'After Earth' Bows at Number One in Japan But Fails to Dazzle

TOKYO – After Earth topped the charts on its opening weekend in Japan, but failed to light up the box office with a gross of $2.57 million (250 million yen) in its first three days on more than 570 screens, as the Will and Jaden Smith-starrer continues its mediocre global run.

By way of comparison, Oblivion bowed in Japan with a $4.4 million opening weekend at the start of June.

With local analysts predicting a $10 million final total for After Earth in Japan, the third largest theatrical market after the U.S. and China, the film may still struggle to cover its production and marketing budget.

PHOTOS: Hollywood Dynasties: Top 14 Movies Featuring Stars and Their Kids

100 Kai Naku Koto (Cry 100 Times), a memory loss love story directed by Ryuichi Hiroki, bowed at number two during the weekend, taking $1.59 million (155 million yen) from 223 screens, a solid start for distributor Showgate Inc, a subsidiary of advertising agency Hakuhodo.

The two debutantes knocked The Great Gatsby into third place after it had opened at the top spot last week.

G.I. Joe Retaliation, released locally as G.J. Back 2 Revenge, fell to fifth in the weekend rankings in its third week of release. One place below it was Oblivion, which has now earned more than $10 million locally in its first month.

STORY: Could 'After Earth' End Will Smith's Box Office Domination?

The Complex (Kuroyuri Danchi), the supernatural thriller from The Ring director Hideo Nakata, which has also passed the $10 million mark, fell to ninth in its sixth week of release.   

Propping up the chart after three weeks in theaters is Antoine Fuqua's Olympus Has Fallen, released in Japan as End of Whitehouse.

 

Obama Will Not Meet With Critically Ill Mandela

President Barack Obama plans to visit privately Saturday with relatives of former South African President Nelson Mandela, but doesn't intend to see the critically ill anti-apartheid activist he has called a "personal hero."

The White House did not disclose any details for Obama's plans to meet the family in a brief statement issued upon Obama's first morning in South Africa during a weeklong tour of the continent. The statement simply said that Obama and his wife would offer their thoughts and prayers at the family's difficult time.

"Out of deference to Nelson Mandela's peace and comfort and the family's wishes, they will not be visiting the hospital," the statement said.

Obama told reporters on the flight to South Africa Friday that he was grateful that he, his wife and daughters had a chance to meet Mandela previously. Obama hangs his photo of the introduction he had to Mandela in 2005 in his personal office at the White House — their only meeting, when Obama was a senator.

"I don't need a photo op," Obama said. "The last thing I want to do is to be in any way obtrusive at a time when the family is concerned about Nelson Mandela's condition."

Obama will be just a couple miles from the hospital where 94-year-old Mandela has been for three weeks after being admitted with a lung infection. The U.S. president has a bilateral meeting and news conference with President Jacob Zuma at the Union Buildings, where Mandela was inaugurated as the country's first black president in 1994 after 27 years behind bars under racist rule.

Obama has said the imprisoned activist's willingness to risk his life for the cause of equal rights helped inspire his own political activism. Obama said his message during the visit will draw on the lessons of Mandela's life, with a message that "Africa's rise will continue" if its people are unified instead of divided by tribe, race or religion.

"I think the main message we'll want to deliver if not directly to him but to his family is simply a profound gratitude for his leadership all these years and that the thoughts and prayers of the American people are with him and his family and his country," Obama said on his flight into the country.

Obama also is paying tribute to the fight against apartheid by visiting the Soweto area Saturday afternoon for a town hall with students at the University of Johannesburg. At least 176 young people were killed in Soweto township 27 years ago this month during a youth protest against the apartheid regime's ban against teaching local Bantu languages. The Soweto Uprising catalyzed international support against apartheid, and June is now recognized as Youth Month in South Africa.

The university plans to bestow an honorary law degree on the U.S. president, while protesters are planning demonstrations against U.S. policy on issues including the U.S. detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, the war in Afghanistan and global warming. Hundreds marched to the U.S. Embassy on Friday, carrying signs that read: "No, You Can't Obama," a message inspired by Obama's "yes, we can" campaign slogan.

Obama, the son of an African man, has been trying to inspire the continent's youth to become civically active and part of a new democratically minded generation. Obama hosted young leaders from more than 40 African countries at the White House in 2010 and challenged them to bring change to their countries by standing up for freedom, openness and peaceful disagreement.

Obama wraps up his South Africa stay Sunday, when he plans to give a sweeping speech on U.S.-Africa policy at the University of Cape Town and take his family to Robben Island to tour the prison where Mandela spent 18 years.

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Gay Marriage Battle Shifts To States

Advocates for gay marriage in New Jersey gather outside the Statehouse on Thursday.

Gay rights activists celebrated two big victories this week before the U.S. Supreme Court, as justices overturned the Defense of Marriage Act and cleared the way for same-sex marriages in California.

Now gay marriage opponents and supporters are turning their attention to individual states, like New Jersey, where polls show most residents support same-sex marriage. So far, one person, Gov. Christ Christie, has stood in the way.

"I believe that the institution of marriage for 2,000 years has been between a man and a woman, and I believe that it should continue to be," Christie said recently on a radio call-in show in Trenton last week.

Heading into a re-election campaign, Christie remains popular, even though most voters in the state disagree with him on this issue. He says advocates should put the issue before voters in November with a referendum.

"The proponents have said all along that the majority of people in New Jersey want it," he told radio listeners. "Well then put it on the ballot and then it'll pass and then it's the end of the discussion."

Privately some gay marriage supporters say they want to avoid an expensive campaign. But more important, they say a referendum is not how they want to win.

Sheila Oliver, speaker of the New Jersey General Assembly, says guaranteeing civil rights should be the role of courts and lawmakers. Last year New Jersey's legislature approved a gay marriage bill, but Christie vetoed it.

"Many of our legislative leaders believe that civil rights should not be litigated in a public referendum," Oliver said. "I think the next tactic you will see in the next coming weeks in New Jersey are efforts to get a veto override."

Hayley Gorenberg, an attorney with Lamda Legal, said at a rally Thursday that there's a clear legal argument now to establish same-sex marriages in the Garden State. New Jersey already has civil unions, but gay rights groups want full marriage.

"Based on the Supreme Court decision, we will file a motion for summary judgment for an immediate ruling that same-sex couples be allowed to marry," Gorenberg told supporters.

In neighboring Pennsylvania, several Democratic lawmakers are introducing same-sex marriage legislation. But those bills will likely have an uphill battle in the Republican-dominated legislature.

