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51 companies tell Congress it's time to tackle data privacy
The corporate world isn't waiting around for Congress to get started on tougher data privacy laws. A group of 51 CEOs from the Business Roundtable advocacy group, including tech companies like Amazon, AT&T, IBM, Motorola and Qualcomm, have sent an open letter to House and Senate leaders asking them to pass a "comprehensive consumer data privacy law." They claim that state privacy laws vary too widely, leading to confusion for customers and potentially threatening the US' competitiveness. A federal law would reportedly bolster trust and create a "stable policy environment" where companies can craft products knowing exactly where the boundaries are.
34 major tech companies are uniting to fight cyberattacks
Cyberattacks are a global issue that can cause havoc regardless of who's involved, and key members of the tech industry are uniting in a bid to fight these attacks. A group of 34 companies has signed the Cybersecurity Tech Accord, an agreement promising to defend customers around the world from hacks regardless of where they take place or who the perpetrator might be. They're promising to boost defenses for customers (including users' capacity to defend themselves), establish more partnerships to share threats and vulnerabilities, and -- importantly -- refuse to assist governments in launching cyberattacks.
A closer look at Sony's first crowdfunded products
It could be the start of a new Sony -- a company that's trying to recalibrate its new product compass by throwing nascent ideas and projects to the public... and asking for money. Perhaps Sony's most interesting move might be launching First Flight, its very own crowdfunding platform-slash-online store expressly for its employees' pet projects. These projects have passed auditions in front of senior execs: In fact the Seed Acceleration Project (SAP) has even been granted a fair amount of autonomy from Sony CEO Kazuo Hirai. Even if it still feels a little odd for a firm this size to be asking you to fund its next hit, some of those seeds are now taking root. We visited the company's "Creative Lounge," where employees and outsiders work on pitches as well as prototype products. We got to take a look at three of the most developed projects. Here's what we thought.
Russia wants Apple and SAP to prove that their software isn't used for spying
Russia has been extra-sensitive to technological threats to its government as of late, and that's clearer than ever in the wake of a new government proposal. Communication Minister Nikolai Nikiforov has suggested that Apple and SAP should hand over their source code to prove that it doesn't have "undeclared capabilities" for spying on Russian agencies. In other words, he doesn't want to give the NSA free rein just because an official brought an iPhone to work. While he isn't certain as to whether or not institutions will keep using products whose code remains a secret, there's an implication that Apple and SAP may be locked out of government contracts if Putin and crew believe there's too much of a risk. Much of that business could go to Microsoft, which has been cooperating with Russia since 2003.
Google, Dropbox, Canon and others team up to disarm future patent trolls
Patent litigation from non-participating entities (casually known as "patent trolls") is the bane of a technology firm's legal department. Fighting patent lawsuits from firms that subsist completely on licensing and legal action is a frustrating waste of resources, and one that often stifles innovation indirectly. Now, a new partnership between Canon, Dropbox, Google, Asana, SAP and Newegg hopes to cut off would-be patent trolls at the knees. It's called the License on Transfer Network (LOT), and it's a patent-licensing agreement that neuters a patent's potential for litigation before prospective trolls can exploit it.
BlackBerry sale plans could include Google, Intel, Samsung or others
BlackBerry may have a failsafe in the event that its deal with Fairfax Financial doesn't pan out. Reuters claims that the smartphone maker is now holding early, just-in-case sale discussions with multiple large technology firms that include Cisco, Google, Intel, LG, Samsung and SAP. It's not clear which companies are serious about bidding, but they're reportedly interested in BlackBerry's servers and patents; unsurprisingly, they're not so keen on the ailing smartphone business. None of the involved companies are corroborating the rumor, and there's no guarantees that BlackBerry will sell itself to any suitor besides Fairfax. If there's another big takeover announcement in the future, though, you'll know you had fair warning.
NBA gives casual fans and armchair GMs access to the league's entire statistical history
The odds of rising from NBA stat junkie / forum poster to Houston Rockets GM like Daryl Morey did are slim, but thanks to the new NBA.com/Stats page fans have access to more data than ever before. Until now, only league and team personnel have had access to the NBA's complete official stats -- media got access last spring -- with box scores that go as far back as its start in 1946-47, individual stats for anyone who has ever played in the league plus advanced statistical breakdowns and rankings of best lineup combinations. Fan sites like Basketball Reference have filled in the gaps in the past, but this should bring a new level of accuracy and analysis to bear. Access to these stats means we can evaluate games at a much deeper level to know precisely why the Lakers are so bad this season, or which combinations of players are giving the Knicks their best advantage. SAP announced the project back in July as a part of its marketing deal with the league, as it gets to show off its database chops building a system that can handle such a large number of requests on so much info. Hopefully other leagues follow suit and encourage this level for interaction with fans, although we suspect it would take more than a few Moneyball-esque calculations to fix squads like the Bobcats. Hit the source link below to satisfy a jones for numerics or find the perfect angle for your LeBron vs. Kobe argument, although last night's All-Star Game may have given all the ammo necessary.
