"The appellate decision overturned all monetary awards against Yahoo! Inc. and reduced the monetary award against Yahoo! Mexico to $172,500," the California-based Internet pioneer said in a release.

"Yahoo! Mexico was awarded $2.6 million in the original judgment, and this award was confirmed by the appellate decision."

The lawsuit was brought by Worldwide Directories SA de CV and Ideas Interactivas, alleging "breach of contract, breach of promise, and lost profits arising from contracts related to a yellow pages listing service."

In November, the 49th Civil Court of the Federal District of Mexico City "entered a non-final judgment of US $2.7 billion against Yahoo! Inc. and Yahoo de Mexico" in the case, according to the US firm.

Yahoo! contended the claims were "without merit" and appealed to the Superior Court of Justice for the Federal District in Mexico, which sided with Yahoo! and overturned the ruling, the release stated.

Yahoo! did not provide details regarding facts of the case.

Yahoo! shares were up slightly to $26.75 in after-market trades.

]]> Sat, 18 MAY 2013 00:30:42 AEST Wellington (AFP) May 16, 2013 - New Zealand's Supreme Court on Thursday granted Kim Dotcom leave to appeal a ruling that US authorities do not have to disclose all of the evidence they have against the Megaupload founder.

The Court of Appeal in March had overturned a decision ordering US prosecutors to hand over the evidence to Dotcom's legal team as they seek to extradite him to face online piracy charges.

The appeal court ruled that a summary of the case would suffice.

Dotcom's lawyers have sought to reinstate the original decision, arguing they could not effectively fight the extradition battle without full disclosure of the evidence against their client.

The Supreme Court agreed to hear Dotcom's legal challenge at a date yet to be set. "Leave to appeal is granted," it said in a two-paragraph ruling.

Lawyers representing the United States had argued in the appeal court that the evidence could involve billions of emails and that full disclosure would likely delay Dotcom's extradition hearing, scheduled for August.

The US Justice Department and FBI want Dotcom to face charges of racketeering, fraud, money-laundering and copyright theft in a US court, which could see him jailed for up to 20 years if convicted.

Dotcom is free on bail. He denies US allegations the Megaupload sites netted more than US$175 million in criminal proceeds and cost copyright owners more than US$500 million by offering pirated copies of movies, TV shows and other content.

The German national, who was arrested in an armed police raid on his Auckland mansion in January last year, launched a successor to Megaupload called Mega in January this year.

]]> Sat, 18 MAY 2013 00:30:42 AEST Cardiff, Wales (UPI) May 16, 2013 - British researchers say new technology can read "unreadable," fragile historic documents that could crack and crumble if unrolled or unfolded.

Pioneering X-ray technology developed at Cardiff University and Queen Mary, University of London is making it possible to read such historical documents for the first time in centuries, they said.

The research was funded by Britain's Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council, which said the breakthrough means historians will be able to access previously unusable written sources and gain new historical insights.

The new technology enabling parchments to be unrolled or unfolded "virtually" and the contents displayed on a computer screen, a council release reported Thursday.

It works by scanning a parchment with X-rays to detect the presence of iron contained in "iron gall ink," the most commonly used ink in Europe from the 12th to the 19th centuries.

A three-dimensional "map" showing the ink's exact location is built up from a series of X-ray "slices" taken through the parchment.

Software then combines the data obtained with information about the way the parchment is rolled or folded to produce an image of the document as it would appear flat.

"This is a milestone in historical information recovery," Cardiff researcher Tim Wess said. "The conservation community is rightly very protective of old documents and isn't prepared to risk damaging them by opening them.

"Our breakthrough means they won't have to."

]]> Sat, 18 MAY 2013 00:30:42 AEST San Francisco (AFP) May 16, 2013 - Apple on Thursday announced that the number of mini-programs downloaded from its App Store has blasted past the 50 billion milestone, and celebrated the moment with a $10,000 prize.

The California-based maker of iPads, iPhones, iPods and Macintosh computers said that it gave a $10,000 App Store gift card to an Ohio man who downloaded the 50 billionth app -- a free word game called Say the Same Thing.