On Wednesday, Democratic State Rep. Brian Sims, who is gay, tried to make a statement on the House floor, but Republicans blocked him.

Speaking on member station WHYY, GOP State Rep. Daryl Metcalfe said he felt
obliged to stop Sims from making comments "that ultimately were just open rebellion against what the word of God has said, what God has said, and just open rebellion against God's law."

Most states in the U.S. don't allow same-sex marriages. But now, with California, about 30 percent of the U.S. population will live in states that do have gay marriage. Supporters believe the list of states will grow.

Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn says he hopes his state will soon make gay marriage legal. There's talk of campaigns and legal battles in places like Hawaii, Nevada, Oregon and Ohio.

Colorado allows civil unions, but University of Denver law professor Kris Miccio says she wants full marriage. She believes the Supreme Court's rulings last week give her a good argument to make in court. So she and her partner have a plan.

"We're going to be married the Saturday after Thanksgiving in New York," Miccio said. "And then coming back to Colorado and filing suit."

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What [BLANK] Folks Don't Understand About Rachel Jeantel

Witness Rachel Jeantel continues her testimony to defense attorney Don West during the trial of George Zimmerman on Thursday.

Rachel Jeantel. Her hours-long testimony spanned two days of the George Zimmerman trial, and I bet you'll be talking about it with your friends over the weekend. She's the 19-year-old key witness for the prosecution who had a cellphone conversation with Trayvon Martin moments before he was killed.

And she most definitely touched a nerve.

Multimedia reporter Sherri Williams created a pretty thorough Storify with what she called "good, bad and ugly tweets about Rachel Jeantel," since Jeantel's national television debut this Wednesday. Most of the tweets are just plain "bad and ugly." Folks say Jeantel is overweight; that she has poor diction, bad fashion, and an even worse attitude.

And #RachelJeantel is not just trending on Twitter. (Assume anything we link to in this post has salty language.) I woke up Friday morning to a conversation about her "unusual testimony" on drive-time commercial talk radio, and bloggers have been busy analyzing why Jeantel has been such a target for the past few days.

GlobalGrind had two posts that touched on similar issues — how Jeantel's testimony would be misunderstood by white people. Rachel Samara wrote that Jeantel's defensiveness on the stand would most likely be misunderstood by a predominantly white jury. "Rachel Jeantel's attitude is exactly what I would expect from someone from the hood who has no media training and who is fully entrenched in a hostile environment," she wrote. "There's nothing wrong with it."

Her colleague Christina Coleman wrote about how stark cultural differences between black and white Americans created a "lost in translation" situation in the courtroom. Black people watching the trial would get why Jeantel might not call the police after she knew there had been an altercation, Coleman said, "because the fear and doubt that comes with dealing with law enforcement is as entwined into the tapestry of [black] culture as is our slavery past."

On Twitter, many other people (including Geraldo!) echoed this argument.

But a good number of the tweets I came across during Jeantel's testimony were from people of color, many from folks eager to see George Zimmerman convicted. And those tweets paint a complicated picture.

Jeantel's testimony during the Zimmerman trial stirred up a lot of complicated feelings, including among people of color. There were tweets of shame, embarrassment, and anger at the public education system right alongside feelings of pride and solidarity. Not as easy to unpack as a binary that says, White people don't get her and black people do.

It's a cliche to say that no group of people is monolithic. But seriously, no group of people is monolithic. What we see in Rachel Jeantel says more about us as individuals than as members of a group, and certainly more than it says about Jeantel herself.

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Mandela Is 'Inspiration To The World,' Obama Says

Friday in Pretoria, South Africa, people gathered outside a hospital to pray for former President Nelson Mandela. He remains in critical condition with a lung infection.

Hailing Nelson Mandela's "moral courage," President Obama on Saturday paid tribute to the anti-apartheid icon and former South African president, who remains hospitalized in critical condition. Doctors have been treating him for a lung infection for the past three weeks.

Speaking in Pretoria at a joint news conference with South African President Jacob Zuma, the American leader said "Madiba" (Mandela's clan name, by which he is affectionately known in South Africa) and South Africa's transition to a "free and democratic nation" have been "a personal inspiration to me ... [and] an inspiration to the world."

Mandela, whose 95th birthday is July 18, has been hospitalized since June 8. In his welcome to Obama on Saturday, Zuma said South Africans "continue to pray for Madiba's good health and well-being." Zuma's office has not updated its information about Mandela's health since Thursday, when it reported that he had improved somewhat but remained in critical condition.

Obama is to meet with Mandela's family privately during his visit to Pretoria, but will not be going to the hospital where Mandela is being treated. According to a statement from the White House, "out of deference to Nelson Mandela's peace and comfort and the family's wishes, [the Obama family] will not be visiting the hospital."

The president told reporters Friday that "the last thing I want to do is to be in any way obtrusive at a time when the family is concerned about Nelson Mandela's condition."

On Sunday, Obama and his family plan to visit Robben Island, where Mandela and others were imprisoned during the long struggle against apartheid.

As we've previously written:

Mandela, NPR's Jason Beaubien reminds us, was born in a country that viewed him as a second-class citizen. But from his childhood as a herd boy, Mandela went on to lead the African National Congress' struggle against the racially oppressive, apartheid regime of South Africa. For his efforts, he spent 27 years behind bars as a political prisoner, finally being released in 1990.
In 1993, Mandela shared the Nobel Peace Prize with former South African President Frederik Willem de Klerk — the nation's last white leader. They were recognized for "their work for the peaceful termination of the apartheid regime, and for laying the foundations for a new democratic South Africa."
Then, in 1994, Mandela was elected president in South Africa's first democratic elections. He pledged to serve just one term and left office in 1999.

Outside the hospital where Mandela is being treated, "supporters have been gathering," as South Africa's News 24 reports:

" 'I came to pray for our father Nelson Mandela. We are wishing for our father to be fine,' said Thabo Mahlangu, aged 12, part of a group from a home for abandoned children who travelled to Pretoria.
"A wall of handwritten prayers for Mandela's recovery has become the focal point for South Africans paying tribute to the father of their nation, with singing and dancing by day and candlelight vigils at night.
"One message read: 'If you can fight prison, you can beat this.' "

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War Correspondent's Unflinching 'Diary Of A Very Bad Year'

In early 2011, I started seeing things in slow motion. I cried unpredictably. It was the time of the Arab uprisings. Colleagues and friends were getting kidnapped. Some were getting killed.

