Asia is slowly but surely showing great interest in social media, as demonstrated by the marked rise of Internet traffic in the region. Prior to its new Hong Kong office, Facebook has already opened offices in Singapore and India. Facebook is banned in mainland China, but its move to Hong Kong, a semi-autonomous Chinese territory, is an attempt to further tap Asia’s active online population and sophisticated digital marketing communities.

The company’s North America and Europe offices boast strong marketing relationships with major brands in their respective regions – over 80 of the top 100 advertisers in the US advertise on Facebook. That’s the exact thing that Facebook aims for Asia.

Even if China is, undoubtedly, a lucrative market, Blake Chandlee, Facebook’s VP and commercial director for emerging markets, explains that the company doesn’t have plans on entering mainland China and be aggressive about it right now. But at the same time, to accommodate larger markets, the site is available in all Chinese dialects. “For us that is the first step in any part of the world to make sure people are able to experience Facebook in a language they’re comfortable with,” Chandlee explains.

http://gulfnews.com/business/media-marketing/facebook-opens-hong-kong-office-to-boost-asia-presence-1.759751

Netflix, Google Docs, Windows Live, Flickr, Facebook, and MobileMe are only some of the popular cloud services of today; while, Hotmail, Amazon.com, and eBay are some of the cloud pioneers since the mid-1990s. So yes, despite aggressive advertising drives from companies, such as IBM, Microsoft, and Saleforce.com, “the cloud” that everyone’s talking about is actually nothing new. Previous monikers just thought of calling them in different, non-appealing names in the past, such as “application service provider,” “software as a service,” and “on-demand software.”

The cloud revolutionizes the way you handle everyday computing tasks, like surfing the Web, checking your email, and even writing documents. With the number of services that the cloud handles, you don’t need to use the exact, same computer to access and share documents and other files. It grants you the mobility that these times demand.

Cloud companies are also now selling their services as cheaper solutions to what would have cost you a lot back then. Small businesses, or even individuals, can now borrow space from cloud companies, backed by massive data farms, instead of spending for servers for hosting websites. It cuts the cost and reaps the same benefits – or even more.

Expect issues to arise as this technology grows. Security, for example, becomes a concern since, from controlling your own server, now you have to trust person X, with servers located in who-knows-where locations.

There’s little doubt that the cloud is ready to take on normal, everyday computing tasks. The question  then becomes “are you ready for the cloud?”

http://money.cnn.com/2011/02/09/technology/cloud/index.htm

In agreement with the plaintiffs, a New York judge ordered LimeWire to stop distributing its P2P file-sharing software, arguing that LimeWire highly encouraged copyright infringement. Judge Wood of U.S. District Court of Manhattan further explains that LimeWire “marketed itself to Napster users, who were known copyright infringers.”

LimeWire shutdown its service Wednesday, displaying a legal notice that reads: “This is an official notice that LimeWire is under a court ordered injunction to stop distributing and supporting its file-sharing software. Downloading or sharing copyrighted content without authorization is illegal.”

LimeWire, however, clarifies that this doesn’t mean that the company has been permanently put out of business. LimeWire CEO George Searle explains that the injunction only applies to the LimeWire product.

The Recording Industry Association of America, their trade group, blames much of the music industry’s declining sales – a 12% drop in 2007 alone – on illegal file-sharing made possible by LimeWire’s technology. More than a dozen plaintiffs pursued the case against the company, which began four years ago, including Sony Music Entertainment, Virgin Records America, Inc., Artista Records, Capitol Records, and Warner Brothers Records, Inc.

While the injunction stops software distribution, the networks that the software tapped into – Gnutella and BitTorrent – remain active, and can be accessed through other software apps.

Source: CNN Money

There’s a psychic element to it. Google Instant shows the user’s typed text in black, while the “prediction” text appears in gray. The search box also now instantly moves to the top of the search page as the results appear below. And as more keywords are typed, the results below the search box constantly change as well.

Google notes that people type slowly, typically about 300 milliseconds between keystroke, but read quickly, about 30 milliseconds. With Google Instant, users can save about 2-5 seconds on a typical search.

The update will be available on Google’s Chrome 5 and 6, Firefox 3, Safari 5 for Mac, and Internet Explorer 8.

Like the rest of Google’s new features, users have the choice to keep or turn off Google Instant. A button next to the search box offers that option.

More than a decade after this search engine was launched, Google is determined to stay at the forefront of innovation. The company has already made 500 changes to its search engine so far in 2010.

Source: CNN Money

So how will this new tool know which e-mails should be in the priority list?

Gmail automatically determines whether an e-mail is important based on the user’s behavior. If you have opened or replied to similar emails in the past, then most probably, that e-mail will marked important. Users can also use the new “+” and “-“ buttons to set priorities.

Google has been slow in bringing in new corporate customers for their business application suite. The ‘Priority Inbox,’ together with its new contacts feature and phone call application, is meant to address the things that Gmail’s competitors lack.

What should worry Google is the strong series of updates for Microsoft’s Office suite, including the company’s email client Outlook 2010. The new Outlook is now equipped with features that once helped Gmail take lead – that includes linked conversations, quick search, instant messaging, and option to ignore entire conversations with a click of a button.

And, interestingly, while most companies want users to spend more time with their products, the new feature lessens the amount of time users spend in Gmail by 13% – also risking the money Google makes from the ads found in the Gmail screen.

Source: CNN Money