Google announces India's first ever mapping competition 'Mapathon 2013'

With the view to further improve Google Maps for India, Google has announced India's first ever mapping competition - Mapathon 2013 - which starts on February 12 and culminates on March 25, 2013.
It is an India-wide mapping contest, which is open to anybody who lives in India. "We're inviting Google Maps users from all over the country to help us create better maps for India by adding knowledge of their neighbourhoods through Google Map Maker. And there's something in it for everyone," said Google in a blog post.
The top 1000 mappers in India can get a chance to win Android tablets, smartphones, gift vouchers and Google merchandise.
 

The registrations for the competition have opened. Click here to participate.
How does it work?
Google Map Maker is a tool that allows users to add more detail to Google Maps through a few simple clicks. Using Google Map Maker, you can select a specific area on Google Maps and add new information based on your own local knowledge or by referencing the satellite imagery on Google Maps. With just another click, you can save and submit your input - and once the submitted edit has been verified, the new information will be added to Google Maps.
Google Map Maker was first conceptualised in India, and Map Maker is now used across the world.

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Aircel’s free calling with data plan not a threat, say rivals

Two of the company's major competitors, who did not wish to be named, told ET that they were not unduly worried over the scheme that was expected to hurt voice-dependent operators such as Bharti AirtelBSE -0.06 %, Vodafone and Idea CellularBSE 1.02 %, particularly in metro cities.

The scheme is just a teaser from the company to attract customers, yielding higher revenue and market share, but it did not imply a lower call rate, said an executive with one of Aircel's rivals. Aircel's chief marketing officer Anupam Vasudevan, however, said that the customers still stood to gain from the scheme. "It is not discounting, it is actually giving the customer extra," Vasudevan said, explaining that the company was targeting higher revenue instead of per second profitability through the plan.

The data offering, which lowers the company's realised rate per minute on its network, is part of a larger promotion of freebees linked to usage that is expected to run for at least six months.

A competitor pointed out that the GSM technology network — used by most major Indian operators — is not suited for data consumption. For voice, companies make Rs 0.35-0.50 per minute while for similar capacity consumption at current data prices the GSM 2G and 3G networks get Rs 0.06-0.07, the competitor said. Gartner's research director, Kamlesh Bhatia, said that a similar offer from an LTE (long-term evolution) or 4G operator would be much more disruptive because its key usage is data and its network would not be clogged by voice consumption. "A plan like this will affect call rates across the industry if rolled out by an LTE player because you (existing GSM players) will lose a chunk of high telephone service users."

Another of Aircel's competitors said RILBSE -0.20 % or any other operator could not viably bring down data prices any further, pointing out that such a ploy had been tried and abandoned in developed markets such as the US and Europe. AT&T, for example, had falling voice rates but rising data prices and amid the transition used one to offset the other. In India, argued one of the competitors, the voice and data prices have already hit rock-bottom.

Besides, Aircel's offer has several caveats. A data user has to spend Rs 10 to get Rs 10 worth of local calling and use the free 10 minutes in a single call within the next day. "We have a similar plan with bundled free minutes along with the rental rather than linking it to the actual usage. Overall cost and revenue per consumer remains the same," said the competitor, who did not wish to be named.

RIL was planning to offer a free voice connection with a data connection on the LTE network that is still to be launched. But that may no longer be necessary, with voice options emerging on LTE and Internet, provided it is approved by the telecom regulator Trai. "The only thing to worry about is RIL saying that it will reduce data prices to a sixth, but even they would know that cannot lead them to profitability," said a competitor.

Telecom operator Aircel's competitors have shrugged off potential threat from its recently-launched plan offering free calling with data usage which was touted as a market transforming scheme that Reliance IndustriesBSE -0.20 % would unveil with its 4G launch.

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Google wins landmark advertising case in Australia

 
 
Google Inc won a landmark court case on Wednesday when Australia's High Court ruled that it had not engaged in misleading behaviour with its sponsored links and that it was not responsible for messages conveyed by paid advertisers.