But still, I went toward the story. The next year, 2012 was one of the deadliest years on record for journalists. It was a huge hit to the "tribe" of conflict correspondents of which I am a part. These are people who choose to go to war, to put themselves at risk. But we also enjoy the role, the adrenaline, the life. Some of us have children.

As I reported in Bahrain, Yemen, and Syria, I recorded the tear-gassings, the gunfire, the explosions. I also turned the microphone on my own life, recording diaries and seeking advice from doctors, scientists and colleagues. My goal was to answer one question: Why do otherwise intelligent people risk their lives, when they don't have to?

Nearly two years later, in collaboration with independent producer Jay Allison of Transom.org, the result is a documentary radio hour called "Diary of a Bad Year: A War Correspondent's Dilemma."

To understand how many of us persuade ourselves to be conflict correspondents, consider a story. It was told to me by a former British soldier, who now works as a security adviser for media companies. She told me this story as we drove through rebel-held Syria.

She was working with a major news organization in Baghdad, during some of the most violent years of the Iraq War. She was a trained medic, and it soon became clear she needed to order some body bags. Iraq is hot in the summer. The logistics of repatriating a body in wartime were a challenge.
 
To put it bluntly, if someone died, she was going to need a place to store his or her body for a few days, while she worked out how to get that body home. But she knew how controversial this would be. So she ordered the bags and hid them at the bureau. Sure enough, a producer stumbled upon the bags.

And freaked out.

The security adviser tried to explain, but the whole situation ended in a row.

"This is the crux of the problem," she later told me. "As a soldier, I'm prepared for death. I have to be. I have my will in order, I know exactly what my insurance will cover, I have written that letter to my family — just in case. I make no pretense about the fact that this work could end in death."

"You people?" she said, referring to journalists. "You are all in denial."
 
It's a story that rings true. Every time I go into a dangerous situation, I try to think of the consequences, but I also have an air of invincibility involved. "There's no way that could happen to me," I often tell myself. "I'll be smarter than that guy was."

This is why when a journalist dies in conflict, we are outraged. We are furious that they died. We ask for investigations and inquiries. While I know this might be a controversial thing to say, perhaps our anger is misplaced. Perhaps we should all be willing to accept that if a reporter is going into conflict, that reporter might die?

Perhaps instead of pretending this could never happen, we should assume it will happen. We should prepare ourselves. Making this piece was about my own journey, my own decisions, but I also hope it will help the next shift of conflict correspondents, who are going into this for the first time.

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Preserving The Season's Fruits With A Canning Evangelist

Kevin West is a "canning evangelist," and he's the author of Saving the Season, a colorful guide to preserving the bounty from a backyard vegetable harvest — or a compulsive farmers market shopping spree.

Shopping at a farmers market on a weekend morning can turn bittersweet if your eye for just-picked summer fruit is bigger than your refrigerator and appetite.

A Cook's Guide to Home Canning, Pickling, and Preserving
by Kevin West


Hardcover, 532 pages | purchase
close Saving the SeasonA Cook's Guide to Home Canning, Pickling, and PreservingKevin West
That's a crisis first-time cookbook author Kevin West found himself in a few years back. After one particular farmers market spree, West's buyer's remorse came from a big package of fresh strawberries.

With too many delicious strawberries to eat, West turned to a family tradition: canning and preserving.

This old-school kitchen ritual is the topic of his book, Saving the Season: a cook's guide to home canning, preserving and pickling.

On a sunny and bright day in Washington, D.C., Weekend Edition guest host Lynn Neary hit the farmers market with West to find the right ingredients to preserve.

"With strawberries, I smell them first," West said. "They should have that rich nostalgic smell of strawberries. And if passes those two tests, look and smell, then we want to do a taste test."

The taste test might be the most important selection technique:
Don't mistake a small berry for a bad one — tiny fruits often have the best flavor.Don't use only sweet berries to make jam. Combine tart with sugary ones to get the right balance.
West is truly a canning evangelist.

"This is a real moment. It's a moment in the year, it's a moment in our lives," he said.

He says the time between spring and summer seasons can often bring the most rewarding preserved products later in the year.

"And that's part of what I mean by saving the season is you take this experience in the annual cycle ... and you put it in the jar. And six months from now we will re-experience that moment."

RECIPE: Basic Strawberry Jam

Yields 2 pints

2 pounds ripe strawberries

2 1/2 cups sugar

1 tablespoon freshly squeezed lemon juice

Optional: a few scrapings of lemon zest

To get started, go shopping at a farmers market or roadside farm stand if at all possible, and seek out the smallest, reddest berries. Fragrance is a good indicator of quality, but tasting is better still. The giant strawberries favored by supermarket produce managers are not a good choice. I call them "Pamela Anderson fruit," artificially enhanced and tasteless.
Briefly rinse the berries and remove their caps. Combine with the sugar, lemon juice, and zest, if using, in a large bowl, and crush with a potato masher (or your hands).Turn the fruit-sugar mixture into a preserving pan, and bring to a boil over high heat, stirring regularly. Reduce at a full rolling boil, stirring all the while, to the gel point, 8 to 10 minutes, depending on the size of your pan and the strength of the heat source.Once a gel set has been achieved, skim if necessary, and ladle the hot jam into four prepared 1/2-pint jars, leaving 1/4 inch head space. Seal, and process in a boiling-water bath for 10 minutes.
The sugar content in this recipe is lower than in many traditional farmhouse recipes, but there's still enough for a soft-set consistency and to ensure a reasonably long shelf life once opened. ...

Also, do not double the quantities, at least not initially. A small batch is cheaper, faster, more manageable, and better suited to the size of standard household equipment. If you want more jars, make two small batches. I can assure you from personal experience that you'll be happier with the outcome. In fact, the more experienced I get, the more I'm inclined to do three or four jars at a time — a nice little job to knock off in an hour, rather than a labor that wrings the fun out of the afternoon.

These snappy dill pickles were once Kirby cucumbers. The canning liquid is made with vinegar, fennel and coriander seeds that give them their distinct tart flavor.

RECIPE: Cucumber Dill Spears And Chips

Yields 2 quarts

Processing your pickles in a hot-water bath rather than a boiling-water bath will give you a firmer texture. It follows that if you want pickles with real snap, don't process them at all. These dill-pickle spears — or sandwich chips, depending on how you slice them — can be processed, if you want, for long-term shelf storage, but first try making a batch to keep in the refrigerator. They will be crisp, and the flavor of raw cucumber comes through. It's the freshest-tasting pickle in this book, and perhaps my favorite. The recipe can be scaled up.