"We're absolutely floored to cross this milestone in less than five years," Apple senior vice president of Internet software and services Eddy Cue said in a statement.

"The App Store completely transformed how people use their mobile devices and created a thriving app ecosystem that has paid out over nine billion dollars to developers."

People are downloading mini-programs from the App Store at an average rate of 800 per second, according to Apple.

Apple opened the virtual doors of its online App Store in July of 2008 with 500 apps for the company's coveted mobile gadgets.

The online store is now stocked with more than 850,000 apps for iPhones, iPads, or iPod touch devices powered by Apple's iOS operating system.

"The App Store has been integral in getting us into the hands of millions of iOS users and has transformed our business," said Elizabeth Francis, chief marketing officer at designer fashion flash-sale website Gilt.com.

Smartphones: Android trumps Apple, Windows edges up
Washington (AFP) May 16, 2013 - Google's Android mobile system boosted its lead in the global smartphone market over Apple in early 2013, while Microsoft's Windows edged into third place, a survey showed Thursday.

The IDC survey showed Android's commanding lead with a 75 percent market share in the first quarter, to 17.3 percent for Apple's iOS platform.

The other platforms remained far behind, but Windows Phone posted the largest year-over-year and moved past BlackBerry into third place, IDC said.

IDC said Windows phones accounted for 3.2 percent of the market, after a 133 percent rise in sales, to 2.9 percent for Blackberry.

Nokia was largely responsible for driving Windows Phone sales, accounting for 79 percent of the smartphones using the Microsoft platform.

"Windows Phone claiming the third spot is a first and helps validate the direction taken by Microsoft and key partner Nokia," said IDC's Kevin Restivo.

"Given the relatively low volume generated, the Windows Phone camp will need to show further gains to solidify its status as an alternative to Android or iOS."

IDC's Ramon Llamas said the survey shows some interest in alternative platforms despite the dominance of Android and Apple.

"Android and iOS accounted for more than the lion's share of smartphones in the first quarter, but a closer examination of the other platforms reveals turnaround and demand for alternatives," Llamas said.

A survey by the research firm Gartner earlier this week had similar results, but showed Blackberry barely ahead of Windows.

]]> Sat, 18 MAY 2013 00:30:42 AEST San Francisco (AFP) May 16, 2013 - Facebook and Twitter launched applications Thursday for Google glasses as developers rushed to learn more about tailoring software for the Internet-linked eyewear yet to hit the market.

"Built by Facebook, this app allows you to upload photos from Google Glass directly to your Facebook timeline," Erick Tseng, head of mobile products at the social network, said in a message posted from the Google developers conference.

"You can also add an optional photo description, just by speaking it."

Tseng's Facebook page displayed an image evidently taken in a packed Glass session at the gathering and was tagged as the first public post to the social network using the application built for the eyewear.

"Can't wait to start seeing Google Glass photos in my News Feed!" Tseng said.

Globally popular messaging service Twitter also introduced an application for Glass.

Twitter for Google Glass let people share pictures or text messages using the glasses, according to engineering manager Shiv Ramamurthi.

Ramamurthi demonstrated his point by tweeting an image from one of the array of sessions devoted to providing developers with insights and tools for making software for Glass. He gave the picture the hashtag #throughglass.

"In addition to sharing photos, you can also keep up with the people you follow on Twitter through notifications," Ramamurthi said. "As always, you can reply to, retweet or favorite these Tweets."

Several major news organizations have also tailored applications for Glass, which has only been made available to developers and a limited selection of "explorers" who paid $1,500 each for the eyewear.

Google Glass was a common sight at the California-based Internet giant's annual developers conference, which continues here through Friday.

Software savants at the gathering shared visions of games, weather reports, news and more delivered to the Internet-linked eyewear.

Many of the 6,000 developers attending an annual Google I/O event in San Francisco sported Glass in what was unofficially deemed the largest ever gathering of Glass wearers.

Envisioned uses ranged from practical tasks such as shopping or delivering local weather reports to sharing real time video streams of riding cable cars or playing augmented reality games in which the world is the board.

