RIM tilts at iPhone with new BlackBerry phones

Research In Motion unveiled two new versions of its touchscreen BlackBerry Torch on Wednesday as it seeks to regain ground it has lost to Apple and Google with powerful consumer-friendly models.

Investors reacted favourably, pushing RIM's deflated stock price up more than 5 percent. But some analysts were sceptical, given delays leading up to this launch. They said a radically new software package due next year would be RIM's big test.

The new Torch models include an all-touch version that mimics the popular style of Apple's iPhone and most Android devices. Along with a previously announced upgrade to its workhorse Bold model, they are part of what the Canadian company called the biggest global launch in its history.

"The pure touch model could be very interesting. It has some great tech in terms of computing horsepower," said Will Stofega, a mobile device analyst at research firm IDC.

He dismissed concern that consumers would snub the devices while waiting for "superphones" due out next year using the QNX operating system that powers RIM's PlayBook tablet and said the phones could tempt buyers away from the iPhone.

"What people seem to want is a vibrant, iconic, shiny device," he said.

RIM has lagged its competitors in bringing out must-have phones with speedy browsers, and its PlayBook competitor to Apple's iPad launched to dismal reviews in April.

The company is slashing 2,000 jobs to reduce costs and streamline operations after reporting a fall in quarterly profit and a dismal earnings outlook.

WAITING FOR SUPERPHONES

It has already promised "superphones" next year using the QNX-based operating system that runs the PlayBook, so analysts are looking beyond this launch.

"This is a necessary product refresh in advance of the big bang that we hope and expect will happen with QNX-based phones," said John Jackson, vice-president of research at CCS Insight.

The three touchscreen BlackBerrys are RIM's most powerful yet. They run on an upgraded operating system, boast improved displays and pack a 1.2 GHz processor from Qualcomm as well as dedicated graphics processor that should make video and gaming sharper and more responsive.

RIM says the browser is 40 percent faster than the original Torch, its last major phone launch, which hit shelves almost a year ago.

"RIM's new BlackBerry smartphones could well be the most important devices in the Canadian smart device vendor's history, following a recent slowdown in device shipments, staff cuts and doubts over the company's strategy and leadership," Ovum analyst Tony Cripps said.

All three devices will be launched by carriers around the world by the end of August, RIM said. The slider Torch, with both a keyboard and a touch screen, will be exclusive to AT&T in the United States from this month, the carrier said, while AT&T will offer the other phones later in the year.

The all-touch Torch is RIM's first attempt at the popular style since two versions of its Storm model failed to excite.

"It's definitely an acknowledgment that there are people that want that full-touch device," RIM's newly promoted global head of sales, Patrick Spence, said in a phone interview.

LOOKING AHEAD

The timing could boost RIM's earnings for the quarter to late August as it sells the phones to carriers. But figures for user sales won't be available until the following quarter.

RIM shipped 13.2 million phones in the three months to late May -- its first fall in shipments from a previous quarter since at least mid-2007 -- as it pushed the launch of the latest products back to August.

RIM's aging hardware and software have looked increasing outdated as manufacturers such as Motorola, Samsung and HTC push out sleek, large-screen devices using Android and its applications.

Its market share has fallen steeply in the United States, according to data compiled by research firm Gartner. The global fall has been less severe, but from a smaller starting point.

"What would constitute success for these guys is essentially holding the fort," CCS's Jackson said. "A stop-loss outcome would be a success for these products in developed markets."

Shares of Waterloo, Ontario-based RIM have dropped 65 percent from their peak in February. The stock rose $1.18 to $25.33 on the Nasdaq and was up C$1.19 at C$24.42 on the Toronto Stock Exchange.

Google strikes deal to acquire daily deal service

Google Inc.'s latest deal aims to help people find the best daily deals on the Web.

In its latest acquisition of talent and technology, Google has bought Dealmap. It's a 15-month-old startup that compiles discount offers from local merchants scattered in markets across the nation.

Financial terms of the acquisition announced Tuesday weren't disclosed. It's the latest in a flurry of acquisitions that Google has made to expand its Internet empire into promising new markets. Since the end of 2009, Google has spent more than $2.7 billion buying more than 70 companies.

