Sunday, August 24, 2014

Messi:Lionel Messi strikes twice as 10-man Barcelona sink Elche

Lionel Messi strikes twice as 10-man Barcelona sink Elche

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Tim Hanlon

Double strike: Lionel Messi sinks Elche.
Double strike: Lionel Messi sinks Elche. Photo: AFP
BARCELONA: Lionel Messi wasted little time in finding his stride as he struck twice to lead 10-man Barcelona to a 3-0 home win over Elche and hand new coach Luis Enrique a happy start to the La Liga season on Sunday.
Youngster Munir El Haddadi hit the woodwork as did Andres Iniesta before Messi made the breakthrough, turning well in the box and slotting in after 42 minutes.
Barca's job was complicated with Javier Mascherano sent off for bringing down Garry Rodrigues a minute later but Munir, drafted into the side as a replacement for the injured Neymar, clipped home to make it 2-0 shortly after the restart.
Messi, whose Argentina side were beaten in the World Cup final by Germany in July, was the talisman once again for Barca.
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He made space for himself on the edge of the area and found the back of the net again after 63 minutes.
The result handed Luis Enrique a promising start with Barcelona after the club failed to win any major trophy last season under Gerardo Martino.
"I've always said that Messi is the best player in the world in all the ways that you want to look at it," Luis Enrique told a news conference.
"If Messi wanted to be a defender he would be the best in the world defending. We have seen him do more difficult things in training and he will keep being the best in the world as long as he wants to be.
"The game was made more difficult with the sending off and the team had to respond by playing a bit deeper but with the team we have and Messi in form it worked out."
EIBAR WIN
Luis Enrique put his confidence in youth with Munir and Rafinha given a chance in attack alongside Messi. It was a sign of veteran Xavi's changing role in the side that he was on the bench with new signing Ivan Rakitic taking his place and the Croat slotted in effortlessly in the midfield.
It was the usual Barca style with more pace than they showed for much of last season but they found it difficult to break down a well-organised Elche.
Munir has looked sharp during pre-season and his quick movement and shot almost gave Barca the lead midway through the first half but his effort came back off the crossbar.
Iniesta also struck the woodwork from 25 metres and Dani Alves failed to hit the target from inside the area before Messi gave them the lead.
Mascherano's dismissal for upending Rodrigues as last man did not unsettle Barca and having quickly got their second from Munir they never looked back.
Messi was found by Alves and he toyed with the Elche defenders, looking to go one way then the other, before picking his spot to complete the scoring.
In other matches, Eibar made their debut in the top flight with a 1-0 victory over neighbours Real Sociedad with Javi Lara scoring the only goal before halftime.
Joaquin Larrivey, Fabian Orellana and Nolito gave Celta Vigo a 3-1 victory over Getafe whose only reply came from Jorge Sammir.
Champions Atletico Madrid begin their title defence on Monday at Rayo Vallecano having lifted the Super Cup on Friday with a 2-1 aggregate win over Real Madrid, who host Cordoba in their La Liga bow on Monday. 


Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/sport/soccer/lionel-messi-strikes-twice-as-10man-barcelona-sink-elche-20140825-107zb5.html#ixzz3BNaJUgY3
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Samsung:Samsung bets on smart homes to revive growth

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Samsung bets on smart homes to revive growth

By Simon Mundy and Song Jung-a in Seoul
Samsung spokesmodel displays the connectivity feature on a Samsung smart refrigerator©Getty
Samsung smart refrigerator
At the display store underneath Samsung Electronics’ headquarters in Seoul stand a refrigerator and washing machine that draw scant attention from most of the curious visitors inspecting the group’s gadgets.
Such basic household appliances may lack the glamour of Samsung’s premium smartphones and ultra-high-resolution televisions, but they lie at the heart of a strategic push by the company: the smart home.

