October 12th, 2011
NEW YORK (Reuters) – The auction of online video site Hulu has been slowed by recent developments which could derail it completely, according to sources familiar with the process.
Among the issues are conflicts over complicated digital rights, a wide bid-ask gap, and Yahoo being sidelined as a potential buyer by its own issues. Moreover, NBC Universal's hiring of Morgan Stanley banker Stuart Epstein, who was involved in the sale process for the bank, as its chief financial officer complicates a potential deal.
And then there is the lack of commitment to sell by Hulu's owners — News Corp, Walt Disney Co, Comcast Corp's NBC Universal and Providence Equity Partners.
News Corp Chief Operating Officer Chase Carey even acknowledged during the company's third-quarter earnings call last month that a Hulu sale might not happen.
A new round of bids are due next week and price will be in a key issue in whether the auction moves forward, according to a source close to the situation.
Other sources with knowledge of the talks said an unusually wide gap has developed in recent weeks between the price bidders are offering and what the Hulu owners are willing to accept. Hulu's owners are becoming more steadfast about the price and feel enough strategic alternatives are available to reject low-ball offers, sources said.
Bids have ranged from as low as $500 million to as much as $2 billion. The most serious suitors include Google Inc, Amazon.com Inc, DirecTV Group Inc and DISH Network Corp.
Yahoo Inc had been viewed as one of the most enthusiastic likely bidders, but that was before its leadership imploded last week with the firing of CEO Carol Bartz. The company is likely to be too preoccupied with its own issues to digest a multibillion dollar deal. Moreover, Hulu's owners would be reluctant to sell to a company undergoing an internal upheaval.
As with any sale, the situation is fluid and there remains a chance Google or another party could swoop in with a rich offer. Reports have suggested Google was planning an offer, but company insiders are uncertain Hulu's media owners would sanction a sale to the search engine giant — at least not without caveats such as blocking piracy searches, for example.
After intense initial interest due to Hulu's huge and growing popularity, the sale has stalled as bidders questioned what they would get for their money.
One senior media executive said the nature of Hulu's content deals is key to whether a deal happens or not.
"I guess the brand and technology are worth something, but probably not for that asking price because digital companies could develop a site on their own," the executive said, who asked not to be identified speaking about a partner company.
CBS Corp boss Les Moonves openly questioned Hulu's value during an interview at a Paley Media Center event on Thursday.
"What are they getting and how long are they getting it?" asked Moonves, whose company is not a Hulu owner or content provider. "Are they buying two years of programs for $2 billion? I don't know. I shouldn't say more, I'll get in trouble."
The issue of rights, particularly on newer platforms such as the Web and mobile, are both unclear and complicated, adding to the potential deal's complexity.
BTIG analyst Richard Greenfield said a recent decision by NBC Universal to offer programs for free via an iPhone and iPad app without requiring a cable subscription effectively undermines the value of the rights Hulu's owners are trying to sell. The move also potentially conflicts with News Corp unit Fox TV's strategy of allowing Hulu users to access only the latest TV shows if they are a pay-TV subscriber.
"It gets more challenging to push through the Hulu sale, given what NBC just did," said Greenfield.
Comcast agreed, as part of the regulatory restrictions attached to its takeover of NBCU, that NBCU would abstain from key management decisions at Hulu.
If the sale falls apart, it will mark the second time its owners have fashioned a full or partial exit strategy that has failed. After nearly six months of planning, the owners ditched an initial public offering last December to raise up to $300 million. Such an IPO would have valued the company at about $2 billion.
But the decision to ditch the IPO in favor of a sale prompted industry observers to wonder whether media companies should risk handing over their future online to digital rivals such as Google and Amazon. Greenfield has described the plan to sell Hulu as a mistake of "epic proportions."
"Hulu appears to be the perfect weapon for networks and content creators to embrace so they can grow revenues and profits, even if the current multichannel ecosystem becomes unglued over the next decade," said Greenfield in his client-targeted blog.
(Reporting by Yinka Adegoke; Editing by Peter Lauria and Richard Chang)
Categories: Computers and Technology
Tags: Comcast Corp, Morgan Stanley, NBC Universal, NEW YORK, News Corp, Stuart Epstein, Walt Disney Co
October 12th, 2011
NEW YORK (Reuters) – Yahoo Inc. The unrest has proved a headache for AOL, others are deeply questioned the Internet company tries to reverse his fate.