In this case, Google is trying to become a bigger player in the rapidly growing specialty of distributing daily bargains from local merchants around the country. Groupon and LivingSocial have emerged as early leaders, but hundreds of competitors are now vying for a share. Google, as the owner of the Internet's most popular search engine and most lucrative ad network, looms as one of the most imposing entrants.

Google is adding Dealmap to its arsenal just a few weeks after starting its own daily deal service. Its version, called Offers, currently confines its bargains to New York, the San Francisco Bay area and Portland, Oregon, but Google plans to add more cities. The company developed its service after Groupon turned down a $6 billion takeover offer last year.

"We've been thrilled with the early success of our commerce offerings, and we think (Dealmap) can help us build even better products and services for consumers and merchants," Google spokeswoman Katelin Todhunter-Gerberg said.

Groupon, which is based in Chicago, is now pursuing an initial public offering of stock that's expected to be completed in September or October. Although it's only three years old, Groupon already is on pace to generate more than $2 billion in annual revenue — a threshold Google didn't eclipse until its sixth year in business.

Both Groupon and LivingSocial have been aggressively expanding in an attempt to build on their early lead in the daily deal market. LivingSocial broadened its reach in Asia on Tuesday with its own acquisition of a South Korean deal site called TicketMonster.

Dealmap, which is based in Menlo Park, California, has built a database that lists deals from more than 450 different sources. It says it has more than 2 million users.

Yao Chen cracks 10 million follower milestone, Obama sends Twitter "spam"

Yao Chen has become the first person on China's microblogging platform Weibo to rustle up more than 10 million followers.

The Chinese-born actress joins the likes of Lady Gaga and Justin Bieber in the very small group of microbloggers who now can boast more than 10 million followers.

US President Barack Obama has his eyes set on joining the group with close to 9.4 million fans; however, thousands of fans unfollowed the President last week during a campaign blitz.

During an intensive Twitter session, Obama's campaign staff posted well over 100 messages urging followers to contact their Congress members "If you want to see a bipartisan #compromise." The surge of tweets gained Obama a reputation of a "Twitter spammer" and saw an estimated 40,000 followers stop their subscription to his Twitter feed.

All water off a duck's back, it seems, as in the space of a few days he had gained back more followers than he had lost.

During the week Lady Gaga set yet another new Twitter record, becoming the first to race past 12 million followers, Chinese actor Chen Kun reached the 7 million followers mark on Weibo, and Shakira leapfrogged over Ashton Kutcher to become the seventh most followed microblogger on Twitter.

In September 2010, Twitter had 175 million registered users, while Sina reports that Weibo had more than 140 million registered users in May 2011.

Most popular people on Twitter:

Lady Gaga (12,145,276 followers)

Justin Bieber (11,413,234)

Barack Obama (9,398,442)

Britney Spears (8,732,191)

Katy Perry (8,760,059)

Kim Kardashian (8,647,536)

Shakira (7,307,431)

Ashton Kutcher (7,296,391)

Taylor Swift (7,255,103)

Ellen DeGeneres (7,173,495)

Most popular people on Sina's microblog (Weibo):

Yao Chen (10,179,809 followers)

Dee Hsu (9,213,824)

Kevin Tsai (8,190,725)

Zhao Wei (7,783,496)

Jung Kyung Ho (7,648,738)

Li Bingbing (7,481,904)

Xie Na (7,469,939)

Yang Mi (7,429,738)

Chen Kun (7,136,145)

Huang Jianxiang (6,609,674)

http://twitter.com

http://weibo.com

Google tablets seen overtaking iPad in 5 years

Tablet computers running Google's Android software will catch up with Apple's iPad and surpass it in 2016, research firm Informa said.

Informa said it expects Apple's current 75 percent market share to fall to 39 percent in 2015, when Android market share will grow to 38 percent.

"From 2013, as cheaper and more advanced Android tablets enter the market, we forecast that sales will pick up considerably, eventually surpassing iPad sales in 2016," analyst David McQueen said in a statement on Wednesday.

Samsung Electronics Galaxy Tab has been the best-selling Android tablet so far, but also other vendors including Motorola Mobility use it on their devices.

"We have seen a huge explosion in the tablet market in recent years, driven primarily by the iPad, and we estimate that the market will go from strength to strength, growing from under 20 million tablets sold in 2010, to over 230 million in 2015," McQueen said.

