Sunday, January 9, 2011

Seven Technologies That Will Rock 2011 (prediction, news, tech, update, Auckland)

Article by Erick Schonfeld, TechCrunch.com

So here we are in a new decade, and the technologies that are now available to us continue to engage (and enthrall) in fascinating ways. The rise and collision of several trends—social, mobile, touch computing, geo, cloud—keep spitting out new products and technologies which keep propelling us forward. Below I highlight seven technologies that are ready to tip into the mainstream 2011.

Before I get into my predictions, let's see how I did last year, when I wrote "Ten Technologies That Will Rock 2010." Some of my picks were spot on: the Tablet (hello, iPad), Geo (Foursquare, Gowalla, Facebook Places, mobile location-aware search, etc.), Realtime Search (it became an option on Google) and Android (now even bigger than the iPhone). Some are still playing out: HTML5 (it's made great strides, but isn't quite here yet), Augmented Reality (lots of cool apps have AR functionality, but for the most part it is still a parlor trick), Mobile Video (FaceTime and streaming video apps pushed it forward), Mobile Transactions (Square and other transaction processing options came onto the scene), and Social CRM (Salesforce pushed Chatter, and tons of social CRM startups pushed their wares, but enterprises are always slow to adopt). And one got pushed to 2011: Chrome OS (we are still waiting).

What's in store for 2011? Some of these themes will continue to evolve, and some new ones will gain currency. Here are seven technologies poised to rock the new year:

