Verizon Will Suspend Remaining 3G Unlimited Data Plans This Summer
Via FierceWireless: Should Verizon’s current 3G customers decide to migrate toward 4G LTE pastures, their $30 unlimited data plans won’t be going with them. Verizon CFO Fran Shammo announced at a J.P. Morgan conference today that the company’s “grandfathered” 3G customers will have to purchase shared data plans if they upgrade to devices that are compatible with the newer LTE network. Till now, customers have been able to stay on unlimited plans as long as they had signed on before Verizon introduced tiered-pricing last July. The new shared plans will allow customers to connect multiple devices under one data plan, will arrive this summer, but Shammo did not share pricing information.
The announcement comes two weeks after AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson said his company’s unlimited data plan, which it pulled in 2010, was his “only regret.”
Facebook Adds 83.8 Million Shares To IPO
Via CNN: Facebook has increased the size of its IPO and is now looking to raise $16 billion in total (at the higher end of its bracket of $34 to $38 per share). In its recent amendment, Facebook added 83.8 million shares to its S-1 filing, from share sales by early investors, in addition to the extra 50.6 million it added yesterday, taking its total past 421 million shares.
With Knowledge Graph, Google Can Finally Tell The Difference Between Apple Inc. And Apples
Google today launched the Knowledge Graph, a new search engine feature that helps users quickly find relevant information using semantic search technology. Now, when a user conducts a search, Google will return results with two right-hand-side panels that will include additional relevant information on the search subject, such as biographical data, as well as a list of related topics. The Knowledge Graph attempts to make the search process more user-friendly by providing information about a search result’s relationship to other, previously scattered pieces of data.
The Knowledge Graph is powered by both private and public databases, including Wikipedia, Freebase, and the CIA’s World Factbook, that feed into the graph’s current storehouse of information on more than 500 million people, places, and things. It’s the company’s most significant search engine enhancement since 2007, when its Universal Search feature sprinkled video, image, and shopping results into its main list of search results.
The Knowledge Graph will roll out nationwide over the next few days. The announcement comes one day after Microsoft made its newly launched slew of social features for competitor Bing available to all U.S. users.
Flipboard Gets Audio From SoundCloud, NPR, PRI
Social reader Flipboard is adding audio content to its list of sourse streams. Social music site SoundCloud, as well as audio content makers PRI and NPR, are its first partners. Flipboard is reaching out to users who are visually impaired--the app now integrates with Apple's VoiceOver feature to read text out loud. Flipboard's SoundCloud partnership is breaking the app reader mould set by the pre-audio Flipboard, and other reader apps like Zite and Google Currents. But considering Flipboard's emphasis on social content--"Everything we do at Flipboard is fundamentally social," Flipboard founder Evan Doll once told me--SoundCloud, a source of music from friends, is entirely consistently with the Flipboard flavor.
Facebook Hires Lightbox App Builder Team
Facebook has hired the team behind the photo app Lightbox, in a last minute pre-IPO shop--further evidence that Facebook cares a good deal about how users view and share photos on the social network. Lightbox founders Thai Tran and Nilesh Patel made the announcement on their blog yesterday, saying Facebook wouldn't be acquiring the company itself, though Lightbox would no longer be accepting new users. Patel and Tran will be joining a team and leader that's grown up since Facebook's early college-style all-night coding sessions to a more careful, considered and deliberate product building culture.
Social Ad Spending To Reach $10B Soon, But How Much For Facebook?
A new survey from BIA/Kelsey has looked at the trends in advertising on social media and concluded that by 2016 it'll be a market topping $10 billion per annum, mainly as display ads. For context, some $3.8 billion was spent on these ads in 2011, so phenomenal growth is predicted. In the very week Facebook IPOs this sounds like great news, except for different data coming from Wordstream that suggests Facebook's adverts have less reach and are less effective in generating click-throughs than traditional web ads served up by Google. Meanwhile car giant GM is reported by the Wall Street Journal to be killing its $10 million Facebook advertising campaign because it simply didn't work to generate sales. GM will continue to use free channels on Facebook to generate brand awareness, but it's decision means Facebook will lose out on income.