50 Percent Will Abandon Facebook for Google+, Poll Finds

As Google+'s numbers climb to an estimated 18 million users, PCMag asked readers: will you ditch Facebook for Google+?

As of publication time, a total of 6,237 readers have weighed in, overwhelmingly in favor of Google+. Half of the respondents (50 percent or 3,091 people) said they like Google+ and they plan to leave Facebook. The second most popular response came from 21 percent of voters (1,303 people) who said they're undecided, considering how new Google+ is. There's still 12 percent (733 people) of readers who said they haven't been unable to join G+ yet. The idea of social networking as a whole was rejected by 11 percent (682 people) who said they're against the whole concept. Only 7 percent (428 people) said Facebook is irreplaceable and they're sticking with it.

Despite the poll's response, it's highly unlikely there will be such a significant exodus from Facebook. Facebook boasts a membership of 750 million people—375 million people just aren't going to quit the number one social network. But the results of this informal poll point to a bigger issue: people are increasingly annoyed with Facebook.

"There is no reason to stay on horrible Facebook, period," user tlwinslow wrote. "It's the ZuckerBeast, an enemy of everyone's personal privacy, and must go, it really must go. More power to Google for providing a saner alternative."

Commenter Stephanie Daughterty also expressed some Facebook-induced frustration: "Seriously, Facebook was already on my bad side," wrote. "One word: appspam. If the only way there is for me to cut off all the FrontierVille and CityVille and all those other things that are clogging up my wall is to turn off all apps, it's a flawed model—the same flawed formula that made MySpace into the laughing stock of the social networking world."

Others argued that Google+ won't be worthwhile until more people join.

"Personally, I'll actually start using [Google+] once I see an influx of friends using it," reader Travis Brown wrote. "After all, that's why I use a social networking site in the first place. A 'cool' way to organize the people I know does not justify a move at this point."

But still, some readers appear to be loyal to Facebook.

"I see no reason to move to Google+. Facebook works well and all my friends are there," user Don Reba said.

Google+ has only been around for about a month, so how it will perform in the long run remains to be seen. The comparison of Google+ to Facebook is unavoidable, and perhaps Google has launched its social network at just the right time to take a bite out of Facebook's 750 million users; the site has been plagued by low consumer satisfaction and pervasive privacy concerns.

It's possible Google+ fans are in the honeymoon stage with the new platform, too; the fresh social network has its own issues, as Google figures out how to handle businesses and pseudonyms on the site.

RIM buys Swedish video editor for PlayBook

BlackBerry maker Research In Motion said on Friday it has bought Swedish video editing company JayCut and hinted the operation will work on features for its PlayBook tablet computer.

"By working with JayCut to add video editing capabilities to the BlackBerry platform we can further enrich our customers' multimedia experience with BlackBerry," RIM's chief technology officer, David Yach, wrote on RIM's blog.

Financial terms were not disclosed.

The seven-employee Stockholm-based company licenses its online video editor to customers.

JayCut joins Stockholm-based design company The Astonishing Tribe, which was bought by the Canadian smartphone and tablet maker in December to improve user interface.

In the blog post announcing the purchase, Yach pointed out that the PlayBook, which has struggled to wrest attention from Apple's iPad, has dual high-definition cameras, high-quality playback and can send images to a television screen via a common cable.

RIM has bought a number of companies to fill particular needs in recent years. They include QNX Software, which provides the PlayBook's operating system, and Torch Mobile, which enabled the company to upgrade its Web browser, long criticized as slow in comparison to rivals.

Anything for an Apple gadget in China - even kidney

So strong is the appeal of the Apple brand in China, some Chinese are willing to sell a kidney to pay for its gadgets.

Apple Inc's iPads, iPhones and iMacs have been a smash hit in China, especially with the affluent, and upwardly mobile, middle classes and fashion-conscious urban youth who are snapping up the slinky, easy-to-use goods with gusto.

The apparently insatiable appetite for Apple goods in the world's second largest economy is good news for the Cupertino, California-based firm, which reported forecast-smashing results this week, helped by massive growth in Asia, and China in particular.

