Linked by Thom Holwerda on Mon 15th Aug 2011 12:04 UTC
Okay once again I'm breaking my own one-week time-off from OSNews due to, you know, taking a break and being too busy with other things, but this one is big - very big. Also, only the second time in OSNews history we've used the 'breaking'-tag. Google has just announced it is going to buy Motorola Mobility for $12.5 billion (more here). While providing Google with a dedicated mobile phone business, it also gives Google ownership of one of the most valuable mobile technology patent portfolios in existence. Update: Responses from the Android ecosystem are positive. HTC: "We welcome the news of today's acquisition, which demonstrates that Google is deeply committed to defending Android, its partners, and the entire ecosystem." Sony Ericsson & LG: "We welcome Google's commitment to defending Android and its partners."
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RE[3]: Awesome rehash of a Phandroid comment ...
by glarepate on Mon 15th Aug 2011 21:35
in reply to "RE[2]: Awesome"
Member since:2006-01-04
3) People who think the other Android licensees are happy about this really need to think 30 seconds. The "statements" from so-called competitors in support of this acquisition are so closely-worded it appears they all "voluntarily" put out a joint press release. That is fairly creepy and should raise eyebrows at the DOJ.
I know. What I really expected them all to say was:
"We welcome our new googly overlords and look forward to surrendering beeeeelyuns in IP licensing fees in order to be allowed to continue to do business at all."
You don't think a better way to get the attention of of the regulations bodies would be to say that they feel threatened by this, or that it seems like too much concentration of power? You think that we will see headlines like:
DOJ investigates pod-person CEO statements
I remain unconvinced.
Member since:2008-09-21
I fail to see how Google owning the same weaker portfolio makes it any stronger overnight.
Such a fight is expensive, takes long and usually ends with an arrangement. Sometimes it's easier and more cheap to just pay (and maybe even get something in return) to reach that arrangement faster.
Now the interests are different. Moto's top-priority is protecting the Android-ecosystem now.
3) People who think the other Android licensees are happy about this really need to think 30 seconds.
You can be sure they get something in return. The statements are clear that this protects the ecosystem and the partners. Both of them where in strong need for that. And maybe there are even more details we don't know about yet.
4) If you think Google is not going to favor its own hardware over that of licensees you're being naive.
If you think google would kill it's successful Android online-/service-strategy then you are naive. They have better ways to maximize profit while still keeping partners happy (like removing the Microsoft/Apple taxes and control what they just did & kick competition out what is what happens with Microsoft/Nokia Phone 7).
Edited 2011-08-16 03:00 UTC
News
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/20/13 22:43 UTC
The Verge pointed me to a blog post by Leap Motion - which reveals how their Kinect-like motion control works with Windows 8. "From the second you plug in your Leap Motion Controller, you'll be able to browse the web and interact with your computer just by moving your hands and fingers in the air. With Leap Motion technology and Windows, you can do everything that's possible with multi-touch inputs - without actually touching anything. This also means that existing applications in Windows 7 and 8 will respond to your natural hand and finger movements. Soon, we'll show you how Leap Motion will work with Mac OS X." Quite cool.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/20/13 21:50 UTC
PocketNow interviews Marc Dillon, and there's an interesting note about why Jolla is keeping the display properties under wraps: "We're leaving some of those details out because we do understand that there are a lot of really big players in the market and they tend to take certain components in the market and dominate them. We created the ability to actually be able to run Sailfish on multiple hardware displays and be able to swap components, so this is part of the demand and supply planning phase. We are committed to this industrial design which is a 4.5-inch display, an 8 megapixel camera on the back and a front-facing camera at the front, and the exact specs of the display we'll provide when we're close to delivery." Something you rarely hear anything about.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/19/13 23:15 UTC
"This is my NeXTstation Turbo Color booting the Mac System 7.1 Operating System using a hardware add-on called 'Daydream'. The Daydream has a Mac ROM and a few custom ICs in it and hooked up to the NeXTs DSP port. Turns your NeXT into a full fledged 68k powered Mac." So cool.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/19/13 23:11 UTC, submitted by Drumhellar
"The NetBSD Project is pleased to announce NetBSD 6.1, the first feature update of the NetBSD 6 release branch. It represents a selected subset of fixes deemed important for security or stability reasons, as well as new features and enhancements. Please note that all fixes in the prior security/bugfix updates (NetBSD 6.0.1 and 6.0.2) are also in 6.1."