The ruling helps Internet providers and search engines argue that they are not publishers, but simply carriers of information provided by third parties.

While the judgment applies only in Australia, the ruling will be closely watched around the world and could be cited as a precedent in the event of similar cases arising in the rapidly evolving area of law.

"Others will definitely be looking at this ruling. Google is a worldwide business. This is something of a first, and it does add some clarity for the industry," the head of Australia's Internet Industry Association, Peter Lee, told Reuters.

The finding ends a six-year legal battle between Google and Australia's consumer watchdog, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC), which accused Google of engaging in misleading and deceptive conduct over paid advertisements.

The ACCC based its case on search results in 2006 and 2007, where a search for Honda Australia would show a paid advertisement for a Honda competitor, CarSales. The ACCC said the ads were deceptive, as they suggested CarSales was linked to Honda Motor Co Ltd .

Google argued that it was not responsible for the advertisements, as it was only the conduit for the advertiser.

In a unanimous finding, five judges of Australia's High Court ruled in favour of Google, overturning a ruling from the Federal Court. The lower court had ordered Google to set up a compliance programme to make sure paid advertisements on its search engine were not misleading.

The five High Court judges said Google did not create the sponsored links and the company was not responsible for messages in the links.

"Ordinary and reasonable users of the Google search engine would have understood that the representations conveyed by the sponsored links were those of the advertisers, and would not have concluded that Google adopted or endorsed the representations," the court said.

Google issued a brief statement saying it welcomed the decision, while the ACCC said it would review the judgment to see if it had wider ramifications for Australian consumer law.
"The ACCC took these proceedings to clarify the law relating to advertising practices in the internet age," ACCC chairman Rod Sims said in a statement.
The legal victory comes after Google and language software maker Rosetta Stone Inc last year settled a trademark infringement dispute in the United States over Google advertising practices.
Rosetta had argued people searching for its products on Google were being directed to competitors and software counterfeiters.

Google has since changed the way it displays its sponsored links in Australia, now clearly labelling them as advertisements on top of search results.

A Google search for Honda Australia on Wednesday displayed paid ads for Honda Australia's website. (Editing by Edwina Gibbs)

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Google search results show 'significant racial discrimination': Report

Google search results contain "significant discrimination" according to the perceived race of the people whose names are typed in, a study has revealed.

According to Harvard professor Latanya Sweeney, names typically associated with black people were more likely to produce ads related to criminal activity.

In her paper, Prof Sweeney suggested that Google searches might expose "racial bias in society".

According to the BBC, the study analysed the type of advertisements that appeared on Google when certain names were searched for.

The investigation suggested that names linked with black people, as defined by a previous study into racial discrimination in the workplace, were 25 percent more likely to have results that prompted the searcher to click on a link to search criminal record history.

According to the report, Prof Sweeney noted that one possible cause for such search results might be Google's "smart" algorithms, technology which automatically adapts advertising placement based on mass, user habits. (ANI)

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Yahoo! enetrs in online ad alliance with Google

Yahoo! on Wednesday announced an advertising alliance with Google, the company that dethroned the pioneering Internet firm in the world of Internet search.

Google will use its online ad targeting skills at some Yahoo! properties, stepping in to put relevant marketing messages in available spaces, according to Sunnyvale, California-based Yahoo!.

Yahoo! gave the example of someone online shopping for boots being shown an ad for something completely unrelated because no advertisements for footwear were available in inventory.

"If you see an ad for boots, that's instantly going to pique your attention more than an ad for, say, a car battery," Yahoo! said.

"That's better for users. This is why contextual advertising is such a powerful tool."

The large stocks of ads at Google AdSense and Admob increase opportunities to present Yahoo! website users with marketing messages they will click on, generating revenue.

"By adding Google to our list of world-class contextual ads partners, we'll be able to expand our network, which means we can serve users with ads that are even more meaningful," Yahoo! said.

"For our users, there won't be a noticeable difference in how or where ads appear."

The move comes amid turn-around efforts by Yahoo! chief executive Marissa Mayer, who was a high-level Google executive before taking the Yahoo! helm in July.