It's also created a sizable market for knock-offs in the world's prime manufacturer of imitation goods, where pirates set up a fake Apple Store in the southwestern city of Kunming that is so good that even the employees believe it's the real deal.

"Apple is a very well-known brand in China, and that's reason enough for some people to buy," said Xu Ziqing, a 23-year-old Beijing hotel receptionist.

"Chinese people these days care very much about brands. They might not know whether the product is truly good or bad, but if it's a good brand, they will want it."

Desperation to get hold of Apple computers can lead to extreme behaviour.

Last month, state media reported that a teenager from the poor inland province of Hunan had sold one of his kidneys to be able to afford an iPad 2.

The tablet computer is also becoming the must-have accessory on Beijing's notoriously crowded, stifling subway, a transport network used mainly by middle-income white collar workers and eschewed by the wealthy.

Apple executives have said they have just scratched the surface in China, and the company is in the process of opening more stores there.

Apple's two Beijing stores -- in the shopping districts of Xidan and Sanlitun -- heave with people, even on weekdays, and on weekends, queues can stretch around the block. For many customers, Apple products are a tangible sign of belonging to a certain social strata.

"All of my friends use Apples. I thought it was time we found out what the fuss was all about," said Annie Xue, browsing a 13,000 yuan ($2,015) 27-inch iMac with her husband at one of Apple's two bustling official retail stores in Beijing.

"I've only used Windows before, and I am a little worried I won't be able to find my way around an Apple. But it seems so easy and intuitive," she added.

At the company's official Beijing stores, Apple employees claim to have heard nothing of the fake shop in Kunming.

"I can assure you that there are only four official Apple stores in China, and you're standing in one of them right now," said one employee at the crowded Sanlitun branch.

Many Chinese are attracted to Apple goods precisely because they are made by a reputable foreign company, and are not tainted with the suspicion of shoddiness that comes with many local brands.

The fact that Apple computers are all assembled in China doesn't seem to matter to many customers. Some could not believe that their country has anything to do with the gadgets they craved.

"It's made in China? Really? I had no idea," said travel agent Xiao Wang, fiddling with a shop display iPad.

"No Chinese company could make something as cool as this," she added, upon being assured it was actually designed in California. "It's money well spent."

Entire Apple stores being faked in China

China, long known for producing counterfeit consumer gadgets, software and brand name clothing, has reached a new piracy milestone — fake Apple stores.

An American who lives in Kunming in southern Yunnan province said Thursday that she and her husband stumbled on three shops masquerading as bona fide Apple stores in the city a few days ago.

She took photos and posted them on her BirdAbroad blog that show staff in blue T-shirts with the Apple logo chatting to customers in a white-walled shop with minimalist decor and signs advertising the iPad 2.

The three stores are not among the authorized resellers listed on Apple Inc.'s website. The maker of the iPhone and other hit gadgets has four company stores in China — two in Beijing and two in Shanghai — and various official resellers. Apple's Beijing office declined to comment.

The proliferation of the fake stores underlines the slow progress that China's government is making in countering a culture of a rampant piracy and widespread production of bogus goods that is a major irritant in relations with trading partners.

China's Commerce Minister promised American executives earlier this year that the latest in a string of crackdowns on product piracy would deliver lasting results.

The 27-year-old blogger, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the set-up of the stores was so convincing that the employees themselves seemed to believe they worked for Apple.

"It looked like an Apple store. It had the classic Apple store winding staircase and weird upstairs sitting area. The employees were even wearing those blue T-shirts with the chunky Apple name tags around their necks," she wrote on her blog.

"But some things were just not right: the stairs were poorly made. The walls hadn't been painted properly. Apple never writes 'Apple Store' on its signs — it just puts up the glowing, iconic fruit."

A worker at the fake Apple store on Zhengyi Road in Kunming, which most of the photos of the BirdAbroad blog show, told The Associated Press that they are an "Apple store" before hanging up.

The manager of an authorized reseller in Kunming, who gave only his surname, Zhang, said most customers have no idea the stores are fake.

Some of the staff in the stores "can't even operate computers properly or tell you all the functions of the mobile phone," he said.

"There are more and more of these fake stores in Kunming. Although they may sell real Apple products, some of those products were not imported through legal means. And they cost more."