Web Video On Your TV: We've already seen many attempts to turn the Internet into a video-delivery pipe to rival cable TV: Google TV, Apple TV, the Boxee Box, Roku, and a slew of "Internet-enabled" TVs.  None of them are quite yet cable killers, but they are seeding the market with simple ways to bring Internet video to your large-screen TV in the living room. The more cable-quality video that becomes available over the Web via streaming services such as Netflix, Vudu, or iTunes, the more that people will turn to Web when they are looking for something to watch. This trend is not about surfing the Web on your TV. Nobody wants to do that. It is about using the Internet as an alternative way to deliver movies and TV shows to your flat-screen TV. Even the cable companies will dip their toes into the Internet delivery waters (or plunge deeper if they already have their toes wet). What looks like a pale competitor to cable today will be a lot more viable in a short, twelve months.
Quora Will Have Its Twitter Moment: Social Q&A site Quora may be the current darling of Silicon Valley, but not a lot of people beyond the insular tech startup world actually use it yet. That will start to change in 2011, which I believe will be the year Quora has its Twitter moment and start to really take off. Quora represents a bigger technology trend, which is the layering of an interest graph on top of people's social graph. On Quora, you can follow not only people, but topics and questions. It defines the world by your interests, not just the people you may know or admire. This is a powerful concept and is not limited to Quora (both Twitter and Facebook also want to own the interest graph), but Quora is designed from the ground up to expose and help you explore your interests. It is addictive, and as it reaches a critical mass of early users, this will be the year it emerges from its shell much like Twitter did in 2007.
Mobile Social Photo Apps:The end of 2010 witnessed a spate of mobile photo apps including Instagram, PicPlz and Path. They all take advantage of several massive key trends: the growth of iPhone and Android, the ubiquity of decent cell phone cameras, GPS, and existing social networks like Facebook, Twitter, and Foursquare. Each of these apps is built for mobile first. They let you take a picture, mark your location, and share it with your social network (sometimes public, sometimes private). With Instagram and PicPLz, you can choose a filter to make humdrum pics look more exciting or capture a mood. By building on top of existing social networks like Twitter and Foursquare, they are making popular new ways to use those services. Instead of simply checking in, now you can do a photo checkin (even Foursquare lets you do that now). Already Instagram is one of the most popular photo apps in iTunes. Sharing photos is pretty much a universal impulse, and these apps make it easier and more fun.
Mobile Wallets: If you could use your cell phone as a credit card, would you? Everyone from Apple and Google to Nokia want to make that a reality and tap into the mobile payments market. Both Apple and Google are exploring this opportunity. Google bought mobile payments startup Zetawire to gain experience and the latest Android phone, the Nexus S, comes with an NFC chip—the same kind that is embedded into credit cards and lets you pay by waving it over a wireless reader. The iPhone 5 also may come equipped with an NFC chip, and Apple was sniffing around mobile payments startup BOKU last year for a possible acquisition. It is going to take more than just NFC chips in every phone to make mobile payments a reality, but efforts by the major players this year should begin to move the needle.
Context-Aware Apps: Whether it's search, mobile, or social apps and services, the most useful apps people will keep coming back to are the ones which help people cut through the increasing clutter of the Internet. Apps that are aware of the context in which they are being used will serve up better filtered information. When you search on your mobile phone, that means you get local results and local offers served up first. If you are on a service like Quora that understands your interest graph, it means that you are only shown topics that you care about, sorted in realtime. If you are on a news site, you will see the most shared links from people in you follow on Twitter or are connected to on Facebook. Music and movie services will similarly surface social recommendations. In a world of information overload, context is king.
Open Places Database: Every mobile app, it seems, taps into the geo capabilities of phones to pinpoint your exact location and show you what is around you. (Incidentally, that is another example of a context-aware app). But there is a lot of duplication going on, with everyone from Google to Facebook to Foursquare creating their own database of places. It would make much more sense if there was an open places database that any company could both pull from and contribute to. While we are not there yet, we are making progress towards a more open places database, or at least a federated one. Factual is providing some of the data for Facebook Places and creating a places database is a major focus for the company; MapQuest (owned by AOL, as is TechCrunch) is adopting OpenStreetMaps (which could very well become the central places database with more resources and development); and Foursquare lets other apps pull from its places database through its API. There are economic reasons why some companies don't want to participate (controlling the places database makes it easier to serve up local offers), but expect to see this movement pick up steam in 2011.
The Streaming Cloud: As all media moves to the cloud, more and more people will stream their movies and music whenever they want to any device. I've already mentioned the forces that will bring Web video streaming to your TV, but those movies and TV shows should also be available on your iPads, Android Tablets, or even mobile phones if you want. Expiring downloads will still make sense for plane trips and other places where the network is spotty, but you will manage your subscriptions and collections in the cloud. Think Netflix streaming applied to all media. If Google or Apple can convince the record companies to come along for the ride, the streaming revolution will hit music as well, with both working on jukebox-in-the-sky services. Why would you want to bother with managing all the download rights for the songs you buy from iTunes between your iPhone, iPad, laptop, and your wife's computer, when you could just sign in form anywhere and start streaming? Plenty have tried with varying degrees of success and failure (Rhapsody, Rdio, Spotify), but it will take someone with the negotiating muscle of Apple or Google to finally bring streaming music to the masses.
What technologies do you think will make it big this year?

your professional Apple iPhone 4 Repair and unlock specialist!
If you think you have been cheated by questionable "professional repair centre" in New Zealand had illegally changed/steal your motherboard, please text us at +64211172222 and we will be more than happy to show you which government agency to file a report and recover your full amount of lost you have suffered plus data loss.

Google Android passes Apple's iPhone in total US subscribers

Strong sales of phones running Google Android throughout 2010 have managed to push the mobile platform past Apple's iPhone in total active subscribers for the first time, according to comScore.

The research firm released its latest figures this week, revealing that Android was the second-largest mobile platform in November of 2010. Google jumped past Apple even though the iPhone did not lose any share of the market, percentage wise.

Android continued its fast growth, taking another 6.4 points from its previous total in September to give it 26 percent of the U.S. market of smartphone subscribers. Android now only trails Research in Motion, which lost 4.1 points to hold 33.5 percent of the market.

Apple and the iPhone came in third, representing 25 percent of the total domestic market. The Cupertino, Calif., company gained 0.8 points from its share in September.

