A H-2A rocket lifts off from the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency's Tanegashima Space Center on Tanegashima Island in Kagoshima Prefecture, southwestern Japan, early Friday, May 18, 2012. JAXA and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd. successfully launched a South Korean satellite into space aboard the rocket, local media said. (AP Photo/Kyodo News)

The HII-A rocket lifted off from a remote southwestern Japan island carrying the South Korean satellite and three Japanese satellites.

Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, a private company in charge of HII-A rocket production since 2007, is hoping to compete with the U.S., Russia and Europe as a launch-vehicle provider.

The Korean satellite, KOMPSAT-3, was developed by the Korea Aerospace Research Institute to monitor the environment. The rocket also carried Japan’s Shizuku satellite to monitor climate change and two smaller Japanese satellites.

Facebook's much-anticipated IPO is set for today, where the company will raise US$ 16 billion, leading to a US$ 104 billion valuation. (AP Photo/Paul Sakuma)

The social network said on Thursday that it valued shares at US$ 38 each, and that its shares would begin trading in New York on Friday.

At this price the eight-year-old firm would be worth US$ 104 billion.

Demand is set to be high; earlier this week Facebook said it would be selling 25% more shares than planned.

But questions remain about the firm’s ability to generate profits and take advantage of mobile phone platforms.

There are also concerns that once the company has to answer to shareholders, there may be a greater emphasis on advertising to generate profits.

Limited say

Earlier this week, the company indicated the price would be between US$ 34 – US$ 38 a share, with about 421 million shares up for sale.

By selling shares at that value, Facebook raised US$ 16 billion for itself.

However, the new shareholders will not have much of a say in how the company is run.

The shares on offer are A shares, which carry one vote per share, whereas the current owners’ shares are B shares, which carry 10 votes each.

They will control more than 96% of the votes after the public listing, with founder Mark Zuckerberg holding just under 56% of the voting power of the company.

Read more at BBC News.

(Photo credit: Shutterstock)

Medianama has produced an exhaustive list of the blocked sites and the respective ISP’s. PirateBay, XMarks, PasteBin, Vimeo, isohunt, and DailyMotion are among many sites which are blocked. I tried accessing few sites from Airtel’s Broadband connection from Bangalore and this is what I get :

As some blogs are pointing out, you can’t access these sites or some of these sites by using https instead of http.

Anonymous Retaliates

In what seems to be a retaliation of India’s blatant moves to block websites and its impending proposal to police the Internet later this month, Anonymous has defaced the government websites as per Medianama. The blog had screenshots of the defacement. The sites seem to be restored now.

Fight against Piracy

India’s fight against piracy isn’t new. If any, it looks renewed. It has most recently banned songs.pk and obtained ban on 104 similar sites. Songs.pk, the famous Bollywood song site, has now spawned into Songspk.pk. There are no guarantees that the sites blocked above could be spawned into new sites. In fact that seems like the only logical outcome. Given the fact that hosting a site and mirroring a site isn’t all that difficult, I wonder how long the fight by blocking sites would last.

Earlier I had reflected my thoughts about piracy thusly:

To draw an analogy, controlling online piracy is like trying to put an army of frogs into a basket. When you have figured out a way to put three in the basket, two frogs pop out and it goes on. Piracy is no different.

I still stand by it.

PS: On a different note, should these orders be called John Doe even in India too. Don’t you think there should be some kind of localization? Given the frequency at which India is using these, it wouldn’t hurt to come up with a creative name. What do you think Copyright Labs?

PPS: If it matters, I have watched the movie Dammu (Telugu) in theaters with my family. I haven’t watched 3 at all.  And no, the block doesn’t make me want to watch it even more.

The Chinese carrier’s chairman has confirmed the two firms are in talks.

Compatibility issues between the iPhone and China Mobile’s 3G network mean that currently Apple’s handsets only work on the much slower 2G service.

The problem could be resolved with the launch of the next iPhone, rumoured to happen this summer, and when China adopts the 4G standard, analysts say.