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/18/13 21:06 UTC
"At the end of a week in which Electronic Arts confirmed it wasn't developing a thing for the Wii U, one of the software engineers in EA Sports' Canada studio, in a series of since-deleted tweets, disparaged the console as 'crap' and suggested Nintendo should give up on hardware altogether. 'The Wii U is crap. Less powerful than an Xbox 360. Poor online/store. Weird tablet', tweeted Bob Summerwill, listed as a senior software engineer at EA Canada, in a reply to a tweet posting a link about EA's no-Wii U news. 'Nintendo are walking dead at this point'." The Wii U is turning into the 21st century's Virtual Boy.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/18/13 7:37 UTC
"In NixOS, the entire operating system - the kernel, applications, system packages, configuration files, and so on - is built by the Nix package manager from a description in a purely functional build language. The fact that it's purely functional essentially means that building a new configuration cannot overwrite previous configurations. Most of the other features follow from this." Interesting approach. A Linux distribution, sure, but with some very refreshing ideas about system configuration.
Linked by fran on 05/18/13 1:38 UTC
Appfour added, among other features, C/C++ support to its new version of AIDE. From Android-IDE, "Now you can write parts of your app or your whole app in C/C++ on your device. AIDE supports the Standard Android NDK toolchain (GCC 4.6 + Bionic, STL, ...). No changes are necessary if you want to build an app developed on a PC with Eclipse. C/C++ development is fully integrated: Build errors appear in the error list and files can easily be navigated to with Go to file. The editor supports C/C++ syntax highlighting."
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/17/13 23:35 UTC, submitted by kragil
Ars nails it: "The answer is that Google did announce what amounts to a fairly substantial Android update yesterday. They simply did it without adding to the update fragmentation problems that continue to plague the platform. By focusing on these changes and not the apparently-waiting-in-the-wings update to the core software, Google is showing us one of the ways in which it's trying to fix the update problem."
Linked by MOS6510 on 05/17/13 22:22 UTC
"It is good for programmers to understand what goes on inside a processor. The CPU is at the heart of our career. What goes on inside the CPU? How long does it take for one instruction to run? What does it mean when a new CPU has a 12-stage pipeline, or 18-stage pipeline, or even a 'deep' 31-stage pipeline? Programs generally treat the CPU as a black box. Instructions go into the box in order, instructions come out of the box in order, and some processing magic happens inside. As a programmer, it is useful to learn what happens inside the box. This is especially true if you will be working on tasks like program optimization. If you don't know what is going on inside the CPU, how can you optimize for it? This article is about what goes on inside the x86 processor's deep pipeline."
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/17/13 22:15 UTC, submitted by Tom
"It was the only moment I heard regret slip into Otellini's voice during the several hours of conversations I had with him. 'The lesson I took away from that was, while we like to speak with data around here, so many times in my career I've ended up making decisions with my gut, and I should have followed my gut,' he said. 'My gut told me to say yes.'" The world would've been a much different place - Apple would have been less dependant on Samsung for its chips, which probably would've meant less money for Samsung to develop its Galaxy business.More News »
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2009-12-07
That should give some leverage in the future patent wars.
Seeing as how MS and APPL have already filed infringment claims against MMI, I seriously doubt they considered it a threat deterrent. I fail to see how Google owning the same weaker portfolio makes it any stronger overnight.
This whole announcement is alot of fanboi PR spin and hype.
1) Motorola is a hardware OEM whose market share has been on a steady dramatic decline and industry analysts were writing its epitaph just a few years ago. 1 or 2 profitable quarters does not erase a track record of diminished quality and problems that spans a decade.
2) Google, a software company with an extremely poor track record of managing consumer hardware experience (see Nexus One, lolz) is purchasing one to "bolt on" to its existing corporate structure. Yeah, that has a history of working well.
3) People who think the other Android licensees are happy about this really need to think 30 seconds. The "statements" from so-called competitors in support of this acquisition are so closely-worded it appears they all "voluntarily" put out a joint press release. That is fairly creepy and should raise eyebrows at the DOJ.
4) If you think Google is not going to favor its own hardware over that of licensees you're being naive. Android is now on the same path as Symbian.
On the plus side, Google is paying $12.5 billion for MMI, Microsoft paid $8.5 billion for Skype. Go figure.