1/4 cup kosher salt

6 cups lukewarm water

2 teaspoons coriander seeds

1/2 teaspoon fennel seeds

3 large flowering dill heads (4 inches across)

3 pounds Kirby pickling cucumbers

4 cloves garlic, crushed

2 cups white-wine vinegar
Dissolve the salt in the water, and add the coriander, fennel, and dill. Set aside.Scrub the cucumbers well, rubbing off any spines. Cut away a thin round from the stem and blossom ends, and slice lengthwise into quarters. Put the spears in a large bowl, and cover with the brine. Weight the cucumbers with a plate, cover the bowl with a kitchen towel, and set aside for 24 hours. If the bowl won't fit in your refrigerator, it's fine to leave it out at room temperature.The next day, pack the cucumber spears into two scalded quart jars, saving the brine. Measure out 2 cups of the brine and reserve. Strain the remaining brine through a fine sieve to capture the aromatics, and divide them between the jars. Tuck a dill head and two cloves of garlic into each jar.Mix the vinegar and the 2 cups reserved brine, and bring to a boil. Pour it over the pickles to cover. Seal the jars, and store in the refrigerator for a week before using. For long-term shelf storage, leave 1/2-inch head space when filling the jars, then seal. Process in a boiling-water bath for 10 minutes, or in a hot-water bath, between 180 and 185 degrees, for 30 minutes.
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Facebook, Foursquare, and Flipboard lead a flood of big-name Windows 8 apps

Don’t be fooled by all this blabber about Windows 8.1 being Microsoft’s grand chance for a re-do—talk I’m admittedly guilty of myself. Windows 8.1 does a terrific job of refining Microsoft’s modern-style vision, but as an operating system built from the ground up to revolve around an app-based experience, it—and specifically the Start screen—can never truly shine unless the Windows Store is stuffed.

 

That’s a big problem, since both the quantity and the quality of the Windows Store’s selection has been lackluster thus far. Microsoft seems to be tackling the issue head-on, though: Not only did the number of apps in the Windows Store spike in the weeks ahead of Build 2013, but Microsoft took advantage of the developer conference to announce a slew of high-profile apps coming to Windows 8’s virtual marketplace.

 

Here’s a rundown of the biggest apps destined to land on the Windows Store’s currently dusty shelves.

Yes! A Facebook app is coming to the Windows Store.

Finally—finally—a proper Facebook app is coming to Windows 8, where we hope it will embrace the modern style as wholeheartedly as the Windows 8 Twitter app. While no official launch date was announced, you can look forward to a day where “Pin an IE shortcut to the Start screen” isn’t Microsoft’s official answer to the missing Facebook-app question.



Yes, the popular social check-in service is coming to Windows 8 at some unspecified point in the future, Microsoft announced yesterday. Live Tile fanatics will no longer have to rely on third-party alternative apps to become the mayor of their favorite taco carts! The few screenshots Microsoft showd really seem to nail the modern motif.

MicrosoftFlipboard was one of three apps Steve Ballmer specifically mentioned at Wednesday’s Build 2013 keynote.

Don’t worry, we’ll get to apps that don’t start with F soon.

 

Flipboard is a newsreader app with an image-heavy style that should translate well to Windows 8. It’s similar to the Microsoft-exclusive New Bento. Flipboard pulls in not just news, but also posts from your various social feeds, making it close to a one-stop, up-to-the-minute news shop. It’s incredibly popular on iOS and Android, so look for the app to make waves in the Windows Store whenever it launches, too.



Streaming music services haven’t exactly stampeded to Microsoft’s camp. Aside from Slacker Radio, Nokia Music, a couple of apps that play digital streams of terrestrial radio, and Microsoft’s own baked-in Music app, all has been quiet on the Windows front. Microsoft’s storefront still doesn’t have dedicated Pandora, Spotify, MOG, or Rdio apps—but now, it does rock one of the most storied names in streaming music: Rhapsody.

 

Available now, the Rhapsody app is free, though you’ll need a premium Rhapsody subscription to use it. Don’t have one of those? You can sign up for a free trial right from the app’s starting screen.



OpenTable lets you make real-time reservations at tens of thousands of restaurants across the country, making it handy-dandy for Windows-tablet-wielding foodies. Seriously, if a restaurant has any sort of Web presence whatsoever, you can probably find it on OpenTable—and you can find the OpenTable app in the Windows Store right now.



Rockmelt is kind of like Flipboard, but with a few extra wrinkles. In addition to displaying the sites, YouTube feeds, and social feeds you follow (in modern-tinged visual fashion, natch) on the opening screens, Rockmelt lets you check out the latest news in more than a dozen preset categories, like Cars, Business, Travel, and Tech & Geek. It’s a pretty nifty app, and it, too, is available in the Windows Store right now.

 

Now we know what all those NFL coaches are doing with all those Surface tablets: Playing fantasy football! At the Build keynote on Wednesday, Steve Ballmer announced that NFL apps are Windows 8-bound, starting with a Fantasy Football app. The exact release date is yet to be announced, but here’s hoping we’ll see it before opening day (September 5, in case you were curious).



The somewhat creepily named Where’s My Mickey? is already available in the Windows Store, but that’s just the tip of the torrent. Microsoft announced that Avengers: Initiative, Monsters University, Temple Run: Oz, Toy Story Smash It!, and Wreck-It Ralph apps are all inbound this fall.

 

That’s a flood of fairly big-name apps. In the weeks and months ahead of Build 2013, we saw additional high-profile Windows Store releases like MLB.tv, Nokia Music, Twitter, Vevo, and a Discovery Channel app. Build also brought a momentous under-the-hood announcement when the uber-popular Unity game engine announced support for Windows 8, along with Windows Phone 8 and Xbox One. And of course, Windows 8.1 packs a few new native apps of its own, like Reading List and Health & Fitness.

 

Yes, there are still some prominent Windows Store no-shows, but the recent announcements show that Microsoft’s wooing of developers is finally starting to pay off. The Windows Store still has a long road to travel before it becomes a compelling destination, but at least it finally appears to be on the right track.

 

The next question: Can Microsoft keep up the momentum, or did it exhaust all its star power in a big Build blow-out? Keep an eye on the Windows Store in the coming months.