It also raised the possibility of Yahoo! turning to Google to power Internet searches at its website, once freed from its current deal to use Microsoft's Bing service.

Yahoo! has been trying to reinvent itself since the once-flowering Internet search service found itself withering in Google's shadow.

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iTunes hits 25-billion mark; German student wins 10K euros for Monkey Drums download

Apple's iTunes music store hit its 25 billionth download - equal to selling more than three songs for every person on Earth - and on Wednesday gave the German student who bought the track a gift card worth 10,000 euro ($13,500).

Economics student Phillip Luepke, 22, of Hanover, Germany, downloaded the techno song Monkey Drums (Goksel Vancin Remix) by British DJ Chase Buch, hitting the number a decade after the online music store debuted. "I was very surprised to hear the news," Luepke said on phone from his Germany home.
"I woke up this morning and had an email from Apple saying I had the 25 billionth download," he said. "In fact, I didn't quite believe it at first. It's a new feeling for me."

Luepke, who is currently studying for exams, said he came across the song at a disco last Saturday night. He used the song-identification smartphone application Shazam to look up its name, after which he downloaded Monkey Drums the following evening.

Luepke, who will celebrate over a few beers with friends, said he is not sure how he will spend the gift certificate, but he is confident that his music and movie collection will grow. Cupertino, Califoria-based Apple launched the iTunes store in April 2003 and has averaged about 15,000 songs downloaded each minute. The store has a catalog of more than 26 million songs in 119 countries.

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Your phone is all you'll need in a BlackBerry 10 future

A lot of buzz is billowing around BlackBerry these days, as analysts, consumers and the media keep a rabid eye on the renamed company's every move and so far non-specific sales numbers. Though all eyes are on BlackBerry 10 and sales of the Z10 (the Q10 isn't available yet), CEO Thorsten Heins is already looking to the future, Reuters reported Tuesday. It's apparently a future where the only device you'll need is a BlackBerry.
Heins wants BlackBerry to come to represent "true mobile computing," though he said it's not going to happen in the next quarter; the current game plan will play out over the next two to four years.
Heins said it's not just about tablets and smartphones, either. The architecture behind BlackBerry 10 is "not a downgraded PC operating system," he said. "It is a whole new innovation build from scratch. It's built for mobile."

The sky's the limit

So if the BlackBerry 10 architecture won't be limited to just phones and tablets, what exactly is Heins envisioning?
BlackBerry's Chief Marketing Officer Frank Boulben told Reuters that starting this year, "you will be able to plug the [Z10] device into a docking station at the office and then all you need is a keyboard, a mouse and a screen."
"Combined with cloud services, this would mean you don't need a laptop or a desktop," he added.
As Reuters pointed out, BlackBerry owns the QNX operating system behind BB10, which also powers everything from cars to nuclear reactors. Who knows where the company could go with it?
"What we need to decide is where do we play? It could be a software play, a licensing play, an end-to-end horizontal play, we'll figure that out," Heins said. "In five years, yes we might still be in hardware, but we may not be in hardware ... I'm not ruling anything out."

Remaining focused

But BlackBerry is going to remain focused on consumers and BB10 for now.
"Over the short term, yes, we have to be successful with the [BlackBerry 10] devices," he said, admitting that BlackBerry has to win back enterprises and consumers who were lost to Apple and Android.
In the U.K. and Canada, BlackBerry 10 devices are breaking records for the company. As of Tuesday, stock was up more than 24 percent from Friday's close.
That's surely a good sign, though the new OS's presence in the U.S. has yet to be reestablished - BB devices had plummeted to just one percent of mobile traffic in the U.S. by last summer, and BlackBerry 10 won't launch stateside until March.
The BlackBerry Q10 could launch in the U.S. as late as June.
In addition, Heins told Reuters that BlackBerry remains committed to tablets. After the minimal impact of the BlackBerry PlayBooks, though, he needs to make sure the next BlackBerry tablet - which is currently in the works - is profitable.

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