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This week Samsung cited its ambitions to build a “smart home business” when it announced the purchase, for an undisclosed sum, of Quietside, a US air conditioning distributor. A few days before, in a deal rumoured to be worth about $200m, it agreed to buy SmartThings, the Washington DC-based creator of a platform enabling a home’s appliances, utilities and security to be controlled using a smartphone.
The announcements underscore Samsung’s determination to build on its huge suite of electronic products to become a leader in the increasingly fashionable “internet of things”. Samsung and its rivals Google and Apple are battling to build and expand software systems that allow users to control a vast range of devices, including baby monitors and thermostats, with a few taps of their smartphones.
This month’s deals help fulfil public promises that Samsung executives made last year to chase growth through acquisition more aggressively. They also come at a time of acute nervousness about the company’s growth prospects.
Samsung’s mobile handset business drove galloping profit growth over the past three years, gaining and then consolidating a position as the world’s leading smartphone maker by unit sales. But that business’s profits have been sliding, due in part to competition from cheaper Chinese competitors, with a sharp impact on group earnings. Samsung’s operating profit fell 24 per cent in the second quarter of this year, the third consecutive quarterly decline.
A successful dive into the internet of things could reignite the performance of Samsung’s household appliances division, long seen as a dull, low-growth and low-margin business. While Samsung is the world leader by sales in TVs, the global market in many other household electronic devices remains fragmented between a large number of regional companies, notes CW Chung, an analyst at Nomura.
“But if people know Samsung products can be networked, they might be willing to pay a premium,” he says, adding that the “networking effect” could encourage customers to buy a suite of Samsung home appliances.
Apple has already exploited a similar dynamic – many of its customers are attracted by the ability to “sync” between their MacBook computer, iPad and iPhone – and the US group may prove a strong competitor for Samsung in the smart home space. It has launched a platform, HomeKit, that software developers can use to pair household devices with the iPhone, and has been developing a “hub” to co-ordinate these devices, say people familiar with the company’s plans.
Google is also investing aggressively in this field, having spent $3.7bn over the past eight months on Nest Labs, which produces “smart” home thermostats and smoke detectors, and DropCam, which makes household security cameras.
“They’re all different plays,” says Mark Newman, an analyst at Bernstein. “Samsung has all the important pieces of hardware, while Google is coming from the operating system side, and Apple has a much more integrated model.”

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Unlike Apple, which has allowed only a few companies to work with HomeKit, Samsung is opting for an open platform model where different groups work together. Last month, it formed a partnership with Intel and Dell to develop standard technologies that will make smart appliances made by the different companies compatible. Days later it announced a similar tie-up with Nest and chip designer Arm Holdings.
Yet while the smart home concept is receiving heavy attention, it has already been pursued for years with little success, warns Daniel Kim, an analyst at Macquarie. “It sounds great conceptually, but adoption of these devices has been very slow,” he says. “Home appliances are so fragmented by region . . . and it’s a very slow-moving industry.”
Yet Mr Kim sees the sector’s attraction. “I don’t think any other sector is big enough to offset the slowdown in Samsung’s smartphone business,” he adds, noting the company’s slow progress in developing other targeted long-term growth businesses such as solar power and LED lighting.
A report last year by the consultancy Berg Insight suggested that adoption of smart home technology is close to gaining meaningful momentum, predicting that nearly 50m homes in the US and Europe would install smart home systems by 2017, when annual sales of such systems would reach more than $12bn.
But such estimates are tough to make with confidence, Mr Newman warns. “It’s the next big area of growth after smartphones, but . . . how it’s going to be monetised is not very clear.”

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Facebook:Centscere, The Startup That Lets You Donate While Posting On Facebook, Is Getting Ready To Scale

Centscere, The Startup That Lets You Donate While Posting On Facebook, Is Getting Ready To Scale