 

 

BlackBerry can rise from the ashes as a leader in MDM

The clock is winding down on BlackBerry’s days as a mobile OS or mobile device maker. BlackBerry divulged its quarterly earnings figures today, and it’s not a pretty picture: BlackBerry the company will survive, but it’s time to throw in the towel on BlackBerry the mobile platform vendor.

 

Wall Street expected 7.3 million smartphone shipments. The reality was a more meager 6.8 million smartphones. Wall Street projected that BlackBerry would ship 3.3 million BlackBerry 10 devices—one bullish analyst went so far as to suggest that number would be 3.6 million. The tally for BB10 devices was a mere 2.7 million. Wall Street projected revenue of $3.4 billion, but BlackBerry reported a paltry $3.1 billion.

Heins revealed disappointing results for the most recent quarter.

Do those figures assure that the end is nigh for BlackBerry as a company? Not necessarily, but this should have been BlackBerry’s biggest quarter in years. This was supposed to be its moment to shine. It was BlackBerry’s last best chance to demonstrate that after all the setbacks and delays, BlackBerry 10 was worth the wait, and that the company is back and ready to go head-to-head with iOS, Android, and Windows Phone.

 

BlackBerry didn’t even meet conservative Wall Street expectations, in a quarter that included the launch of the BlackBerry Z10 and BlackBerry Q10. This is the pinnacle. Demand for BlackBerry devices will never be any higher, and the fight for market share will not get any easier. So, yes—the future looks very bleak for BlackBerry as a mobile platform.

 

I recently spent a few weeks using a BlackBerry Z10 in place of my iPhone 5. It is an OK device in terms of hardware. I like its size it better than the massive Nokia Lumia 928 or the gargantuan Samsung Galaxy S4. The BB10 OS was OK as well. It has some cool and unique features, but it lacks most of the apps I use frequently and have come to rely on.

 

The bottom line for BB10 and BB10 smartphones is that “OK” is not good enough. Evaluated from rom a consumer market perspective, BlackBerry 10 was DOA. “OK” means that users at companies that still mandate the use of BlackBerry devices finally have smartphones that are at least from the same era as rivals running the iOS, Android, and Windows Phone operating systems. But once BlackBerry customers held hostage by their existing investments in the BlackBerry ecosystem escape, almost no one will buy a BlackBerry by choice.

IDGNSThe BlackBerry Z10 and Q10 will not save the company.

I've said negative things about BlackBerry's fate before, and some readers replied with comments declaring BB10 to be the best mobile OS ever, and that they and everyone they knew immediately traded in their iPhones and Android smartphones to switch to the BlackBerry Z10. But I haven't seen any evidence of that happening. Anywhere. Ever.

 

I then asked my Facebook, Google+, and Twitter contacts—a combined audience of about 35,000 (plus whatever extended audience might have seen the question after the fact)—if they or anyone they knew had intentionally switched from another platform to a BB10 smartphone without their employer holding a gun to their head. Crickets. Not a single person responded to say they had even heard of such a thing.

 

The only reason BlackBerry’s quarter was as good as it was is the pent-up demand from customers who are locked into BlackBerry. Beyond that, there is no demand, and it will get only worse from here.

 

I sounded the death of BlackBerry as a mobile platform or device manufacturer more than a year ago, predicting that BlackBerry Mobile Fusion would be the future for BlackBerry. I still think the company can emerge from its ashes and re-establish itself as a mobile device management (MDM) company.

 

It seems BlackBerry CEO Thorsten Heins is beginning to see things that way, too. He devoted much of the earnings call to spinning the quarterly results. Heins' message was essentially “Don’t pay attention to the dismal smartphone sales and revenue figures, just look at the silver lining: BlackBerry isn’t just a device company—it can live on as an enterprise mobility company.”

 

BlackBerry is already marching in that direction, starting with BlackBerry Mobile Fusion. The company has also announced plans to make BlackBerry Messenger (BBM) available on iOS and Android. More recently, it added that BlackBerry Secure Work Space will also be offered for iOS and Android. Do you see the pattern?

 

The ship has sailed on BlackBerry as a mobile platform, and BlackBerry smartphones and tablets are not long for this world. But many companies remain entrenched in the BlackBerry ecosystem. They love BBM. They appreciate the security and the control BlackBerry provides. By extending the features and capabilities that customers love most about BlackBerry to iOS and Android, BlackBerry enables its customers to incorporate or transition to other platforms without losing the BlackBerry mobile-management tools they value so highly.

 

BlackBerry invented mobile device management before there was an MDM market. It makes sense for BlackBerry to surrender the mobile platform and device market, and assert its role as the dominant MDM player.

 

 

Here's what an eavesdropper sees when you use an unsecured Wi-Fi hotspot

You’ve probably read at least one story with warnings about using unsecure public Wi-Fi hotspots, so you know that eavesdroppers can capture information traveling over those networks. But nothing gets the point across as effectively as seeing the snooping in action. So I parked myself at my local coffee shop the other day to soak up the airwaves and see what I could see.

 

My intent wasn't to hack anyone's computer or device—that's illegal—but just to listen. It’s similar to listening in on someone’s CB or walkie-talkie radio conversation. Like CBs and walkie-talkies, Wi-Fi networks operate on public airwaves that anyone nearby can tune into.

 

As you'll see, it’s relatively easy to capture sensitive communication at the vast majority of public hotspots—locations like cafes, restaurants, airports, hotels, and other public places. You can snag emails, passwords, and unencrypted instant messages, and you can hijack unsecured logins to popular websites. Fortunately, ways exist to protect your online activity while you’re out-and-about with your laptop, tablet, and other Wi-Fi gadgets. I'll touch on those, too.

 

I opened my laptop at the coffee shop and began capturing Wi-Fi signals, technically called 802.11 packets, with the help of a free trial of a wireless network analyzer. The packets appeared on screen in real time as they were captured—much more quickly than I could read them—so I stopped capturing after a few minutes to analyze what I had vacuumed up. Note: You can click on any of these screenshots to view larger versions that are easier to read.

My own website, captured via the hotspot packets and reassembled for viewing.

I first searched for packets containing HTML code, to see which websites other hotspot users were browsing. While I did see activity from other patrons, I didn’t capture anything interesting, so I visited my own website—www.egeier.com—on my smartphone.

This is a copy of the email I sent (and subsequently received) using my smartphone connected to the hotspot.

The raw packets with HTML code looked like gibberish, but as you can see above, the trial network analyzer I used reassembled the packets and displayed them as a regular webpage view. The formatting was slightly off and some of the images were missing, but plenty of information still came through.