Watch as a DIY 8-bit computer comes together, learn something in the process
We've actually already seen one completely home-built 8-bit computer but, while Jake Eisenmann wasn't afraid to show off his creation, Kyle Hovey is actually inviting us along for the ride. The project started up last week when Hovey gathered his first batch of parts and a pair of books and started designing a simple 8-bit computer based on the SAP-1 architecture (SAP stands for Simple as Possible). The transistor-transistor logic (TTL) design is slowly coming together and every step of the process is being documented by Hovey on his blog so that others may follow along and learn from his experience (and, most likely, his mistakes as well). For more details on this rather impressive project, and to monitor its progress, check out the source.
Managing 12,000 iPads: SAP CIO shares lessons learned
SAP's CIO Oliver Bussmann has a singularly interesting point of view on using the iPads in a business environment: He oversaw the implementation of iPads at SAP, which was an early adopter of using Apple's tablet in a full-scale company. He recently talked with the folks at InfoWorld, and says that going about the process open-mindedly was the best way to do it. SAP figured, right when the iPad was announced, that its employees would be using them anyway, so the company took a very ad hoc approach to supporting them in the workplace, building on what its employees did with iPads rather than trying to structure actual work functions around them. Bussmann seems to say that the biggest issue on an iPad is security, but technology is getting better all the time, apparently, and the latest version of iOS 5 introduces some new improvements that should help IT departments with all of the headaches that come from having sensitive information available on the iPads. Most interestingly, however, Bussmann says that iPads do have one important advantage over traditional PCs in a business environment: Users seem much more willing to interact with and "explore" data on the iPad. I agree with this -- even in my own iPad usage, I'm much more ready to search for a good restaurant or browse through ticket prices sitting on my couch with an iPad versus sitting in front of a computer screen. I don't know if that difference has been fully explored by developers yet, but it's definitely something to think about going forward, especially when implementing the iPad in a specifically business environment.
SAP co-CEO shares story of a compassionate Steve Jobs
Last week SAP co-CEO Bill McDermott told Jim Cramer that SAP was the largest enterprise user of iPads on the planet. In the 8 minute interview, which you can watch here, McDermott and Cramer talked about the iPad's adoption among businesses and the fact that the iPad is "the future." But one of the most interesting tidbits to come out of the interview was a personal story about Steve Jobs. Bill McDermott's mother had cancer and one day McDermott called Steve Jobs and asked him for help on the matter. As he told Jim Cramer: "As a matter of fact, when my mom was sick -- she had a similar ailment to Steve's -- I called him up for help, and I asked him for help. And the guy gave me an hour of his time. He gave me all of his docs, his experiences. He's a tremendous human being and the world is in his debt, he's a great visionary, and he's a terrific person. My heart goes out to him and his family." This story is one of the many that have leaked out from tech leaders after Steve Jobs' resignation last week and shows a compassionate and empathetic side of Steve Jobs that one rarely hears about. However, Steve Jobs private life will come into much sharper view in November when his authorized biography is published. For the biography author Walter Isaacson had access to dozens of personal and professional contacts in Steve Jobs' life. In addition to this unprecedented access Jobs also agreed to not read the book's manuscript until it was published. Steve Jobs biography will hit shelves on November 21st. [via Forbes]
Encrypted Text: A rogue's guide to patch 4.2
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Encrypted Text for assassination, combat and subtlety rogues. Chase Christian will be your guide to the world of shadows every Wednesday. Feel free to email me with any questions or article topics you'd like to see covered! Rogues have a lot to look forward to when patch 4.2 is released. If you spend most of your time in dungeons or raiding, you'll be happy to hear about the sizable buffs to all three of our talent trees. Unfortunately for rogues that favor PVP, there are some cooldown changes to Cloak of Shadows and Combat Readiness that won't be well-received. While I'm not completely satisfied with the size of our buff when compared to our relative position in the DPS pack, our potency in Firelands still remains to be seen. In addition to the slew of balance changes, we can start salivating over the new gear that will be available. Our tier 12 set has some very fun bonuses, and also some great crafted gear coming up. Our caster rivals will get access to their first legendary weapon since Atiesh, so we'll have to do our best to keep up. The duration of Blind in PVE is going up to a full minute, giving us two forms of long-term CC in Sap and Blind. As proof that rogues are designed to be the best at what they do, most other CC effects in the game are going to start mirroring Sap. Polymorph and the rest won't aggro mobs that they're used on, which should make it far easier to coordinate CC in a PUG. Plus, even if the group manages to somehow mess up CC and starts combat early, we can just use Blind as a stand-in for Sap anyway.
