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+ - NYT: Apple's Web of Tax Shelters Saved It Billions 2

Submitted by theodp
theodp writes "Even as Apple became the nation's most profitable tech company, it avoided billions in taxes in the U.S. and around the world through a web of subsidiaries so complex it spanned continents and went beyond anything most experts had ever seen, according to Congressional investigators. The investigation is expected to set up a potentially explosive confrontation between lawmakers and Apple CEO Tim Cook at a public hearing on Tuesday. "Apple successfully sought the holy grail of tax avoidance," said Senator Carl Levin. "It has created offshore entities holding tens of billions of dollars while claiming to be tax resident nowhere." In response to the release of the Congressional report, Apple published its prepared testimony a day early. One can only hope to see a Steve Jobs-like presentation by Cook on Tuesday!"

Comment: Powering Down Google Island (Score 4, Funny) 149

by theodp (#43765413) Attached to: Wired Writer Imagines Google Island

We have just announced on the Official Google Blog that we will soon retire Google Island (the actual date is August 18, 2013). We know Island has a devoted following who will be very sad to see it go. We're sad too.

There are two simple reasons for this: usage of Google Island has declined, and as a company we're pouring all of our energy into fewer products. We think that kind of focus will make for a better user experience.

To ensure a smooth transition, we're providing a three-month sunset period so you have sufficient time to find an alternative island. If you want to retain your Island data, you can do so through Google Takeout.

Thank you again for using Google Island.

+ - Welcome to Google Island

Submitted by theodp
theodp writes "Google fan fiction, anyone? The last thing Wired's Mat Honan remembered before awaking on the self-driving boat that dropped him on the island was sitting through a four-hour Google I/O keynote in Moscone Center and hearing Google CEO Larry Page promote a vision of a utopia where society could be free to innovate and experiment, unencumbered by government regulations or social norms. "Welcome to Google Island," a naked-save-for-a-pair-of-eyeglasses Larry Page tells Honan. "As soon as you hit Google's territorial waters, you came under our jurisdiction, our terms of service. Our laws-or lack thereof-apply here. By boarding our self-driving boat you granted us the right to all feedback you provide during your journey. This includes the chemical composition of your sweat. Remember when I said at I/O that maybe we should set aside some small part of the world where people could experiment freely and examine the effects? I wasn't speaking theoretically. This place exists. We built it.""

+ - Feeling Sorry for Tsarnaev

Submitted by theodp
theodp writes "'Dzhokhar Tsarnaev is accused of setting bombs in Boston that killed three people,' writes the New Yorker's Paul Bloom. 'He seems like the perfect villain.' No wonder Slate's Hanna Rosin is taken aback by the warmth and compassion directed toward Tsarnaev by teen-age girls and mothers: "In the past week and a half I have not been to a school pickup, birthday, book party, or dinner where one of my mom friends has not said some version of ‘I feel sorry for that poor kid.’” So why is Tsarnaev feeling the love? On this, Bloom and Rosin agree: Dzhokhar is cute. 'Even better for Tsarnaev,' Bloom explains, 'he is baby-faced: studies find that baby-faced individuals also tend to get lighter punishments, perhaps because they inspire parental warmth.' Tough luck, Jared Lee Loughner."

+ - Is Google the Asshole?

Submitted by theodp
theodp writes "'If you meet an asshole in the morning,' observed Raylan Givens, 'you met an asshole. If you meet assholes all day, you’re the asshole.' Google sure does seem to be meeting its share of assholes. On Wednesday, Google CEO Larry Page suggested that Microsoft was being an asshole for not playing nice with other software companies, even as similar charges were leveled at Google for demanding that Microsoft pull its WP8 YouTube app. And on Thursday, an indignant Google groused about UK lawmakers who were trying to unfairly tax them by mischaracterizing 'people with sales skills' as 'salespeople'. In the past, Google has famously locked horns with the likes of Apple, book publishers, newspapers, Facebook, Yahoo, privacy advocates, and consumers. So has Google just met a lot of assholes, or is it the asshole?"

