reading
Pearson buys a small stake in Nook Media, wants a fast track for digital education
Source: http://www.engadget.com/2012/12/28/pearson-buys-a-small-stake-in-nook-media/
Publishers often want to work closely with e-book outlets — possibly a little too closely — but it’s rare that they involve themselves directly. Pearson is taking that uncommon step by making a 5 percent, $89.5 million investment in Nook Media, the joint venture between Barnes & Noble and Microsoft. Some of the reasoning won’t be made public until Barnes & Noble provides holiday sales results on January 3rd, but Pearson is clear that it’s furthering its online education plans: it wants Nook Media’s distribution skills to make a “seamless and effective experience for students.” Just when we’ll see this harmony is still up in the air, though. Nook Media has yet to outline what Microsoft’s partnership means for e-books and e-readers, let alone how Pearson factors in. We’re not expecting a sea change until companies start speaking up.
Continue reading Pearson buys a small stake in Nook Media, wants a fast track for digital education
Filed under: Microsoft
Source: PaidContent
Nielsen teams up with Twitter to create social TV ratings
Source: http://www.engadget.com/2012/12/17/nielsen-twitter-tv-rating/
Nielsen’s long been the gold standard for TV ratings, and as our watching habits change, the firm’s reforming its ways to keep track of what we’re watching. Earlier this year it combined its online and broadcast metrics to give advertisers a more comprehensive look at a show’s reach, and now its going to track how much buzz shows are getting on Twitter. Called the Nielsen Twitter TV Rating, it aims to provide a look at real-time social activity during programming, so networks can provide tailored interactive experiences and better engage with their viewers. What kind of interactive experiences, you ask? We aren’t sure just yet, but you can get the full PR spiel touting the nebulous benefits of the forthcoming Twitter tracking after the break.
Continue reading Nielsen teams up with Twitter to create social TV ratings
Filed under: Home Entertainment, HD
Via: TechCrunch
Reading Migrates To Tablets
Source: https://intelligence.businessinsider.com/welcome
More than 30 percent of American adults use their tablet devices daily to read news.
Over 15 percent read a book on their tablets every day, according to Pew’s Demographics Of Mobile News report. The Pew study excluded e-readers, which are sometimes lumped together with tablets in a single market.
Interestingly, despite being trumped as a much ballyhooed savior for magazines, it seems few Americans regularly use a tablet to browse their favorite magazines (10 percent or less across age groups).
Nonetheless, the findings point to a mobile future for reading.
As we discussed last week, books and magazines are the fastest growing mobile content category by audience growth. News is the fourth largest content category by audience size and continues to show significant audience growth.
Whether mobile growth in news and books will be able to make up for lost offline or desktop-based revenue is another question. E-books typically cost much less than their print counterparts, for example. However, for ad-supported content, the huge growth in tablets sales should be welcome news because tablets are a much more promising ad platform than smartphones.
Please follow www.businessinsider.com/research“>BI Intelligence on Twitter.
How China’s Web Censorship Is Driving Traffic to a Miami Pet Spa Website
Source: http://gizmodo.com/5964199/how-chinas-web-censorship-is-driving-traffic-to-a-miami-pet-spa-website
China’s well-known for its long and illustrious history of censoring the web. But rather than just blocking sites, it’s employing some rather strange techniques—which means the online home of a small pet spa in Miami is receiving an insane number of hits every day.
New Scientist has taken a peek inside the sinister world of Chinese web censoring, and it makes for fascinating reading. Richard Fisher explains that, far from simply blocking websites, Chinese authorities are employing all kinds of techniques to prevent their population from seeing the real web.
Often that involves subtle tricks, like giving the appearance of a slow internet connection. But sometimes the country uses DNS poisoning, which uses cheeky redirection to throw up a website that wasn’t requested. In particular, a Miami pet spa, known as The Pet Club, is one of the chosen sites. New Scientist explains:
[W]hen people in China try to access torproject.org – a tool that prevents online tracking – they instead often get the IP address of thepetclubfl.net…
No one knows why the censors picked The Pet Club’s website. Until now, Dennis Bost of Universal Merchant Solutions in Hollywood, Florida, who set up the website for the salon owners, had been puzzled by the web traffic he’d been seeing. “I’m amazed at the number of hits they get from China,” he says. “They’re a grooming salon. No one is popping over from Beijing to have their Shar Pei groomed.”