AOL's interest in private equity firms have intensified after the company's stock has fallen 30 percent in earnings results last month sad. Allen & Co. and Bank of America Securities is the advisor of AOL's strategic alternatives including a possible sale, sources said.
The problem is that private equity firms have focused on Yahoo, which appears to be pursuing its own sales after firing CEO Carol Bartz, September 6 and attract the wrath of activist investor Daniel Loeb.
AOL declined to comment for this article.
Sources said that top-tier private equity firms looked at AOL are now focusing on the company is known for its purple logo and Peppy exclamation mark, see it as more valuable and homes more attractive assets than AOL.
"Yahoo has jumped in front," said an industry source familiar with the situation.
In fact, according to industry source and a second source of several PE firms have lines out to at least two media companies to see if they are willing to cooperate in a bid for all or part of Yahoo. Both sources declined to name the PE firms and media companies.
AOL and Yahoo are two very different activities in terms of market capitalization – about $ 1.6 billion and $ 19 billion – which means that there are different groups of potential buyers for every asset.The big private equity firms with huge amounts of money under management is able to go to Yahoo on your own or with a strategic partner. The smaller private equity firms to digest better equipped AOL and Yahoo probably not pursue a missing part of a consortium of buyers.
Or put another way, AOL is a second-class assets are now only the interest of second-tier buyers.
In fact, only when used with AOL, Yahoo will compare the winners.
"They are both in raw form, but AOL has more structural challenges as Yahoo," said Ross Sandler, an analyst at RBC Capital Markets.
AOL Compounding problems is the fact that its participants is lucrative dial-up companies also one of the largest commitments. Sandler said Dial-up is partly responsible for a 25 per cent over the previous year in free cash flow by AOL.
"At Yahoo you have these problems," he said.
To compensate for the loss of Subscription revenue, AOL is training the eyes of advertising revenues. But even this is to have his back in September The launch last September of an expensive ad format with great interactive panels that dominate a site called the Devil, The project is still trying to get traction on Madison Avenue.
According to Armstrong, AOL has also developed a preference for investing in projects that do not have to pay.
Case in point: Patch.com. AOL has shoveled about $ 160 million in the network of more than 800 neighborhood-oriented Web sites dedicated to local news, many of whom have less than a year old. But Patch is on track to lose $ 140 million to $ 150 million this year, estimates Sandler.
Although expensive, at least for AOL to attract the attention of acquisition of the Huffington Post for $ 315 million what gives the business is profitable.
Yahoo is on the block could not have come at a worse time for Armstrong. The first ads from Google Inc. sales manager has damaged his reputation since he became AOL. According to a source in the industry, "Armstrong's reputation has taken as part of a coup that Bartz, even before they blew the dust up that resulted in the overthrow of TechCrunch founder Michael Arrington.
(Reporting by Jennifer Saba; Editing by Peter Lauria and Richard Chang)
Categories: Computers and Technology
Tags: America Securities, AOL Compounding, CEO Carol Bartz, Daniel Loeb, NEW YORK, RBC Capital Markets, Ross Sandler, Yahoo Inc
October 12th, 2011
Hal Turner, of North Bergen, N.J., enters a courtroom in Hartford, Conn., Superior Court Thursday, Sept. 15, 2011, where he is on trial on charges of
HARTFORD, Conn. – A blogger was acquitted Friday of charges that he threatened state officials when he urged readers to “take up arms” and suggested that government leaders “obey the Constitution or die.”
Harold “Hal” Turner, of North Bergen, N.J., was found not guilty of felony inciting injury to people and misdemeanor threatening by a Hartford jury that deliberated less than three hours. He could have faced a decade in prison if convicted of the felony charge.
Turner, who will be returned to a federal prison in Indiana to complete a nearly three-year sentence for threatening judges in Illinois, hugged family members after the verdict was announced.
“I am very pleased,” he said, as he was led away by correction officers.
Turner, who represented himself, argued that no one was hurt and there was no evidence that his words led to any violence. He also cited his First Amendment right to free speech.