Glass lets wearers take pictures, record video, send messages, or perform other tasks with touch controls or by speaking "Okay Glass" followed by a command.

Glass connects to the Internet using Wi-Fi hot spots or, more typically, by being wirelessly tethered to mobile phones. Pictures or video can be shared through the Google+ social network.

Google co-founder and chief Larry Page depicted Glass as part of an ongoing effort to get computers "out of the way" so people can focus on lives enriched by what the Internet has to offer.

"We want to make sure we are building experiences that make people really happy," Page said while speaking about Glass.

"We are relying on you to make happy users," he told developers at the conference. "Ultimately, I think a lot of your experiences will move to Glass."

Google executive chairman Eric Schmidt said recently that it will take "a while" before consumer versions of Glass are available.

]]> Sat, 18 MAY 2013 00:30:42 AEST Washington (AFP) May 16, 2013 - A year after a nightmarish share offering, Facebook still has its ardent backers and detractors.

The world's biggest social network, which now has more than 1.1 billion users, has managed to boost its earnings since the initial public offering, including from its mobile platform, important in countering its critics.

The IPO on May 18 last year sparked a series of crises for Facebook, with the shares plunging from $38 to as low as $17.73 in September.

Shares closed Thursday at $26.13.

A year ago, the company faced doubts on whether it could boost revenues and adapt to the shift to mobile computing. The IPO also sparked accusations on whether investment banks withheld key data, and a trading glitch led to claims of tens of millions of dollars in damages against the Nasdaq exchange.

Since then, however, Facebook has lifted its profits, and boosted the mobile segment to 30 percent of ad revenues in its most recent results, which generally beat Wall Street estimates.

Facebook's share price has stabilized in a range of $25 to $28, and even some of its early critics are offering grudging praise.

"It has a better strategy. It seems a little more mature," said Trip Chowdhry at Global Equities Research, a skeptic at the time of the Facebook IPO.

Chowdhry has an "equal weight" rating and a price target of $28, suggesting Facebook has some potential to rise if it executes well.

"Facebook is the undisputed leader in the segment. Nobody even comes close," Chowdhry told AFP.

He maintained that Google+, the social network from Facebook's Silicon Valley rival, "has not put even a single dent on Facebook."

Still, the analyst is cautious on Facebook, saying it needs to keep innovating to find ways to keep users engaged.

"They can't be too greedy," he said. "They need to put product before monetization."

Chowdhry said that if Facebook goes too heavy on ads, it will turn users away "and they could become the next MySpace," the failed social network which led the sector before Facebook.

Some analysts remain lukewarm about Facebook because of its high price-earnings ratio -- Wall Street measure of share price against profits. Even with optimistic profit projections, Facebook's ratio is around 70, compared with around 27 for Google and 10 for Apple.

Analyst Stephen Ju at Credit Suisse said Facebook delivered "solid" results and "our bias remains positive," but that shares "are already reflecting the near-medium term benefits" of its recent efforts.

Nicholas Landell-Mills at Indigo Equity Research said it was hard to know if Facebook's high price is justified.

"Facebook is still evolving and many products are still at an early stage of development," he said in a research note.

"Facebook needs to revolutionize online display ads to raise ad returns and prices."

Lou Kerner, manager at The Social Internet Fund and a longtime Facebook bull, said the company is "executing quite well."

"They've come up with better mobile apps that people engage with, and they have shown some ability to monetize that," Kerner said.

In the past year, Facebook has ramped up its advertising efforts, especially for mobile, has tweaked its News Feed and launched Graph Search, a way to find postings within the network. It has also launched its own smartphone platform called Home which puts Facebook on the start screen for Android handsets.

Kerner said that as Facebook has matured, "it isn't cool anymore" but that many people need to use it to connect with friends, brands and celebrities because of its reach.

"You can connect in a way that you can't anywhere else," he said.

Even though investors remain cool about Facebook, Kerner said he remains "very bullish."

"The market has never seen something like Facebook and I don't think people have had a chance to evaluate the risks and the opportunities of Facebook," he said.

"I invest in companies that leverage the Facebook platform and those companies are doing very well."