Encrypted Text: The secret rogue skills
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Encrypted Text for assassination, combat and subtlety rogues. Chase Christian will be your guide to the world of shadows every Wednesday. Feel free to email me with any article suggestions or questions you have! The word "rogue" has several meanings. Some people envision a swashbuckling pirate, deftly wielding two maces and smashing faces in. Others imagine a trained ninja, assassinating marks silently in the night. Many of those with Dungeons & Dragons experience expect rogues to be similar to the thief, sneakily disarming traps and picking locks. I love the rogue class because it has enough versatility to meet all of these stereotypes and more. Before dungeons were the streamlined "on rails" encounters of today, they were complex and open-ended. There were several paths to victory, and rogues had the ability to use their unique flair to unlock alternate routes. While it's obviously not good for business to have rogues be a pivotal part of every dungeon, it was nice to see our utility actually being utilized. Young rogues today don't get the experience of playing their class outside the box.
TUAW interview: SAP CIO Oliver Bussmann on iPads in enterprise
A while ago SAP's CIO Oliver Bussmann made some waves in the Apple news-o-sphere by commenting that SAP was to deploy several thousand iPads within the company. I spoke to Mr. Bussmann this week to discover that his employees are now using over 2,000 iPads at SAP and they have plans to buy many more. However, the iPad is not the only tablet in SAP's sights. As Mr. Bussmann explained, the possibilities of thin-client, fast-startup, tablet-form computing devices are enough for SAP to consider the Galaxy Tab, the PlayBook and possibly any Android tablet that meets their needs and specifications. On the next page we discuss with Mr. Bussmann why SAP chose the iPad, how the company is using them and more.
Encrypted Text: Cataclysm heroics from a rogue's perspective
Every Wednesday, Chase Christian of Encrypted Text invites you to enter the world of shadows, as we explore the secrets and mechanics of the rogue class. This week, we discuss the new heroic dungeons in the upcoming expansion. I remember what it was like to play a rogue in dungeons in vanilla WoW. Our only form of long-term crowd control was Sap, and it brought us out of stealth every time we used it. Subtlety rogues could spend three talent points on Improved Sap, which still left Sap knocking us out of Stealth a tenth of the time. Every mob had some sort of AoE or whirlwind-style attack, and rogues were often right behind tanks in terms of healing necessary. We've come a long way since the old days. Tricks of the Trade, with its instant threat transfer, has become the crutch that supports even the greenest tanks. Fan of Knives is one of the best AoE abilities in the game and synergizes with our poisons for incredible potency. Improved Sap has been baked in to the ability, and we can use our CC safely on a wide variety of targets. Feint's new ability to reduce our AoE damage taken also allows us to survive most attacks. You might say that rogues are nearly perfect for running heroics. Unfortunately for us, Cataclysm's heroics have a thing or two to teach us about complacency.
SAP deploying 1000 iPads to employees, more on the way
SAP has embraced its devotion to mobile solutions by distributing 1,000 iPads to employees with more to come. ZDNet reports that SAP's CIO Oliver Bussmann shared news of the iPad program late last week on Twitter. Bussmann notes that the iPads are ready for duty. Each is equipped with access to Citrix tools via a virtual private network (VPN) and email for participating employees. Additionally, the users will pilot the Mobile Sales for SAP CRM app for iOS. The iPads have been spread across SAP employees around the world. We can assume this is just the beginning of the program, as Bussmann took to Twitter once again to suggest that there's "more to come." Best of luck to SAP in their new initiative.