 

I didn’t find anyone else sending or receiving emails during my visit, but I did discover the test messages I sent and received via my smartphone while it was connected to the hotspot. Since I use an app to connect to my email service via POP3 without encryption, you could have seen my login credentials along with the message (I've blurred the username and password in the screenshot).

 

This is all the information someone would need to configure their email client to use my account and start receiving my emails. They might also be able to send emails from my account.

And these are the packets that went over the network when I sent an instant message using Yahoo Instant Messenger.

I also used Yahoo Messenger to send a message while I was capturing Wi-Fi signals. Sure enough, the tool plucked that information out of the air, too. You should never use an unencrypted instant-messaging service with any expectation of privacy.

 

If you still use FTP (File Transfer Protocol) to download, upload, or share files, you should avoid connecting to them over unsecured hotspots. Most FTP servers use unencrypted connections, so both login credentials and content are sent in plain text, where any eavesdropper can easily capture them.

These captured packets reveal the username and password securing my FTP server (I've blurred them in this screenshot).

While using my laptop to connect to my own Web server’s FTP server, I was able to capture the packets containing my login ID and password—details that would have enabled any nearby eavesdropper to to gain unfettered access to my websites.

 

Computers aren’t the only devices susceptible to eavesdropping. I also ran an app called DroidSheep on my spare rooted Android smartphone. This app can be used to gain access to private accounts on popular Web services, such as Gmail, LinkedIn, Yahoo, and Facebook.

 

DroidSheep looks for and lists any unsecure logins to popular websites. While it doesn’t capture the passwords to those sites, it can exploit a vulnerability that allows you to open the site using another person’s current session, giving you full access to their account in the process.

 

As you can see from the screenshot below, DroidSheep detected Google, LinkedIn, and Yahoo logins from other people who were connected to the hotspot, as well as the Facebook login I made on my other smartphone.

DroidSheep detected other users' log-ins, which means those accounts were vulnerable to hijacking.
.

I couldn’t legally access other people’s logins, of course, but I did open my own Facebook login.

Using DroidSheep, I was able to access my own Facebook page without providing a user ID or password. I could have done the same with any other patron's accounts if they were logged in.

Once I’d done that, I could magically access my Facebook account on that rooted Android phone (see the screen at lower right) without ever providing my username or password from that device.

 

Now that you’ve seen just how easy it is for someone to eavesdrop on your Wi-Fi, here's how you can use a public hotspot with some degree of security:

Every time you log in to a website, make sure that your connection is encrypted. The URL address should start with https instead of http.You also need to make sure that the connection stays encrypted for all of your online session. Some websites, including Facebook, will encrypt your log-in and then return you to an unsecured session—leaving you vulnerable to hijacking, as discussed earlier.Many sites give you the option of encrypting your entire session. You can do this with Facebook by enabling Secure Browsing in the Security settings.When you check your email, try to login via the Web browser and ensure that your connection is encrypted (again, look for https at the beginning of the URL). If you use an email client such as Outlook, make sure your POP3 or IMAP and SMTP accounts are configured with encryption turned on.Never use FTP or other services that aren’t encrypted.To encrypt your Web browsing and all other online activity, use a VPN, or virtual private network (this article will show you how).Keep in mind that private networks have similar vulnerabilities: Anyone nearby can eavesdrop on the network. Enabling WPA or WPA2 security will encrypt the Wi-Fi traffic, obscuring the actual communications, but anyone who also has that password will be able to snoop on the packets traveling over the network. This is particularly important for small businesses that don’t use the enterprise (802.1X) mode of WPA or WPA2 security that prevents

Are miniature Windows 8 tablets useful? Surprisingly so

The Acer Iconia W3 flips Windows computing on its head, rotating the screen into an 8.1-inch, easy-to-hold, portrait form factor. This may seem like a trivial improvement, but it’s more significant than you might think.

 

Microsoft offered the Acer Iconia W3-810 to all attendees at its Build 2013 conference this week, following an early June unveiling of the small tablet at the Computex trade show. I played with the Iconia W3 for several hours, looking to determine whether the smaller size and screen improves the basic Windows tablet experience. It definitely does, especially if you frequently surf the Web with Internet Explorer. And with its included version of Office, plus a dedicated Bluetooth keyboard, content creation is possible on the Iconia W3, too.

 

Microsoft's Surface tablets (and similar Windows 8 devices with displays in the neighborhood of 10 inches) are all much larger than the Iconia W3—leaving the W3 to play the role of Google's Nexus 7 within the Windows ecosystem. If anything, Acer's Iconia W3 is a viable competitor to the Surface, which would normally deliver the “pure” Windows experience.

Held in landscape mode, the Acer Iconia W3 looks like any other small form factor tablet. Except with Windows, of course.

The Iconia W3 ($429 direct from Acer) runs the full version of Windows 8. It's the OS that came on the hardware Microsoft provided, and we didn't update it to Windows 8.1 for expediency’s sake. Inside the tablet is an Intel dual-core Atom Z2760 running at 1.5GHz—the same “Clover Trail” chip that powered many underpowered, first-generation Windows tablets. While the weak CPU may rule out a purchase for some, don’t necessarily dismiss the Iconia W3 outright. It ran Pinball FX2 and other apps just fine.

 

Along with the CPU, there's just 2GB of memory and 64GB of flash storage that can, of course, be augmented by Microsoft’s SkyDrive. There’s a single USB port, but it's a microUSB connection. (The Iconia W3 is powered by a separate power cord.) Some may turn up their noses at the visible pixels on the 1280-by-800, 8.1-inch display, but that’s not a dealbreaker in my book.

The Iconia W3-810 is slightly larger and heavier than the Goolge Nexus 7.

On the plus side, there's a mini HDMI connector and an SD card slot, both expansion options that the Surface tablets lacks. And Microsoft and Acer have included a click-to-run version of Office Home and Student 2013, which can be loaded onto the machine when the proper license key is entered.

 

The slow processor and dearth of memory seemed to cause the setup process to drag a bit longer than usual. Once completed, the tablet asks for your Microsoft ID, and populates the system with any shared settings, photos, and contacts.

 

For the last few years, computers have bowed to the tyranny of video, with displays slowly growing wider and wider to accommodate high-definition movies and games. But if you agree that portrait mode is superior for viewing ebooks and lengthy Web articles, then tablets like the Iconia W3 are a step forward. Windows tablets can reorient themselves into portrait mode, sure, but most are generally awkward to hold.