China Mobile is the country’s biggest mobile phone network, and in terms of users the world’s largest, with more than 660 million customers.

Even though the iPhone is not yet in China Mobile’s official product line-up, about 15 million of the company’s customers are thought to be iPhone users already, having bought the phone through different channels.

China Mobile’s market share is about 67% – a lot more than its two rivals China Unicom and China Telecom – but it has been slipping steadily in the past few years.

Officially offering the iPhone to its subscribers could help China Mobile to get back the consumers it has lost to other carriers.

China Mobile chairman Xi Guohua mentioned the ongoing discussions between the two firms at a shareholders meeting in Beijing.

“We’ve been actively talking to Apple on how we can cooperate,” he said.

“I can’t give you too many details, but I’d like to repeat that both sides do hope to boost our cooperation.”

Via BBC News.

As the name suggests, the LTE II will come with built in 4G LTE capability. It’s also the first smartphone ever with a 2 GB RAM. LG has also upped the ante, with a faster processor chip and a higher-capacity battery for faster and longer smartphone fun (or work time).

The LG Optimus LTE II — or LTE 2 — comes with the following features and specs.

• Qualcomm S4 MSM8960 quad-core processor running at 1.5 GHz
• 4.7-inch IPS display at 720 x 1280 resolution
• 2GB RAM
• 2,150 mAh battery
• Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich

Early reviews of the Optimus LTE 2 consider the smartphone at par with its main competitor, the Samsung Galaxy S3. There are a few highlights, though, including LG’s release of its Optimus UI 3.0, which runs on top of Android 4.0 ICS. The new UI is claimed to be simpler than previous iterations, although it comes with a few bells and whistles that smartphone owners are likely to love.

This includes pattern-unlock commands that run different apps or commands depending on the unlock swiping pattern used. The Optimus LTE 2 also has a voice-controlled camera app that will take photos at command. The camera app actually saves four snapshots from the second before the shutter button is pressed, and gives the user a choice of which photo to save.

LG says all three South Korean operators will release the LTE 2 this week, and is banking on the launch of faster LTE networks in the country to support the smartphone’s capabilities. LG has not indicated when the LTE II will be released outside of South Korea, but a company rep has said “if carriers overseas want to sell them, we’ll give it to them.”

The Pirate Bay has confirmed the attack on its Facebook page, saying that it did not know who was behind it, although it “had its suspicions.”

A provider of DDoS defence systems said that it was unlikely that the attack came from hacking group Anonymous.

“There will be further attacks, but what’s significant about this whole story is that people think that it is the Anonymous attacking a site which is typically a type of site that they defend,” said Andre Stewart of Corero Network Security.

“It could be the record labels, or a government somewhere that has had enough of not being able to catch The Pirate Bay, it could be just one person who had rented some cloud power from Amazon and is sitting in a cafe, and is able to launch an attack.”
Although some users may have attempted to access the site using proxies, TPB itself warned them against doing so.

“Use proxies at own risk. Don’t login unless you trust the proxy supplier. Don’t freak out. You’ll get your TPB fix tomorrow,” said the site.

Via BBC News.

In December, HTC was found guilty of infringing a patent held by Apple and there is a ban on the sale of any HTC phones in the US that use technology involving that patent.

The HTC One X is among the world's first quad-core smartphones. (Photo credit: Abe Olandres / TechWireAsia)

HTC said that it had altered its technology and design, but that the shipments still require inspection.

Its shares dropped 6.6% to close at NT$411 on the Taiwan Stock Exchange.

“The US availability of the HTC One X and HTC EVO 4G LTE has been delayed due to a standard US customs review of shipments that is required after an International Trade Commission exclusion order,” the firm said in a statement.

Setback

Last month, it reported that its first quarter net profit had dropped by 70% from a year earlier.

Via BBC News.

Tablets will outpace smartphones in web access by 2013, and will comprise 10% of all web traffic by 2014, says Adobe.(Photo credit: Shutterstock)

The Adobe Digital Index has found out that traffic from tablet computers is growing at a rate far exceeding smartphones, and that web access from these devices will exceed smartphones by 2013. The study has likewise determined that consumers find access from tablets as engaging as on PCs.