Via FierceWireless: Should Verizon’s current 3G customers decide to migrate toward 4G LTE pastures, their $30 unlimited data plans won’t be going with them. Verizon CFO Fran Shammo announced at a J.P. Morgan conference today that the company’s “grandfathered” 3G customers will have to purchase shared data plans if they upgrade to devices that are compatible with the newer LTE network. Till now, customers have been able to stay on unlimited plans as long as they had signed on before Verizon introduced tiered-pricing last July. The new shared plans will allow customers to connect multiple devices under one data plan, will arrive this summer, but Shammo did not share pricing information.
The announcement comes two weeks after AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson said his company’s unlimited data plan, which it pulled in 2010, was his “only regret.”
Facebook Adds 83.8 Million Shares To IPO
Via CNN: Facebook has increased the size of its IPO and is now looking to raise $16 billion in total (at the higher end of its bracket of $34 to $38 per share). In its recent amendment, Facebook added 83.8 million shares to its S-1 filing, from share sales by early investors, in addition to the extra 50.6 million it added yesterday, taking its total past 421 million shares.
With Knowledge Graph, Google Can Finally Tell The Difference Between Apple Inc. And Apples
Google today launched the Knowledge Graph, a new search engine feature that helps users quickly find relevant information using semantic search technology. Now, when a user conducts a search, Google will return results with two right-hand-side panels that will include additional relevant information on the search subject, such as biographical data, as well as a list of related topics. The Knowledge Graph attempts to make the search process more user-friendly by providing information about a search result’s relationship to other, previously scattered pieces of data.
The Knowledge Graph is powered by both private and public databases, including Wikipedia, Freebase, and the CIA’s World Factbook, that feed into the graph’s current storehouse of information on more than 500 million people, places, and things. It’s the company’s most significant search engine enhancement since 2007, when its Universal Search feature sprinkled video, image, and shopping results into its main list of search results.
The Knowledge Graph will roll out nationwide over the next few days. The announcement comes one day after Microsoft made its newly launched slew of social features for competitor Bing available to all U.S. users.
Flipboard Gets Audio From SoundCloud, NPR, PRI
Social reader Flipboard is adding audio content to its list of sourse streams. Social music site SoundCloud, as well as audio content makers PRI and NPR, are its first partners. Flipboard is reaching out to users who are visually impaired--the app now integrates with Apple's VoiceOver feature to read text out loud. Flipboard's SoundCloud partnership is breaking the app reader mould set by the pre-audio Flipboard, and other reader apps like Zite and Google Currents. But considering Flipboard's emphasis on social content--"Everything we do at Flipboard is fundamentally social," Flipboard founder Evan Doll once told me--SoundCloud, a source of music from friends, is entirely consistently with the Flipboard flavor.
Facebook Hires Lightbox App Builder Team
Facebook has hired the team behind the photo app Lightbox, in a last minute pre-IPO shop--further evidence that Facebook cares a good deal about how users view and share photos on the social network. Lightbox founders Thai Tran and Nilesh Patel made the announcement on their blog yesterday, saying Facebook wouldn't be acquiring the company itself, though Lightbox would no longer be accepting new users. Patel and Tran will be joining a team and leader that's grown up since Facebook's early college-style all-night coding sessions to a more careful, considered and deliberate product building culture.
Social Ad Spending To Reach $10B Soon, But How Much For Facebook?
A new survey from BIA/Kelsey has looked at the trends in advertising on social media and concluded that by 2016 it'll be a market topping $10 billion per annum, mainly as display ads. For context, some $3.8 billion was spent on these ads in 2011, so phenomenal growth is predicted. In the very week Facebook IPOs this sounds like great news, except for different data coming from Wordstream that suggests Facebook's adverts have less reach and are less effective in generating click-throughs than traditional web ads served up by Google. Meanwhile car giant GM is reported by the Wall Street Journal to be killing its $10 million Facebook advertising campaign because it simply didn't work to generate sales. GM will continue to use free channels on Facebook to generate brand awareness, but it's decision means Facebook will lose out on income.
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