Turner wrote a blog posting in June 2009 in response to state legislation, withdrawn three months earlier, that would have given lay people of Roman Catholic churches more control over parish finances. Turner, 49, believed the legislation flew in the face of the constitutional doctrine of separation of church and state.
He suggested that Catholics “take up arms and put down this tyranny by force,” said government leaders should “obey the Constitution or die” and said he would post officials’ home addresses. He also wrote that if authorities tried to stop his cause, “I suspect we have enough bullets to put them down too.”
Three of the six jurors said in interviews after the verdict that they didn’t like what Turner did. They said his words were “outrageous” and wrong but they had to focus on the specifics of state law and didn’t believe the prosecution proved all the elements of the charges.
“We all felt he was guilty of certain aspects,” juror Ann Parise said. “Although we found him not guilty, we don’t feel he was innocent.”
Prosecutor Thomas Garcia said he was disappointed with the verdict and declined further comment.
Two state officials testified that they had received unrelated threats before because of their jobs, but they said Turner’s comments went above and beyond those previous remarks.
The trial began Thursday morning, and both sides rested their cases Thursday afternoon. Turner didn’t testify or present any witnesses, saying the state hadn’t proved its case beyond a reasonable doubt.
Turner’s mother, Kathy Diamond, said she was grateful and happy for the acquittal.
“I think the state of Connecticut ought to be ashamed of themselves, and this was nothing but a political witch hunt,” she said.
During his closing argument Friday, Turner said, “Ladies and gentlemen, this case is a fraud.”
“I said some nasty things about politicians, and they’re trying to use the power of the state to throw me in jail,” he said. “These are the kinds of things we heard about in the former Soviet Union.”
But Garcia said Turner’s targets testified that they were truly concerned about their safety and Turner’s words were meant to incite violence.
“Words have power. We know that from our daily lives,” Garcia said. “They can have the power to inspire people to do good. They also have the power to inspire fear and incite others to violence. That’s the central issue and in many ways the only issue in this case.”
He accused Turner of twisting the facts and putting on a “performance” for the jury. He also reminded the jury of random acts of violence on public officials without mentioning any names.
“This isn’t a battle between big, bad government and poor, little Hal Turner,” Garcia told the jury. “Hal Turner’s the bully here.”
On Thursday, Andrew McDonald, who was a state senator at the time of the blog post, told the jury Turner’s posting “was an extraordinary document that far exceeded any other threat I had ever received.”
“I thought that this was a very real threat,” said McDonald, who is now Democratic Gov. Dannel P. Malloy’s general counsel.
McDonald said Friday that he respected the jury’s verdict but didn’t agree with it.
“I try not to dwell on Mr. Turner,” he said. “Somebody who is filled with that kind of rage is not somebody I’m going to preoccupy myself with. He seems to be erratic, and I hope he will use his remaining time in prison to deal with his aggressive predisposition.”
State Ethics Enforcement Officer Thomas Jones added in his testimony, “I interpreted this as people were going to be coming to my house within 24 hours with bullets and guns. … This was real. This was tangible. This was electric.”
State Capitol Police said Turner’s targets were McDonald, Jones and Michael Lawlor, a state representative at the time who is now the governor’s undersecretary for criminal justice planning. McDonald and Lawlor were co-chairmen of the legislature’s Judiciary Committee, which proposed the legislation but later withdrew it amid public opposition.
Turner alleged during the trial that McDonald used the church finances bill to retaliate against the church for opposing gay marriage rights, which McDonald denied.
Prosecutors say Jones was targeted because he had written to Catholic Church officials, saying some of their activities at the state Capitol could possibly be considered lobbying and they weren’t registered as lobbyists.
The federal case for which Turner is serving a prison sentence stemmed from his online criticism after a 2009 ruling in which a federal appeals court dismissed lawsuits challenging handgun bans in Chicago and Oak Park, Ill. Turner said: “These judges must die.”
Categories: Computers and Technology
Tags: Ann Parise, First Amendment, Hal Turner, HARTFORD, North Bergen, Roman Catholic, Superior Court Thursday
October 12th, 2011
The Federal Trade Commission is proposing changes to the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Rule, which of the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act, COPPA, or commissioned. The COPPA Rule regulates the information that Web sites ask visitors under the age of 13 can, and the agency sought public comment on the proposed changes.