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Social media users have been called in many ways, not all of them flattering: narcissistic, tech addicted, self centered, to name a few. There’s probably some truth in this, although critics sometimes seem to compare the current situation to a pre-Facebook golden age, where everybody was altruist and full of friends; an era that exists – I’m afraid – only in their imagination. Technology, as it has often been said, it’s neither good nor evil: it’s in the way that you use it.
As it turns out, you can actually use social networks not just to picture yourself in your latest selfie, but to do some good. It’s the mission behind Centsere, a startup born in Syracuse, NY, a couple of years ago, that wants to turn your social media actions into charitable donations.
Centscere’ working is pretty straightforward: you just have to create an account, choose one of about 50 charities you wish to donate to and decide how much you want to give, usually a few cents, for each “like”, and each “post” on Facebook and Twitter TWTR +1.93%. The amount is then taken from your credit card, once it reaches  a certain threshold. You can also set a monthly cap in order not to break the bank.
An algorithm takes care of the rest.
Image credits: Centscere
Image credits: Centscere
“We work with the Facebook and Twitter API’s – Centsere’s co-founder Ian Dickerson tells me – We have built a program that simply registers the interactions made by the users on their social media accounts. The backend then knows how many interactions were made by the users then multiplies it by the monetary amount that the users has designated for their interactions”.
Centscere have made some interesting moves lately to streamline the user experience and set itself as a benchmark for startups working at the intersection of technology and philanthropy: it won the Syracuse accelerator competiton – “we received $150,000 and $50,000 in marketing and branding services from Eric Mower and Associates (a marketing firm), Dickerson says – and moved to New York City”. Not that much money, but enough to keep expanding and improving the service, while the new home in the Big Apple AAPL +0.73% could help establish relations with VCs and other entrepreneurs.
The startup has also made some recent partnerships with some big NGOs, like The Alliance to End Hunger, and in September, it will also roll out a new website design, and a new logo. Perhaps even more important, it recently became a certified B Corporation, a title bestowed only to a small number of companies whose mission is to solve social and environmental issues.
In the near future, it could also expand its reach beyond Facebook and Twitter, allowing users to donate through their online behaviour on other websites. “We’ll begin to explore more social networking sites to add to our platform – Dickerson says – We have  plans to add Instagram next to our platform”.
Right now, Centscere has roughly 300 users and it has collected over $8,000 for non profits. By the end of this it would like to expand to 50,000 users and look for more funding. If successful,  it could be the best proof that social media users are not just “slacktivists”.
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Blogger Hacked:Dotcom denies hacking New Zealand blogger in dirty tricks row

Dotcom denies hacking New Zealand blogger in dirty tricks row

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  • POSTED: 25 Aug 2014 11:16

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    Internet mogul Kim Dotcom denied Monday (Aug 25) that he hacked a right-wing blogger and leaked emails that have embroiled New Zealand's conservative government in dirty tricks allegations ahead of a general election.

    Megaupload founder Kim Dotcom speaks at Bowen House in Wellington. (AFP/Marty Melville)
    WELLINGTON: Internet mogul Kim Dotcom denied Monday (Aug 25) that he hacked a right-wing blogger and leaked emails that have embroiled New Zealand's conservative government in dirty tricks allegations ahead of a general election.
    Claims arising from the stolen emails that Prime Minister John Key's government colluded with blogger Cameron Slater to smear political opponents have dominated campaigning ahead of the September 20 election, with Key dismissing any suggestion of wrong-doing. The emails were originally cited by left-wing author Nicky Hager in his book "Dirty Politics", released this month, triggering intense speculation about the source of the documents and how they were obtained.
    Slater last week said he believed Dotcom was behind the cyber-theft from his blog "Whale Oil", an allegation the German national has rejected. "Let me just be crystal clear, I have nothing to do with the hacking of Whale Oil," Dotcom told Radio New Zealand on Monday, saying the extent of his involvement with the site was to monitor it for defamatory statements. "I was going to take legal action against Cameron Slater after he has written 200-plus smear stories (about Dotcom), character assassinations," he added.
    The main thrust of the Whale Oil allegations are that one of Key's former staffers and a senior minister fed sensitive information to Slater, using his blog to damage opponents.
    Dotcom, who is fighting a US attempt to extradite him for alleged online piracy, has been an active participant in the New Zealand election, bankrolling the Internet-Mana Party in a bid to prevent Key winning a third term in office. Dotcom has made no secret of his desire to see Key ousted in the wake of the 2012 raid on his Auckland mansion, when the Megaupload founder was arrested and his online empire crippled.
    Opinion polls show the dirty tricks allegations have had a negative impact on the government -- although it does not appear to be enough, yet, to tarnish Key's chances of securing another term.
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    APPLE: 4 Ways Tim Cook Has Changed Apple as CEO