Independent technology analyst Jeff Kagan said, however, that Facebook has flopped with its new mobile phone platform and has yet to prove it can deliver enough profits to justify its share price.

"The magical Facebook brand has never materialized," he said.

Kagan said Facebook faces a conundrum because it has failed to take steps to adequately monetize the vast amount of customer data it has, but that "if they do that it will turn people off."

Richard Greenfield at BTIG Research said Facebook faces a real threat from Google+, saying it is "methodically drawing consumers and businesses" into its ecosystem.

"While many view Google+ as a failure because consumers do not actively update their friends... we view Google+ as a direct attack on Facebook's control of your online social identity," Greenfield said.

"Google is rapidly enhancing the value to consumers of the Google+ social identity, given its control of search, mapping, android.

"Ultimately, being a part of Google's ecosystem offers far more value to Internet users (not to mention advertisers) than Facebook, which should give them a meaningful advantage in the social ID war with Facebook," he added.

]]> Sat, 18 MAY 2013 00:30:42 AEST New York (AFP) May 16, 2013 - US computer giant Dell said Thursday its quarterly profit plunged 79 percent from a year ago, as a shift away from PCs hammered the company's bottom line.

The net profit for the first fiscal quarter slumped to $130 million, as the Texas-based group was studying a plan to go private to restructure in the face of a shifting technology landscape.

Earnings per share adjusted for special items amounted to 21 cents a share, far below the average Wall Street estimate of 35 cents a share.

Revenues dipped two percent from a year ago to $14.07 billion, beating most analyst forecasts.

The results come with Dell and dissident shareholders locked in a battle over the company's value following a bid by founder Michael Dell to take the company private.

Michael Dell, who is heading the $24.4 billion offer for the company, has argued that a radical change is needed to get the company on track in a market shifting away from PCs to mobile devices.

But dissident investors led by corporate raider Carl Icahn have argued that the bid undervalues Dell and that the private equity deal would be a "giveaway."

Icahn has proposed an alternative plan based on a so-called leveraged recapitalization.

Icahn and the other dissident shareholders, who hold nearly 13 percent of Dell shares, are urging shareholders to reject the private equity buyout and opt instead for its "superior" recapitalization plan, keeping the company public.

In the quarterly results, Dell said revenues from its end user computing segment fell nine percent and operating profits tumbled 16 percent.

The news was somewhat better in other areas where Dell has sought to diversify, such as servers and software.

"We made progress in building our enterprise solutions capabilities in the first quarter and are confident in our strategy to be the leading provider of end-to-end scalable solutions," said chief financial officer Brian Gladden.

"In addition, we have taken actions to improve our competitive position in key areas of the business, especially in end-user computing, and it has affected profitability. We'll also continue to make important investments to support our strategy and drive long-term profitability."

Dell offered no outlook for the second quarter and executives said they would not comment on the buyout plan. It has created a special committee of the board to study the private equity deal and alternative bids.

Dell unveiled plans to go private in February, giving founder Michael Dell a chance to reshape the former number one PC maker away from the spotlight of Wall Street.

The move, which would delist the company from stock markets, could ease some pressure on Dell, which is cash-rich but has seen profits slump, as it tries to reduce dependence on the slumping market for personal computers.

Under the terms of the deal, Michael Dell, who currently owns some 14 percent of Dell's common shares, would remain chairman and chief executive and boost his stake in the company.

Additional cash for the deal will come from Silver Lake, a major tech investment group, and MSD Capital, a fund created to manage Michael Dell's investments. The plan also calls for a $2 billion loan from Microsoft.

]]> Sat, 18 MAY 2013 00:30:42 AEST London, UK (SPX) May 16, 2013 - The results of a large-scale, analysis of BitTorrent file-sharing of computer games, focusing on using open methodologies are to be published in the International Journal of Advanced Media and Communication and bust some of the common myths about digital piracy.

The controversy about illegal file sharing over the Internet has been a focus of intense attention from industry and media alike for the past decade. Despite the massive financial interests involved, there is, however, only limited factual knowledge available backing claims from either side of the controversy.