The proposed amendments are in the range of definitions can, parental notification, parental consent mechanisms, confidentiality and security of personal information children and the role of self “safe harbor” program s. The federal agency written comments to us by 28 November preserved.
Change the “Personal Data”
The rule requiring parental notice and consent to the collection of personal information from children under 13 years, the information is stored securely, and prohibits children from being a prerequisite for participating in activities that require more personal information than necessary.
COPPA says that websites and online services directed to children under 13, or any websites who know that they collect information from users under this age must obtain parental consent before collecting, using or disclosing this information. In 2000 and the FTC’s rule, based on COPPA rules, following a review in 2005, the rule is revised and kept it without change.
In April last year, the FTC sought public comment on the rule, because of rapid changes in technology and how children are now using the Internet.
The technical and usage changes include geographic location information and cookies, or other permanent identification. The FTC proposes that the definition of “personal data” to modify these components, and also suggests that the definition of “collection” be changed to the children participate in interactive communities leave without parental consent, as long that site or service, players “take reasonable steps to remove all or nearly all children personal information before it is published.”
Streamlining Parental Notification
To the parents in advance to streamline the agency advises that important information is presented to parents in a card just in time “message, and not just a privacy policy.It also proposes new ways to obtain parental consent, including scans of the signed parental consent forms, video conference or the use of identity issued by the government compared to a database, provided that the ID be deleted after verification.
He also wants to abolish a form of parental consent, so-called “e-mail anymore,” where the operator can obtain consent by e-mail sent to the parent when the data are collected for internal use.
The FTC also seeks to strengthen the requirements for confidentiality and security, so that operators ensure that third parties, including service providers, is “reasonable procedures” to protect the personal information of a child, which retains information only as long as is reasonably necessary, and remove it properly.
For the “Safe Harbor” self-regulation program, the agency wants these programs to examine their members a year and report the results of the audits.
Categories: Computers and Technology
Tags: COPPA, Online Privacy Protection Act, Online Privacy Protection Rule, Personal Data, The COPPA Rule, The Federal Trade Commission
October 12th, 2011
San Francisco – Yahoo has given the interim Executive Director Tim Morse, a 25 percent up to step into the leadership vacuum created by the struggling Internet company's recent firing of Carol Bartz.
Morse's salary is now $ 750,000, up from $ 600,000, according to an application for registration on Friday. Even Yahoo's finance director, Morse assumed the additional role of acting president on Sept. 6, when Yahoo's board deposed his boss, Carol Bartz.
Yahoo's board is now assessing whether it makes sense to sell the company, either partially or in its entirety. If the Board decides to keep the company intact, it plans to conduct a search for a permanent CEO to replace Bartz.
Morse is bigger paycheck is still afraid of the $ 1 Million salary Bartz received as CEO.
Categories: Computers and Technology
Tags: Carol Bartz, Even Yahoo, Executive Director Tim Morse, SAN FRANCISCO
October 12th, 2011
A pedestrian walks at the headquarters of eBay in San Jose
SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Ebay Inc is building a new division to woo developers and attract more merchants as the company tries to emulate the success of Apple Inc's iOS platform in the e-commerce world.
Ebay's main business is still its giant online marketplaces, which bring shoppers and sellers together. The company's other big division is the payment business PayPal and it acquired GSI Commerce earlier this year to add a third division.
But a fourth business has emerged in recent months called X.commerce. The website for the division, X.com, revives a name from the early days of PayPal, when it merged a competing online payments business called X.com started by Elon Musk.
X.commerce is trying to persuade outside developers to create applications, or apps, for merchants looking to sell more online.
The apps can be designed to work on eBay's marketplaces. They may also include payment capabilities from PayPal and work with websites built on Magento, an open-source e-commerce company that eBay bought in June.
The more useful apps that developers build through X.commerce, the more likely merchants are to use eBay's marketplaces, PayPal's payment technology or GSI's e-commerce services.