    4 Ways Tim Cook Has Changed Apple as CEO

    Apple Hosts Its Worldwide Developers Conference
    Apple CEO Tim Cook walks off stage after speaking during the Apple Worldwide Developers Conference at the Moscone West center on June 2, 2014 in San Francisco, California.Justin Sullivan—Getty Images
    When Steve Jobs stepped down as Apple’s CEO on August 24, 2011, the company’s future was anything but certain. The tech giant had become the most valuable company in the world just weeks before, thanks to a decade’s worth of wildly successful new products like the iPod, iPhone and iPad. The disruptive devices were credited almost exclusively to Jobs’ genius, and consumers as well as Wall Street analysts wondered whether Tim Cook, his soft-spoken successor, could guide Apple even higher.
    Fast forward three years and Cook has proved his doubters wrong. This week, he got quite the anniversary gift when Apple’s stock reached an all-time high, largely because of strong recent earnings reports and anticipation of the iPhone 6, rumored to be announced this fall. Apple’s new share price high is a sign investors are buying into Cook’s vision for the companys’ future, which looks different from Jobs’s.
    Here’s a look at four ways Apple has changed during the Era of Cook.

    Only Cook Could Go to China

    Jobs famously never visited China during his tenure as Apple CEO—that was Cook’s job, who served as the company’s chief operating officer before Jobs stepped down. As CEO, Cook has taken a more hands-on approach in the world’s most populous country, visiting China multiple times to meet with government officials and survey Apple’s factories there. Even more important than the trips is the deal Cook inked last year with China Mobile, the world’s largest wireless carrier, to carry the iPhone. His focus on the country has paid off handsomely. China is now Apple’s fastest-growing sales market by far, generating $5.9 billion in revenue in the most recent quarter.
    “There is no doubt [Cook] recognizes the fact that China will become Apple’s number one market,” Thomas Husson, an analyst at Forrester, said in an email to TIME.

    Goosing Apple’s Stock Through Share Buybacks

    Investors have long clamored for Apple to make better use of its massive $160 billion cash hoard. Jobs ignored a suggestion by Warren Buffet to launch a share buyback program, but Cook has launched a massive share repurchase plan to reclaim $90 billion in company stock. Such programs make investors happy by putting cash in their pockets, while also improving a company’s financial optics by boosting its earnings per share. The share repurchase plan, which was expanded earlier this year, has helped Apple stock rally in recent months after tumbling from an all-time high in September 2012. In fact, the company’s 25% gain in stock price since purchasing $18 billion of its shares in the first quarter of the year was the best return ever following a share buyback, according to Bloomberg.

    Diversifying Apple’s Core Products

    Part of Apple’s financial success stems from the fact that it manufactures a relatively small slate of products that sell on a massive scale. Cook has deviated somewhat from this strategy by introducing variants on the iPad (the iPad Mini) and the iPhone (the iPhone 5c) that serve as smaller cheaper alternatives to Apple’s flagship devices. Apple doesn’t break out the sales of individual products within the iPad and iPhone lines, but according to mobile marketing firm Fiksu, the iPad Mini was the second most-used iPad as of April. More impressive than the sales is the fact that Cook has been able to keep Apple’s margins impressively high while adding new production costs.
    “Jobs did a lot of the heavy lifting developing home run products such as the iPad and iPhone,” says Bill Kreher, an equity analyst at Edward Jones. “Cook has been able to extend the reach of those products, improving profitability.”

    Increasing Apple’s Acquisitions and Partnerships

    Apple made few acquisitions in the Jobs era, and they were generally small. Cook, on the other hand, has bought up 23 companies since taking the reins, according to Crunchbase. No buyout caused more waves than Apple’s $3 billion purchase of Beats Electronics, which was either a smart acqui-hire of Beats’ music and marketing maestros or proof that Apple has lost its creative spark, depending on your perspective. The purchase mainly showed that Cook isn’t afraid to seek help from outside his Cupertino headquarters. For more evidence, consider Apple’s recently announced partnership with former nemesis IBM to bring a suite of enterprise apps to iOS.
    Make no mistake—investors are still clamoring for Cook to release a new product disruptive as the iPhone or the iPad. Rumors persist that Apple will eventually launch an iWatch, or perhaps a pay-TV service to compete with cable. For now, though, with iPhone sales climbing ever higher and investors’ pockets being lined through a share buyback, Wall Street seems content with Apple’s trajectory.
    “You have Steve Jobs, who was the innovator, the visionary, says Kreher, “and you have Tim Cook, who is a good steward of the business and is an excellent executor.”

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