Focusing on digital game piracy specifically, Anders Drachen of the Department of Communication and Psychology, at Aalborg University and the PLAIT Lab, Northeastern University and Robert Veitch of the Department of IT Management at Copenhagen Business School, in Frederiksberg, Denmark, report the results of a large-scale, analysis of BitTorrent file-sharing of computer games, focusing on using open methodologies. Their data covers a three month period during 2010 to 2011 and included information on 173 computer games.

The results present a nuanced picture of game piracy and presents evidence against some of the common myths in digital piracy. For example, the team found that it is not just hardcore "shooter" games that get pirated on BitTorrent.

They also recorded piracy of games across the board, from children's and family games all the way to the major commercial titles. Furthermore, their results indicate that the actual number of illicit digital copies of computer games accessed on BitTorrent is not as high as those mentioned in reports from industry trade organizations, for instance.

During the period of monitoring BitTorrent, the research team found that about 12.6 million unique peers from over 250 countries/areas were sharing illicit copies of games, which included Fallout: New Vegas, Darksiders, Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit, NBA 2k11, TRON Evolution, Call of Duty: Black Ops, Starcraft 2, Star Wars the Force Unleashed 2, Two Worlds II, The Sims 3: Late Night. This represents a wide range of games vendors and games types encompassing simulations, sports and strategy as well as action games.

They report that of the 173 digital games in the sample, the ten most popular games titles during the period analyzed drove more than 4 out of every 10 unique peers on BitTorrent and a mere 20 of the countries monitored were contributing to more than three-quarters of the total file-sharing activity.

For the most popular games, they add, there was an average of 536,727 unique peers sharing via Bit Torrent, and the geographical distribution of the unique peers paint a very diverse picture of where people who access illegally copied games on BitTorrent are positioned.

For example, a number of countries stand out as having very large numbers of unique peers represented in the dataset, including Romania, Croatia, Ukraine, Greece, Poland, Italy, Armenia and Serbia. Portugal, Israel and Qatar also have more than 1% peers per Internet user.

The results also point out that games receiving high critical acclaim tend to have higher numbers of unique peers than those which receive negative critique in media reviews.

While the games investigated covered all major hardware platforms, console games are much tougher to pirate than desktop computer games for the simple reason that one needs to modify the hardware of the console to use them. In contrast, to use an illicit copy of a PC game, one must commonly only modify the computer code itself.

A recent turn towards cloud-based gaming could reduce the chances of games being copied illicitly still further but adoption relies on access to reliable broadband internet for gamers. Of course, better broadband also potentially means more efficient sharing of illegal copies of digital games.

The findings present a picture of peer-to-peer, P2P, distributions that confirms some existing assumptions about piracy while contradicting others. "First and foremost, P2P game piracy is extraordinarily prevalent and geographically distributed [at least it was during the period analyzed].

However, the numbers in our investigation suggest that previously reported magnitudes in game piracy are too high," Drachen adds. "It also appears that some common myths are wrong, e.g. that it is only shooters that get pirated, as we see a lot of activity for children's and family games on BitTorrent for the period we investigated."

"Patterns in the distribution of digital games via BitTorrent" in Int. J. Advanced Media and Communication, 2013, 5, 80-99

]]> Sat, 18 MAY 2013 00:30:42 AEST London (AFP) May 15, 2013 - Internet giant Amazon on Wednesday came under fresh fire over its British tax status after official figures revealed it only paid £2.4 million ($3.6 million, 2.8 million euros)on UK sales of £4.2 billion last year.

Figures filed to investors in the online retailer will increase the scrutiny on company executives when they appear before a parliamentary committee on Thursday to clarify previous evidence they gave about their tax arrangements.

The US-based company used a subsidiary registered in Luxembourg to limit its British corporation tax bill to £2.4 million, £100,000 less than it received in government grants over the same period.

British lawmakers last year urged tax collectors to be more aggressive in confronting global companies who use tax avoidance, amid rising public anger over the issue.

Parliament's public accounts committee released its report about one month after it quizzed senior figures from coffee chain Starbucks, Amazon and Internet search giant Google.

Margaret Hodge, who chairs the committee, said at the time: "Global companies with huge operations in the UK generating significant amounts of income are getting away with paying little or no corporation tax here.