"The idea is to indirectly monetize eBay's main assets PayPal, GSI and Marketplaces," said Matthew Mengerink, the eBay veteran who runs the new division. "X.commerce is in a unique position. I don't have to drive revenue, I have to drive traffic."
Ebay has about 725,000 developers registered with its various developer programs and there are roughly 4,600 Magento apps active on X.com, up from 3,800 at the start of the year, according to Mengerink.
Omniture, a unit of Adobe Systems, Kenshoo, an online marketing software company, and Outright, which makes a financial-management product for small businesses, are among companies that have signed up to develop apps on X.com.
"They're pulling an Apple, calling on the collective power of the developer community," said Bill Smead of Smead Capital Management, which counts eBay as one of its largest holdings.
Apple iOS is the operating system for the iPhone and iPad. The company has a massive following of developers who churn out thousands of apps for those gadgets, making them much more useful for customers.
Mengerink reckons X.commerce can be more attractive for developers than iOS because merchants are willing to spend more money on useful e-commerce apps.
Mengerink said he will measure X.commerce's success partly on how much money developers make selling apps.
"Apple's iOS isn't profitable for most developers," he said. "On Magento, for every $1 we make, the developer makes $15."
"If developers are making the money, you can't shake the platform," he added. "We believe we can create the largest ecosystem."
Smaller merchants will not have to hire lots of in-house developers if a wide variety of e-commerce apps are available to buy and plug into their online stores, Mengerink explained.
The success of eBay's new division will depend on how large and attractive the pool of end-users is to developers, according to Stephen O'Grady, principal analyst at Red Monk, a technology industry analyst group that focuses on developer communities.
Other specialty online marketplaces have sprung up in recent years, such as Etsy, cutting into eBay's dominant position, O'Grady noted.
"But eBay is still a major center of gravity," he said. "For developers that's still attractive."
Another important ingredient for attracting third-party developers to a technology platform is ease of use.
Dan Shahin, a former comic book store owner who has developed an online storefront management system, went with a Google Inc payment system a few years ago, rather than PayPal.
That was because PayPal had several different application programing interfaces, or APIs.
APIs are sets of rules and specifications that help different software programs communicate with each other. PayPal's APIs were "scattered around," making it more difficult for Shahin to develop payment features to include in his storefront management system, he said.
Shahin told Mengerink about this and the eBay executive got to work fixing the problem.
"Third-party developers had to register for each API," Mengerink said. "The X.commerce goal is to have one place to register for developers and partners. There are security and other issues with this, so it takes a while."
X.commerce is promising a lot, but Shahin reckons eBay has the technological chops to pull it off.
"If anybody can do it, they can," Shahin told Reuters. "Matthew is not one of those suits. He's the real deal."
(Reporting by Alistair Barr, editing by Matthew Lewis)
Categories: Computers and Technology
Tags: Apple Inc, EBay Inc, Elon Musk, GSI Commerce, PayPal, SAN FRANCISCO, San Jose
October 12th, 2011
AT & T makes his promise to his high-speed and long-term development of the online data network to bring in this summer. After months of testing the 4G system is open for business as of Sunday.
The first five cities that can use the network, Chicago, Atlanta, Houston, Dallas and San Antonio, Texas.
The network is initially open only to users of computers: AT & T sells a tablet LTE, HTC Jetstream 10.1-inch, two sticks of data for laptops and mobile hotspot, the High 4G. Smartphone equipped for the new network could emerge during the holiday season or at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas in January.
70 million in 2012
The LTE date has been AT & T Chief Financial Officer John Stephens announced at a conference earlier this week Merrill Lynch.
AT & T spokesman Mark Siegel said the carrier plans to add LTE to 10 other markets by the end of the year for a space, including 70 million people. He declined to say when the smartphone would be available to the network, saying he was "determined".
Boy Genius Report last week, a picture of a phone without notice, the HTC holiday, which he said could be the first smartphone from AT & T LTE. 2.3.4 The Android handset has an inch and a 4.5 to 1.2 GHz dual-core processor.
The announcement comes as competitor Verizon Wireless announced Wednesday that its LTE network, launched in December, would be opened in 26 new markets and develop in three cities that had already LTE LTE as its equipped Droid Bionic hit the shelves.