“As businesses rethink their digital experiences to include mobile strategies, tablets are emerging as the consumer device of choice,” said Adobe Systems’ senior vice president and general manager for Digital Marketing Business Brad Rencher. Given consumer demand, marketing executives are advised to “take a mobile first approach to optimize their digital content and marketing initiatives with a focus on the tablet experience.”

The Adobe study has determined that tablet access to web content grew about 10 times faster than smartphone access from 2009 to 2010. Web traffic from tablets grew 300% in 2011 alone. Apart from exceeding smartphone traffic, tablets will likewise comprise 10% of the total web traffic by 2104.

As of Q1 2012, tablets already account for 4.3% of web access, while smartphones have 6.1% share.

The Adobe Digital Index, released earlier this year, studied 23 billion visits to websites owned by 325 companies in various regions in the world. In Asia, these included China, India, South Korea, New Zealand, Singapore and Taiwan.

This will be the second time the event will be held, which will offer a perfect place for building owners and industry professionals in exploring new technologies and the latest solutions for planning new buildings, as well as for retrofitting existing ones. The expo will highlight green building technologies in the following fields:

• Building materials and systems;
• Building mechanical and electrical services and management;
• Building structure and substructure;
• Energy efficiency and energy harvest;
• Exterior works and landscaping;
• Finishing products and materials;
• Fittings;
• Interior finishing;
• Professional service;
• Waste and toxic management; and,
• Water efficiency management.

GBR Expo will will feature new technology and solutions from 300 providers from around the world. More than 5,000 visitors are expected to come from Thailand and Southeast Asian countries from among different roles: landlords, developers, architects, consultants, M&E engineers, facility managers, property managers, maintenance engineers, importers & distributors of green products, government and their officials, military, municipality, and anyone who owns or manages commercial and residential facilities. Last year, the organizers were able to have a total of 4,869 trade visitors and conference delegates from 30 countries in attendance.

The event is supported by over 23 Thai government organizations and trade associations, and attendees can also expect a series of conferences, seminars, workshops and trade certification courses.

Ministry Energy official Danai Egkamol said that the concept of green building is gaining ground in Thailand, and the government has issued regulations for buildings with more than 2,000 square meters to observe energy conservation laws.

(Image Credit: ShutterStock)

The BSA held a briefing in Singapore Tuesday, and expressed concern over the rise in piracy in the region, which went up 12% from 2010. Meanwhile, the worldwide losses to piracy accounted for US$ 63.4 billion, or an 8% increase from US$ 19 billion in 2010.

BSA senior director of marketing for APAC Roland Chan equated piracy to stealing, and stressed the need for better law enforcement. “If 63 percent of consumers admitted they shoplift, authorities would react by increasing police patrols and penalties. Software piracy demands a similar response, concerted public education and vigorous law enforcement,” he said.

Piracy is growing faster in developing economies, particularly with businesses and individuals in these regions buying more personal computers, but less likely or willing to spend on software. Cheap, pirated versions are usually available either through online downloads or on optical media like CDs and DVDs.

The report highlighted software piracy losses in China, where 77% of all software in the country is illegally obtained. Chan said China had the “most troubling piracy problem,” where the “illegal software market was worth US$ 9 billion in 2011 versus a legal market of US$ 3 billion.”

The BSA said that a 10 percentage point drop in software piracy over four years would bring US$ 41 billion into the Asia Pacific economy. This translates to 350,000 jobs, says a joint research by the BSA and IDC.

Knowledge + Enforcement

The BSA acknowledges that enforcement is not enough, given that some users pirate software simply out of ignorance. Chan has highlighted the need for “awareness and education,” and that legislation should not be a deterrent. He acknowledged that tougher laws might be good in theory, but may discourage trade. “If I make it so difficult for business owners to prove rightful ownership, it might discourage them. We have to look at balancing between stopping piracy and discouraging local businesses.”