Of course, Apple's smartphone presence consists solely of the iPhone, while handsets running Google Android are represented by a number of manufacturers and many more devices.

Behind Apple was Microsoft, which slipped from 10.8 percent in September to 9 percent in November. Microsoft's new mobile platform, Windows Phone 7, launched in November.

In all, comScore found that there were 234 million Americans ages 13 and over using mobile devices, with just 61.5 million of those being smartphone owners. But the smartphone market continues to grow, increasing in size by 10 percent in November, versus the previous survey from September.

Quarterly sales of Android phones were first reported to have passed the iPhone in May of 2010. The new data from comScore represents devices actively being used, rather than current sales figures.

This post is sponsored by your Google Android Smartphone unlock specialist.

If you think you have been cheated by questionable "professional repair centre" in New Zealand had illegally changed/steal your motherboard, please text us at +64211172222 and we will be more than happy to show you which government agency to file a report and recover your full amount of lost you have suffered plus data loss.

Bonuses help Apple's Tim Cook earn $59M in 2010, Steve Jobs keeps $1 salary

Apple Chief Operating Officer Tim Cook earned a huge pay increase in 2010, thanks to cash bonuses and stock-based compensation, bringing his total earnings to more than $59 million, while CEO Steve Jobs kept his traditional $1 annual salary.

The compensation was revealed on Friday in the company's 2011 Proxy Statement, filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

Last March, Cook, 50, was given a "special award" to recognize his his "outstanding performance" in overseeing the company's day-to-day operations in 2009 when Jobs was on a medical leave of absence. He earned 75,000 restricted shares of AAPL stock, as well as a $5 million discretionary bonus.

Cook earned an annual salary of about $800,000, and added to his $52.3 million in stock awards and $5 million cash bonus, the chief operating officer received a total compensation of $59.1 million in fiscal 2010. It was a huge pay increase for Cook, who earned $1.64 million total in 2009.

Apple's Compensation Committee also determined in September that it was appropriate to increase Cook's base salary from $800,000 to $900,000, a raise that will be reflected in his compensation for the 2011 fiscal year.

Also given a raise last year was Bruce D. Sewell, who took over as Apple's general counsel and senior vice president in 2009. Sewell earned $650,000 in 2010, and will receive a $50,000 pay raise to $700,000 this year.

Not receiving a pay raise was Jobs, who has famously kept an annual salary of $1 per year since he rejoined Apple in 1997. Jobs remains well compensated, however, as he owns about 5.5 million shares of AAPL stock.

"Since rejoining the company in 1997, Mr. Jobs has not sold any of his shares of the Company's stock," the filing reads. "Mr. Jobs holds no unvested equity awards. The Company recognizes that Mr. Jobs's level of stock ownership significantly aligns his interests with shareholders' interests."

Apple's annual shareholder meeting will be held at the company's "Town Hall" (Building 4) at its Cupertino Calif., campus on Feb. 23 at 10 a.m. Pacific Standard Time. Admission to the meeting is allowed to shareholders on a first-come, first-served basis.

This post is sponsored by your professional Apple iPhone 4 Repair and unlock specialist!

If you think you have been cheated by questionable "professional repair centre" in New Zealand had illegally changed/steal your motherboard, please text us at +64211172222 and we will be more than happy to show you which government agency to file a report and recover your full amount of lost you have suffered plus data loss.

Is the Apple iPad 2 coming soon?

January 9th, 2011--Is the Apple iPad 2 coming soon? Well, you guess is as good as mine.  See what I have found at this link.

This post is sponsored by Abby Technology Limited - Your iPhone 4G Repair Specialist.

If you think you have been cheated or questionable "professional repair centre" in New Zealand had illegally changed/steal your motherboard, please text us at +64211172222 and we will be more than happy to show you which government agency to file a report and recover your full amount of lost you have suffered plus data loss.