"This is outrageous and an insult to British businesses and individuals who pay their fair share."

She described Wednesday's figures as "just a joke".

"What people will find particularly galling is that the amount Amazon is paying in tax is actually less than they are taking from UK taxpayers in the form of government grants," she said.

"Companies like Amazon should pay their fair share of tax based on their economic activity in this country and the profits they make here."

A spokesman for the Seattle-based company said the company had complied with the law and highlighted its plans to create 2,000 British jobs over the next two years.

]]> Sat, 18 MAY 2013 00:30:42 AEST San Francisco (AFP) May 15, 2013 - Google on Wednesday rolled out a music service for smartphones and tablets powered by its free Android software, in a challenge to streaming radio firms such as Pandora and Spotify.

The launch of Google Play All Access came at the kickoff of a packed developers conference, which features a range of improvements to the Internet giant's products, and saw a surprise appearance by chief executive Larry Page.

"We are here because we share a deep sense of optimism about the potential for technology to improve people lives," said Page, taking the stage to applause a day after disclosing he had been diagnosed with partially paralyzed vocal cords.

"Everything I read about Google is us versus some other company or some stupid thing," he continued.

"I don't find that stuff interesting. Being negative is not how we make progress."

Page appeared calm and confident on stage and spent a half-hour fielding questions from some of the 6,000 developers registered for the annual event.

Questions ranged from privacy and self-driving cars to Google Glass Internet-linked eyewear and the need for more women developers at a gathering that skewed heavily male.

Page spoke candidly about his childhood; his belief technology companies should be allies instead of enemies; and his disclosure about his medical condition on Tuesday.

"After I disclosed my voice issue and got so many great emails and such thoughtful advice, I realized that I should have talked about it sooner," Page said.

"I wondered why people worried about keeping medical information private, and the answer is insurance," he continued. "It makes no sense. We should change the rules around insurance so they have to insure people, that's the whole point."

Page capped an hours-long keynote presentation that updated ranks of software developers, along with more than a million people watching on YouTube and at viewing parties, about improvements to maps, Android, Chrome and more.

Google Play All Access combines the Internet giant's music catalog with users' personal collections in a radio station-style subscription service, according to Android engineering director Chris Yerga.

"Anything I am listening to in All Access I can easily turn into a radio station," Yerga said while unveiling the service at the annual Google developers conference in San Francisco.

"It allows you to explore radio without rules."

All Access launched in the United States with a monthly subscription fee of $10 and will roll out to additional countries "soon," according to Yerga.

The California-based firm was offering discounts to those who sign up quickly for the service.

The number of Android smartphones and tablets activated more than doubled to 900 million in the past year, according to Sundar Pichai, senior vice president of Android and Chrome.

"That is an incredible achievement," Pichai said. "We are incredibly humbled by where we have reached, but remember there are more than seven billion people on this planet so we have a long way to go."

More than 48 billion applications have been downloaded to Android devices from the Google Play store and revenue being made by developers of those mini-programs has increased 2.5 times in the past year, according to vice president of Android product management Hugo Barra.

Google's Android mobile operating system grabbed three out of four smartphones sold in the world in the first quarter of 2013, extending its gains over Apple and its iPhone, a survey showed.

Executive Vic Gundotra took the keynote stage to introduce major upgrades to the Google Plus social network that included move lively pages and automated tools that automatically bring out the best in uploaded photos.

Google also unveiled enhancement to its core strength, online search.

"Starting today, we will be anticipating your next questions," Google's Amit Singhal said while describing how the search engine is being revved to the point where it takes on the role of a smart personal assistant.

"You can pretty much ask Google the way you would ask a friend and be able to get answers from your own world."

Google shares leapt to a new all-time high Wednesday, topping $900 for the first time, closing up 3.25 percent at $915.89.

]]> Sat, 18 MAY 2013 00:30:42 AEST Subscribe to our daily selection of space, military, environment and energy newsletters responseText http://visitor.constantcontact.com/manage/optin/ea?v=0016gbbKsaiGSpQFojVO8ZoHw%3D%3D