Siegel said that while varying the speed of LTE, on average, AT & T users should see five to 12 megabits per second download and two to five Mbps upstream, the same promise made by Verizon for LTE network, which launched late last year.
Besides a handful of laptops, access points and modems, smartphones Verizon LTE has four for sale: Thunderbolt HTC, Samsung cargo droid, Droid Bionic Revolution and LG.
Siegel said AT & T was the advantage he had as a high-speed network data backup system of LTE.
"A big advantage is that when, for example, from an area [LTE] to return to HSPA, which is also the 4G technology, and is much faster than Verizon's 3G EVDO, which is their fall back to customers, "said the spokesman." The experience of our users will be more transparent. "
Wireless analyst Ramon Llamas said AT & T would do well to follow the example of Verizon LTE roll-out slowly instead of rushing to catch up.
Easy Does It
"They would be better to take your time and do not make mistakes," said Llamas. "It is easier to make the drive one at Verizon who clearly has a great advantage and experience -.. In the next few quarters may be lost"
With the upcoming iPhone in the wings, said both AT & T and Verizon, llamas Apple will probably make the device ready LTE due to the impact abroad.
"Beyond the U.S., where in the world someone else is deploying LTE?" He asked.
Categories: Computers and Technology
Tags: Chief Financial Officer John Stephens, Consumer Electronics Show, HTC Jetstream, Las Vegas, Mark Siegel, Merrill Lynch, San Antonio, The LTE
October 12th, 2011
What is the future of Yahoo? How about AOL? Where does Microsoft fit into the picture? There seem to be more questions than answers these days — and more rumors than facts.
One rumor insists either AOL or Microsoft will acquire Yahoo. AOL was named as a potential suitor before just-fired Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz came on board two years ago. And Microsoft was pressing hard to scoop up Yahoo's search assets. But some analysts don't see Redmond making another run for its search partner.
"Given what happened last time Microsoft is unlikely to bid for Yahoo. The bidding for Yahoo took down Microsoft stock 10 to 15 percent and it never recovered," said Rob Enderle, principal analyst at Enderle Group. "And Yahoo left Microsoft standing at the altar. It was horribly embarrassing for the executive team."
A Four-Way Battle
The other rumor floating around concerns Microsoft, Yahoo and AOL joining forces to compete against Google on the display advertising front. This is more likely, but none of the companies — even Google — are talking. Microsoft, though, is dropping hints.
"We believe that choice, openness and competition help drive innovation in the market," Microsoft said in a public statement. "As such, we are always looking for ways to partner with others in the digital advertising ecosystem to offer innovative solutions that benefit advertisers and publishers. However we have nothing specific to share at this time."
Laura DiDio, principal analyst at ITIC, noted how this group of vendors is competing against one another in a variety of markets — and the competition is getting fiercer with each passing day.
Google is attempting to chip away at Microsoft's dominance in software and applications with things like Gmail and Google Apps. Apple and Google are competing in the smartphone and tablet markets. Apple and Microsoft have a 40-year old rivalry that continues unabated to this day, she said.
"These are the giant behemoths of the industry and they will fight each other tooth and nail with every weapon in their arsenal: alliances, purchasing patents, marketing, legal action, etcetera, to increase revenue and gain market share," DiDio said. "All of them are straying into each other's territory. Conflict is not just inevitable, it's assured!"
The Search Trio's Chances
As DiDio sees it, the partnership among Microsoft, Yahoo and AOL can best be summed up as three underdogs in search engine/online advertising space banding together to try and take down a common enemy: Google.
"One can look at this as a bold, aggressive move tinged with a sense of urgency. Google presently commands a nearly two-thirds — 65.5 percent — market share in the search-engine arena, according to the latest statistics from comScore," DiDio said.
Google's commanding lead empowers the company to sell more online ads, capture more revenue and therefore further strengthen its position even further, DiDio said. That's why an alliance to sell display ads makes a lot of sense and represents the best chance the three have to go on the offensive against Google.
"The alternative is to do nothing and watch Google continue to run away with the coveted prize of online advertising revenue, which will also fuel Google's ability to compete and win in other market segments," DiDio said. "It now remains to be seen whether the Microsoft, Yahoo, AOL triumvirate can successfully blunt Google's momentum and steal business."