+ - Google's House of Cards 1

Submitted by theodp
theodp writes "In The Design That Conquered Google, The New Yorker's Matt Buchanan reports that "cards" — modeled after real cards — are set to become one of the dominant ways in which Google presents certain types of information to users. The power of a card as a visual-organization metaphor, the secret of its infiltration, said Matias Duarte (lead designer of Android), is that "it makes very clear the atomic unity of things; it’s still flexible while creating a kind of regularity." Hey, maybe that Bill Atkinson was really on to something with that dadgum HyperCard software of his back in the '80s!"

+ - Larry Page's Vocal Cords are Partially Paralyzed

Submitted by theodp
theodp writes "Last summer, unspecified voice problems caused Google CEO Larry Page to miss Google's Annual Shareholder Meeting, the I/O conference, and a quarterly earnings call. Now, Page has come forward and revealed that he suffers from partial paralysis of each of his vocal chords, an 'extremely rare' condition. Not unlike what Sergey Brin and his wife are doing with Parkinson's research, Page and his wife will be funding and overseeing 'a significant research program' led by Dr. Steven Zeitels of Harvard Medical School."

+ - Microsoft Patents "Cartoon Face Generation"

Submitted by theodp
theodp writes "The latest round of patents granted by the USPTO included one for Cartoon Face Generation, an invention which Microsoft explains 'generates an attractive cartoon face or graphic of a user's facial image'. Microsoft adds, 'The style of cartoon face achieved resembles the likeness of the user more than cartoons generated by conventional vector-based cartooning techniques. The cartoon faces thus achieved provide an attractive facial appearance and thus have wide applicability in art, gaming, and messaging applications in which a pleasing degree of realism is desirable without exaggerated comedy or caricature.' A Microsoft Research Face SDK Beta is available. Hey, too bad Microsoft didn't have this technology when they generated Bob from Ralphie!"

+ - Ad Exec: Learn to Code or You're Dead to Me 1

Submitted by theodp
theodp writes "In a widely-read WSJ Op-Ed, English major Kirk McDonald, president of online ad optimization service PubMatic, informed college grads that he considers them unemployable unless they can claim familiarity with at least two programming languages. 'Teach yourself just enough of the grammar and the logic of computer languages to be able to see the big picture,' McDonald advises. 'Get acquainted with APIs. Dabble in a bit of Python. For most employers, that would be more than enough.' Over at Typical Programmer, Greg Jorgensen is not impressed. 'I have some complaints about this "everyone must code" movement,' Jorgensen writes, 'and Mr. McDonald’s article gives me a starting point because he touched on so many of them.' Nice rebuttal, and one might add that even a programming whiz might find it tough to land a job at PubMatic — a 2011 USA Today article noted that PubMatic maintained its 100-person development team in India. Why? 'It is easier to find and retain engineers in India,' explained CEO Rajeev Goel (McDonald's boss). 'And it is more affordable.'"

+ - Elon Musk Quits Mark Zuckerberg's Lobbying Club

Submitted by theodp
theodp writes "Valleywag's Adrian Chen wasn't the only one troubled by the tactics of Mark Zuckerberg's FWD.us political lobbying group. Composed of a Who's Who of tech millionaires and billionaires, the group boasted its control of massive distribution channels, broad popularity with Americans, and money would make it a political force to be reckoned with. But the group came under fire for embracing decidedly old-school political tactics, forming both left-leaning and right-leaning subsidiaries, thus broadening its appeal to those who might help advance its agenda. Reports that FWD.us had funded ads praising Arctic oil drilling drew fire from critics, including Tesla/SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, who FWD.us listed as a 'Major Supporter.' Not anymore. Valleywag reports that Musk has quit Zuckerberg's lobbying cabal, apparently felling that the group's ends did not justify their hit-both-sides-of-the-aisle-to-get-what-you-want means. 'I have spent a lot of time fighting far larger lobbying organizations in DC and believe that the right way to win on a cause is to argue the merits of that cause,' Musk said. 'This statement may surprise some people, but my experience is that most (not all) politicians and their staffs want to do the right thing and eventually do.' BTW, if 'Memory' serves me correct, didn't members of the Zuck PACk create, fund, and appear on Code.org, which lamented the sad state of U.S. CS education and featured a slick documentary showing technically clueless little kids, just weeks before launching their pro-techie immigration push? Hey, all's fair in love and lobbying!"