The Start page, oriented vertically.

The Iconia W3 fits comfortably in my hand. At 5.3 inches wide, it’s wider than the 4.7-inch Google Nexus 7, but not dramatically so. On the flipside, the W3 weighs 1.1 pounds. That may not seem like much, but it’s noticeably heavier than the 12-ounce Nexus 7. As such, the W3 is a rest-it-on-an-armrest type device.

 

Reading apps like Kindle and Nook work best in portrait mode. As a train commuter, I notice many people using e-readers and tablets while seated, but fewer hold them while standing. I would think that the weight would grow fatiguing over time. The screen on the W3 is also too big for one-handed operation, although that seems to be the trade-off with tablets. You may be able to awkwardly cradle it with one hand while swiping from page to page, but I wouldn't recommend it.

 

Whether it's possible to be “productive” with a tablet this small is a somewhat subjective proposition.

 

Acer supplies a Clavier Bluetooth keyboard designed specifically for the Iconia W3 that’s actually pretty good. The keys are a bit narrower than those of the Surface keyboards, but they’re spaced farther apart and offer good travel. The keyboard doesn’t charge the tablet; it just grips it along its edge, allowing the W3 to lean backward. Both a Surface married to one of its keyboard covers and the W3 seated inside the Clavier have a tendancy to flop around if jostled. But the Acer combo is far, far more stable when placed on your lap, and, thanks to its small size, it should be a viable option for airplane travel.

 

In fact, because the Iconia W3 can be snapped directly into a form-hugging opening on the reverse side of the keyboard, Acer's hardware can be easily stowed in carry-on luggage. As long as you don’t need a full-sized screen for your work, the W3 isn’t a bad content-creation option. Just make sure that your documents are saved to SkyDrive to be accessed by your office PC.

Acer’s Bluetooth keyboard works well, although some may not enjoy working with a tablet.

The lack of a powerful CPU will certainly dissuade some potential Iconia W3 buyers, but Microsoft looks to be setting itself up for success: Next-gen “Bay Trail” Atom chips promise significantly improved performance at the same price, and Microsoft appears to be working out the kinks with Windows 8.1. Acer may be doing the same.

 

The Iconia W3 may not be the culmination of Windows tablet engineering, but it demonstrates the viability of what Microsoft has set out to accomplish, and is a convincing proof point to hold up to app developers. It’s taking a while, but Microsoft is finally finding its stride. The next question worth asking is: Is a small-form-factor Surface tablet on the way?

 

 

Review: Download Facebook photos and albums with fbDownloader

fbDownloader We put more of our lives on Facebook than we realize or like to admit. If you lose access, you lose data…so back it up.

 

Download Now

You may or may not realize it, but you put a lot of your life on Facebook.  The social networking website gets its hooks into everyone, making them lose their inhibitions about revealing everything in their lives, including all the latest snapshots. If this sounds like you, you may want to use fbDownloader to create a secondary backup of those pictures.

 

"But Mark," I hear you ask, "why should I bother with a backup?  Isn't the Facebook site secure enough to hold all of my crazy party pictures?" Well yes, but up to a point. Facebook accounts can be hacked. Even if you have the foresight to turn on "Login Approvals," which is Facebook's version of two-factor authentication, there are no guarantees.

After starting fbDownloader, you will see your options on the main screen. On the left, you can choose either your photos or your friend's public photos.

Plus it isn't just hackers you should be concerned about. Facebook makes the rules, and if it doesn't like the way you interpret them, the company can shut your account down without warning (which they've been known to do). If that happens, then goodbye photos. It may not just be your party pics that get zapped. Precious and irreplaceable family photos would also disappear.

 

It pays to have an insurance policy. If a hacker or Facebook ruins your day by cutting off your access to your Facebook account, and everything in it, then you will have a perfectly organized backup offsite.

 

After downloading fbDownloader, install it the usual way (taking care uncheck the boxes for bloatware and browser settings changes).  Once installed, it will ask you to log into your Facebook account (when you are finished, you can revoke its access) and then the main screen will come up. It will give you three options to choose from: download your own tagged photos, download your photo albums, and download your Facebook friends' public photo albums. Choose the option you want and the screen will change accordingly.

If you choose the photo album option, you will see all of your albums in the app and you just have to click on the ones you want.

You can also choose whether or not you want the photos in color or in black and white (although the black and white option requires first that you "recommend" them on Facebook).

 

The first option, the tagged photos, is just a "click and wait for it all to download" deal. You can't pick and choose which pictures you want. It's either everything or nothing. But if you choose the second option, your photo albums, then you have a bit more flexibility. You can view each of your albums in a list and choose which albums you want downloaded to your computer (although you still can't choose individual pictures).

 

The same applies to your friends' albums. You can choose the album, but you can't choose a specific picture. This isn't so much of a problem if the album in question only has a few photos inside it. But some albums have hundreds of photos and if you only want a few, you'd better limber up your Delete key finger.

You'll want to uncheck all those boxes before clicking "Agree & Continue."

One other issue I encountered was that once the downloading process has started, there is absolutely no way to make it stop, except shutting down the program completely. There's no "cancel" option, which is an unusual omission in this kind of program.

 

These small nitpicks aside, this is a nice little program that allows you to backup your Facebook pictures easily, without too much hassle. If fbDownloader doesn't tickle your tastebuds, though, then PhotoGrabber is another solid choice. There's no harm in trying both and seeing which one you prefer.

 

The moral of the story is: Don't rely on just one site for data of any kind. Always have at least one backup elsewhere. For Facebook, these two apps will more than suffice.

 

Note: The Download button takes you to the vendor's site, where you can download the latest version of the software.

 

 

House panel approves bill increasing H-1B limits

A U.S. House of Representatives committee has approved legislation that would more than double the current skilled immigration H-1B cap with the focus on science and technology workers.

 

The House Judiciary Committee approved the Supplying Knowledge Based Immigrants and Lifting Levels of STEM Visa Act, or the SKILLS Visa Act, by a vote of 20-14 late Thursday.

 

The bill would set aside 55,000 green cards each year for employers to hire foreign graduates of U.S. universities with advanced degrees in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) fields.

 

The SKILLS Visa Act would also increase the annual H-1B visa cap to 155,000, from the current 65,000, and increase the additional H-1Bs set aside for foreign graduates of U.S. universities from 20,000 to 40,000.