Categories: Computers and Technology
Tags: And Microsoft, And Yahoo, Enderle Group, ITIC, Laura DiDio, Rob Enderle, Way Battle, Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz
October 12th, 2011
People use the Internet to an Internet cafe in Yangon
Yangon (Reuters) – Myanmar lifted the ban on prominent news sites on Thursday, including some run by critics of the military-dominated government, and published online video portal YouTube, the latest sign of possible reforms in one of the most secluded countries in Asia.
Prohibition was repealed on websites for various organizations, including Reuters news, along with The Bangkok Post, Singapore Straits Times and other regional newspapers, and the Burmese language service of the Voice of America, British Broadcasting Corp., and the exiled Democratic Voice of Burma-run .
Reuters and several other news sites were blocked at the height of an army crackdown on monk-led protests in 2007. Since then, these sites show a simple message from the state-owned telecoms group, Myanmar Posts and Telecommunications (MPT).
"This website has been blocked by the MPT," he said.
Who disappeared Thursday, a day after a U.S. special envoy to the country's first journey ended. It also coincided with the United Nations International Day of Democracy ", an event celebrated by the Nobel laureate and opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi in the commercial capital Yangon.
"Changes on the horizon in Myanmar," she told supporters outside the headquarters of her party.
But television is still strictly controlled by the government and foreign journalists are still largely excluded from reporting in the country legally. Most expect that Western sanctions remain in force until an estimated 2,100 political prisoners have been released.
Every song, book, comic and the artwork is planned subject to approval by the censors eradication political messages and criticism of the authoritarian system in Myanmar.
The editor of a weekly newspaper called the reopening of the websites as "a great improvement in the media policy of the new government.
"We can access these sites, but the connection is too slow most of the time," he said, to identify by name. "Let's see how long it takes."
Rare rapprochement with Myanmar rulers toward liberalization have stirred speculation about possible reforms in the resource-rich country, marred by the 49 years of military rule and starved of capital.
Myanmar in the last year the first elections in two decades, after the military handed over power to civilians in the name – a process widely criticized as a farce by the West.
Other new call for peace with armed ethnic separatists, facing the president with foreign delegations, some tolerance for criticism and more communication with Suu Kyi, who was released last year from 15 years under house arrest.
In a gesture last month, fell Burma's state newspapers back-page banner ads attacking Western media.
(Writing by Jason Szep; Editing by Ron popeski)
Categories: Computers and Technology
Tags: Aung San Suu Kyi, British Broadcasting Corp, Democratic Voice, Myanmar Posts, Singapore Straits Times, The Bangkok Post, United Nations International Day, YouTube
October 12th, 2011
BRUSSELS (Reuters) – European regulators are still undecided if Google dominates Internet search, and if abused rivals in violation of competition rules, EU antitrust chief said Friday.
The European Commission has launched an investigation into Google in November last year after rivals, including Microsoft, has accused the company of abusing its dominant position in the market for web search services.
"As part of our study, we try to determine whether a dominant position in Internet search," EU Competition Commissioner, Joaquin Almunia, said in a conference competition in Florence.
"Google is the browser of choice for many of us, but the domain is not the same as abuse of dominant position abuse is a behavior that protects and extends the domain through illegitimate means, and we have yet to conclude if this is true for Google., "he said.
Google is the world's most popular search engine with more than 90 percent of the global market, according to StatCounter Internet statistics firm.
Your browser Chrome had 22 percent of the world market in July, had Microsoft Internet Explorer, 42.5 percent, while Mozilla's Firefox was 28 percent.
Google faces nine complaints to European antitrust authorities, sources told Reuters last month, when the heat rivals appeared in the company.
The Commission can fine companies up to 10 percent of its sales volume worldwide for breaching EU rules. In recent years has affected Microsoft and Intel, with a billion euro fine for abusing its dominant position.
(Editing by Rex Merrifield and Helen Massy-Beresford)
Categories: Computers and Technology
Tags: BRUSSELS, EU Competition Commissioner, Joaquin Almunia, Microsoft Internet Explorer, Rex Merrifield, StatCounter Internet, The Commission, The European Commission