Citrix Receiver for iPhone
Citrix, the folks who provide a popular way to run applications on remote servers using a thin client, have announced the immediate availability of Citrix Receiver for iPhone (click opens iTunes). We saw the Citrix guys running around the show floor at Macworld Expo this year, surreptitiously demoing an early build of this app to anyone who walked within range.Receiver is a free app that enables iPhone and iPod touch users to run any Windows application as a service on their device. Connecting to a Citrix XenApp environment, iPhone fans can securely work with apps from Oracle, SAP, McKesson, Cerner, and other vendors. The only information sent over the wireless connection consists of screen taps and gestures, keyboard input, and screen updates, so it is simple to keep data secure.Receiver for iPhone uses Citrix HDX to deliver high-definition content to the device so that Flash and Silverlight content can be viewed as well. Flash on an iPhone -- now there's an idea!In enterprises such as hospitals that depend heavily on Citrix already, Receiver is going to be "well received." This should help Apple's iPhone sales efforts in the enterprise market really take off.
The Queue: Proto-drakes, Brilliant Glass, and more
Welcome back to The Queue, WoW Insider's daily Q&A column where the WoW Insider team answers your questions about the World of Warcraft.Since you all need to sit through an extended maintenance today, we're going to have an extended version of The Queue! Well, a little. I guess about two more questions than usual. Or just one, really. Actually, I'm not sure it's extended at all. Maybe if you read through it twice? Yeah, let's do that. Just read it twice, that works.AbsalonPrieto asked...Do Death Knight enchants (rune enchant) stack with regular weapon enchants? If not what would be the best choice rune or regular enchant?
Encrypted Text: Shadows descend upon Northrend
Every Wednesday, Chase Christian of Encrypted Text invites you to enter the world of shadows, as we explore the secrets and mechanics of the Rogue class. This week, we'll be talking the impending expansion, and what you can do to prepare yourself for a long trip through the snow.Arthas has been busy over these past years. Killing his father, defiling the Alliance's most sacred city, enslaving an entire army of mindless undead, and a virulent zombie invasion; just to name a few. The Light's greatest paladin tried to stand against him, and was crushed. The demonic have tried to defeat him using their own fel magics, and were left bloodied in the snow. Even the most powerful Elven mages tried to stop his relentless assault, and their civilization was utterly destroyed. After these hard years, Arthas' cruel reign of fear and terror over the citizens of Azeroth has reached a breaking point. The people can suffer no more pain or agony. The hounds of war have been unleashed and the wax-sealed envelopes from Thrall and Varian have been delivered. We've received our orders, and the message is clear: Assassinate the Lich King. Finally, our leaders have gotten some sense shaken into them by Arthas' brutality and ruthlessness. Finally, they've decided to send in the Rogues.
Encrypted Text: Art of the peel
Every Wednesday, Chase Christian of Encrypted Text invites you to enter the world of shadows, as we explore the secrets and mechanics of the Rogue class. This week, we'll be talking about one of the most important things a Rogue can do that's not called 'DPS'.In WoW, we don't get to decide much about our characters. A few pre-built faces and skin tone are about as deep as the customization options run. Gear is typically released in discrete tiers, and you'll find that most Rogues use mostly the same leather sets. Talents are similarly stale: there are rarely true choices in our trees. Choosing one talent over another either cuts your damage or cuts your usefulness, and for most Rogues the decision is easy.Most people assume one Rogue is as good as another. Take two arbitrary Rogues, Gankenstein and Istabbedu. They're both undead Rogues: their chins are falling off. They're both sporting full Season 2 gear with a few PvE epics sprinkled in. And they both traded in their Slicers for Shankers & Shivs this patch; all aboard the Mutilate train. So what separates these two from each other, and from the other 9,000 Rogues on any given server?
Encrypted Text: Trunks of the Trees, Subtlety
Every Wednesday, Chase Christian of Encrypted Text invites you to enter the world of shadows, as we explore the secrets and mechanics of the Rogue class. This week, we finish a discussion of 51 point talents. We'll be covering Shadow Dance, the final talent in Subtlety.With the nefarious Patch Tuesday behind us, we now have available to us a plethora of new talents. Other classes received their 51 point talent trees as well, and balance is but a faint whisper of what it once was. I killed a Warrior earlier tonight in a full stunlock, and I saw a Retribution Paladin throw a Holy Light for over 7,000.What sets Rogues apart is the true uniqueness of the new abilities. They are very different from anything we have ever seen before, and this can cause confusion and makes them harder to evaluate in terms of usefulness. I have been able to test Shadow Dance first hand, find my full report after the cut.