Sounds likes a good idea, if you’re a Chinese official hell-bent on censoring the web without generating too much suspicion. Or at least, it used to seem like a good idea: let’s hope, for the sake of China’s online community, that Gizmodo and New Scientist aren’t routed to The Pet Club, too. [New Scientist]
Image by Shutterstock / Andersphoto
Amazon and Google are undermining mobile pricing, and that may hurt everyone
Source: http://www.engadget.com/2012/11/03/editorial-amazon-and-google-are-undermining-mobile-pricing/
When Google unveiled the Nexus 4, Nexus 10 and a refreshed Nexus 7 in October, the moment was arguably the crescendo of a change in the Android ecosystem that had been building ever since Amazon’s Kindle Fire first braved the marketplace in 2011. Along with a widely expanded Amazon lineup that includes multiple Kindle Fire HD models and a price-cut tweak to the original Fire, two of the largest players in the mobile world now have top-to-bottom device businesses built around selling at break-even prices and recouping their money through content. That might sound good on the surface, but it’s a bad omen for competitors that genuinely can’t respond in kind — and it could erode some of the values of diversity and innovation that we’re supposed to hold dear as technology fans.
Filed under: Cellphones, Tablets, Mobile, Apple, Samsung, ASUS, Google, Amazon, LG, RIM
Editorial: Amazon and Google are undermining mobile pricing, and that may hurt everyone originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 03 Nov 2012 13:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
Permalink | | Email this | Comments
hurricane load
Source: http://www.engadget.com/2012/10/31/att-and-t-mobile-temporarily-share-their-networks-in-nyc-nj/
Communication has been all too spotty across much of New York City and New Jersey since Hurricane Sandy struck the region, and those who can get through on their cellphones have found themselves on particularly crowded networks. AT&T and T-Mobile are providing some much-needed, if temporary, relief: the two have struck a deal to share their GSM and 3G networks in the area with no roaming fees or plan changes while the networks come back, with the best-functioning network taking precedence in any given connection. A return to the normal state of affairs hasn’t been fixed in stone and will likely depend on many, many factors, but it’s a much appreciated gesture for residents who might not have a choice to relocate for a vital phone call.
Filed under: Cellphones, Wireless, Mobile, AT&T, T-Mobile
AT&T and T-Mobile temporarily share networks in New York City and New Jersey, shoulder the post-hurricane load originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 31 Oct 2012 15:36:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
Permalink | | Email this | Comments
Google Introduces 3 New Sizes Of Nexus Devices (GOOG)
Source: http://www.businessinsider.com/google-new-nexus-tablet-smartphone-sizes-2012-10
Google has introduced three new Nexus devices in three different sizes.
The Nexus 4 is its smartphone-sized device. It has a zippy quad-core processor, a 4.7″ display, and runs Android 4.2 Jelly Bean, the latest version of Google’s mobile oeprating system.
The Nexus 7 is Google’s mid-size tablet. A 16 GB model is $199 and a 32 GB model is $249. For those who need wireless connectivity on the go, high-speed data options are also available.
The Nexus 10 is Google’s flagship tablet. It features a 2560×1600 resolution, making it ideal for watching movies or reading magazines. The battery will run for nine hours and provide 500 hours of standby time. Google also boasts that it’s a “shareable” tablet, meaning you can have multiple users log in and maintain their own settings on it. It’s a good solution for a family who wants everyone to have their own user experience on the tablet.
Google’s Nexus line of devices are designed and branded by Google but built by hardware partners who bid for the business. They’re different from the devices made by Google’s Motorola subsidiary. (Google could in theory pick Motorola to build Nexus devices, but it hasn’t done so with this batch.)
Please follow SAI: Tools on Twitter and Facebook.
Join the conversation about this story »
Dr. Augustine Fou is Digital Consigliere to marketing executives, advising them on digital strategy and Unified Marketing(tm). Dr Fou has over 17 years of in-the-trenches, hands-on experience, which enables him to provide objective, in-depth assessments of their current marketing programs and recommendations for improving business impact and ROI using digital insights. 
!
Digital Consigliere
http://twitter.com/acfou
Send Tips: tips@go-digital.net
Digital Strategy Consulting
Dr. Augustine Fou LinkedIn Bio
Digital Marketing Slideshares
The Grand Unified Theory of Marketing
Tags
Popular Posts
Published Articles by Dr. Augustine FouPages
Archives
Prototype Web Services
