz spectrum, according to the firm’s strategy and emerging business chief, Bharat Bhargava.

“We have multiple options at this stage,” Bhargava told telecomasia.net.

“We could deploy 802.16e, or wait and deploy TD-LTE, or rollout both [technologies].

“We could use some spectrum for Wimax, and the balance for TD-LTE when terminals become available.”

Maxis-controlled Aircel – India’s seventh largest cellco – won 2.3GHz spectrum in eight regions for 34.38 billion rupees ($749.3 million) earlier this month.

It now has both 2.3GHz spectrum and 2100MHz spectrum in eight circles, including Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu, with 3G-only spectrum in a further five markets.

“We wanted 2.3GHz spectrum and 3G spectrum in the same areas….to ensure we don’t run out of spectrum in those regions since we only have 5MHz of spectrum [per circle] for 3G,” said Bhargava.

Nokia provides Skype App via Ovi Store

Nokia is the latest company to promote the availability of Skype voice over IP services, announcing on its blog March 3 that the application can now be downloaded free from its Ovi Store and is compatible with the latest version of Symbian.

The application enables users to make free Skype-to-Skype calls, receive calls to an existing Skype number, send and receive instant messages, as well as files, and to see when other Skype users are online. Nokia said it will work over WiFi or a mobile data connection.

With Skype for Nokia smartphones, more than 200 million smartphone users worldwide will be able to take the Skype features they love with them on the move,” said Russ Shaw, Skype general manager of mobile, said in a statement.

“Making Skype available direct to consumers will help millions of users to keep in contact with the people that are important to them without worrying about the cost, distance, or whether they are away from a computer,” Shaw continued.

On Feb. 17, Verizon Wireless announced that in March it would make a Skype app available to customers with data plans and handsets running the BlackBerry or Android operating systems. Verizon additionally announced that the VOIP service would be allowed to run over its 3G network, in addition to WiFi.

A Skype app for the Apple iPhone is also in the works and can be expected, Skype announced on its site in earle February, “soon.”

The iPhone app, which would also have the option of running on AT&T’s 3G network, is so far delayed, Skype said, until it can get it just right — offering “CD-quality sound,” as well as tools such as a call-quality indicator, to offer feedback and allow users know exactly what’s going on with their calls.

Nokia believes that the Skype offering will drive new traffic to the Ovi Store, which it launched in May as its answer to the Apple App Store. Called a “smart store,” Ovi learns users’ preferences as they shop, and can show them inventory based on their location — or even what their friends bought.

“We’re seeing around 1.5 million downloads a day through Ovi Store now and believe that the Skype client for Nokia smartphones increases the amount of downloads further,” said Jo Harlow, Nokia’s SVP for smartphones.

The Skype application is currently available on handsets including the Nokia N97 and Nokia 6210 Navigator. A complete list of compatible models is available at the Nokia blog.

On March 2, Nokia introduced the C5, a smartphone on a feature phone budget, and new naming guidelines, to help us mere mortals translate the letter and number combinations in its devices’ names. Going forward, it will offer Cseries, Xseries, Eseries and Nseries handsets, each with a number between one and nine, with nine denoting the most advanced capabilities.