+ - Bloomberg Reporters Caught Spying on Terminal Users

Submitted by theodp
theodp writes "Big Bloomberg is watching you. CNN reports that was the unsettling realization Goldman Sachs execs came to a few weeks ago when a Bloomberg reporter inadvertently revealed that reporters from the news and financial data provider had surveillance capabilities over users of Bloomberg terminals. 'Limited customer relationship data has long been available to our journalists,' acknowledged a Bloomberg spokesman. 'In light of [Goldman's] concern as well as a general heightened sensitivity to data access, we decided to disable journalist access to this customer relationship information for all clients.' Business Insider is now reporting on allegations that Bloomberg reporters used terminals to spy on JPMorgan during the 'London Whale' disaster; Bloomberg bragged about its leadership on this story."

+ - Will First Lady Find Google's TV Viewing Patent Evil?

Submitted by theodp
theodp writes "First Lady Michelle Obama's Let's Move! initiative is all about minimizing TV viewing time. Google's pending-patent for User Viewing Data Collection for Generating Media Viewing Achievements, on the other hand, is all about maximizing TV viewing time. From the patent application: 'Users can watch various media, such as television shows, movies, previews, video clips, music videos, etc...Users can be awarded various achievements, badges, etc. based upon the media watched and how/where the media was viewed. Achievements can be shared with others through social media networks, email, web pages, etc. Exemplary achievement rules that can be created include...watching every episode of a series; watching all fall pilots for a particular network; watching every available sports event for a particular team; watching a predetermined amount of television within a period of time; watching media without fast forwarding; viewing a predetermined number of channels within a predetermined period of time; watching a particular program, series, season, as live broadcasts; watching a program in picture-in-picture; watching a program and concurrently requesting data relating to the program; and watching media on different devices and/or different types of devices.' So what's it gonna be, kids — exercise with Mrs. Obama or a straight-out-of-Idiocracy TV-viewing recliner?"

+ - Microsoft Win8 Ads: 'Insanely Great' or Insane?

Submitted by theodp
theodp writes "Two dueling classical pianists simultaneously play tournament-caliber ping-pong with their butts in what GeekWire terms 'Microsoft’s crazy, brilliant Windows 8 ads'. "We created these online-only social videos for the Asian market, where they were well-received," Microsoft explained. So, do you find the trilogy of wacky Win8 ads insanely great, or merely insane?"

+ - Microsoft's "New Coke" Moment

Submitted by theodp
theodp writes "Remember New Coke? Twenty-eight years ago, Coca-Cola replaced the secret formula of its flagship brand, only to announce the return of the "classic" formula just 79 days later. Had it launched in 2013, Coke's Jay Moye suspects a social media backlash would have prompted it to reverse itself even sooner. In a timely follow-up, ZDNet's Steven Vaughan-Nichols points out that Microsoft is facing its own New Coke moment with Windows 8. 'Does Ballmer have the guts to admit he made a mistake and give users what they clearly want?' Vaughan-Nichols asks. 'While it's too late for Windows 8, Blue might give us back our Start button and an Aero-like interface. We don't know.'"

There is always one thing to remember: writers are always selling somebody out. -- Joan Didion, "Slouching Towards Bethlehem"

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