 

The committee approval will help benefit the U.S. economy and aid the “creation of American jobs,” Representative Darrell Issa, a California Republican and main sponsor of the bill, said in a statement. The bill “allows immigrants who graduate from American universities with advanced degrees in STEM fields to remain here and use their talents to make this country a better place.”

 

The bill next moves to the floor of the full House of Representatives. The House action comes in the same day that the Senate passed a comprehensive immigration bill that includes high-skill immigration provisions. The Senate bill faces an uphill fight in the House.

 

Some tech workers groups have denounced proposals to raise the H-1B visa cap, saying there are plenty of U.S. tech workers still looking for jobs.

 

The Issa bill changes the calculation of prevailing wages that companies need to give foreign workers who receive visas. That provision is an effort to protection U.S. workers, Issa said in a press release.

 

The bill would also allocate up to 10,000 green cards a year for alien entrepreneurs who can attract investment from venture-capital firms to establish businesses creating at least five jobs.

 

Several tech trade groups praised the House bill. For years, several large tech companies have called on Congress to increase the H-1B visa cap, saying they can’t find enough skilled workers in the U.S. to fill thousands of jobs.

 

The Consumer Electronics Association, in a statement, called high-skilled immigration a “key priority for the nation.”

 

“For America to remain the world’s leading innovator, we must embrace immigration policy reforms that allow the United States to remain a magnet for the best and brightest to work and build their businesses, create new jobs and contribute to the overall success of our economy,” Gary Shapiro, CEA’s president and CEO, said in a statement.

 

 

BlackBerry sold 6.8 million smartphones but lost $84 million last quarter

BlackBerry shipped 6.8 million smartphones and recorded a $84 million loss during the three months to June 1, as it struggles to turn around its fortunes.

 

The first quarter of BlackBerry’s fiscal year served as a referendum on how consumers and business users have received the new BlackBerry 10 smartphones. The company’s quarterly earnings, released Friday, noted that 2.7 million phones running the new OS were sold, a figure that disappointed analysts.

 

Shipments of 7.7 million phones would have been an “OK” result, according to IDC research director Francisco Jeronimo. The soft sales lead analysts to question the future of BlackBerry 10 and the company during a conference call on the results.

 

BlackBerry CEO Thorsten Heins offered various themes on the same reply as a defense: “BlackBerry 10 is still in the early stages on its transition. In fact, we are only five months in to what is the launch of an entirely new mobile computing platform,” he said.

 

The BlackBerry Z10 is now available in 147 countries, while the QWERTY-equipped Q10 is on sale in 96 countries, with 50 being added during BlackBerry’s fiscal second quarter. The cheaper Q5, which also has a physical keyboard, premiered in Dubai last week. It will be distributed more widely during the second quarter, according to Heins. More products are on the way, but the company will not have more than six new devices in the market at any time, he said.

 

Marina Koytcheva, an analyst at CCS Insight, isn’t surprised by BlackBerry’s continued struggles, but agreed with Heins’ assessment.

 

“It remains too early to tell whether the new BlackBerry 10 platform can emerge as a credible alternative to Android or iOS with shipments of the long-awaited Q10 device and recently announced Q5 only just starting in many markets. We need to wait a couple more quarters before writing off BlackBerry’s chances,” she said via email.

 

The company may be working on new products, but a BlackBerry 10 upgrade for its PlayBook tablet is not one of them.

 

“Our teams have spent a great deal of time and energy looking at solutions that could move the BlackBerry 10 experience to PlayBook. But unfortunately I am not satisfied with the level of performance and user experience, and I made the difficult decision to stop these efforts,” Heins said.

 

BlackBerry reported revenue of $3.1 billion, up 9 percent from the same period a year earlier. Net loss from continuing operations for the quarter was $84 million, compared to a net loss of $510 million a year earlier.

 

BlackBerry’s OSes had a 2.9 percent market share during the first three months of the calendar year, compared to 6.4 percent during the same period in 2012. To grow sales, BlackBerry has to do a couple of things.

 

“It needs strong campaigns to drive awareness of the new platform and user experience; new devices at lower price points, and to refocus on the enterprise segment where they still have a chance. The consumer segment is lost and the only chance is on the enterprise segment, particularly the large enterprises,” Jeronimo said.

 

The smartphone market remains highly competitive, making it difficult to estimate units, revenue and levels of profitability, according to BlackBerry.

 

 

How to boot to desktop mode in Windows 8.1

One of my chief complaints with Windows 8 is that Microsoft forced you to boot to the new Start screen rather than giving you the option of booting to the desktop--which is where I prefer to hang my computing hat.

 

You could work around this using any number of utilities (most of which were designed primarily to restore the missing Start button, essential if you are working in Desktop), but with the release of Windows 8.1, Microsoft has added the capability.

 

In other words, now you can boot directly to the desktop. It's not immediately obvious how--Microsoft still doesn't outfit Windows with any "guides to new features" or the like, a silly oversight--but at least it's easy once you know the steps.

 

1. After booting Windows 8.1 (here's how to get the preview if you don't already have it), click the Desktop tile to enter Desktop mode.

 

2. Right-click any open area in the taskbar, then click Properties.

 

3. Click the Navigation tab, then check the box next to Go to the desktop instead of Start when I sign in.

 

4. Click OK, then reboot. Windows should plunk you right into Desktop.

 

And that's all there is to it. If you want to go back to Start-screen booting, just repeat the process and uncheck the box in step 3. (Also, if you don't have a Navigation tab, leave a comment letting me know. This appears to be an issue for some users. I'm investigating why.)

 

What are your thoughts on this? Where do you prefer to land when you boot Windows 8?
 

Yahoo kills a dozen more products to sharpen its focus

Yahoo is slimming itself down again by axing 12 of its products, part of an ongoing effort to sharpen its focus on services it thinks people need in their daily lives.

The list includes AltaVista, the granddaddy of search engines, and Yahoo RSS Alerts. The other products, including Yahoo Axis, Citizen Sports and Yahoo Browser Plus, are less well known.

“Today we’re shutting down a few products so we can continue to focus on creating beautiful products that are essential to you every day,” said Jay Rossiter, executive vice president of platforms at Yahoo, in a blog post Friday afternoon.

Yahoo ditched numerous other products in April, such as Deals and SMS Alerts, touting similar goals around “sharpening our focus.”

Here’s the full list of services being killed off, in order of their planned closure dates:

Yahoo Axis, a browser plug-in (June 28)Yahoo Browser Plus, a service for Web app developers (June 28)Citizen Sports, a sporting news and stat service (June 28)Yahoo WebPlayer, a media player for websites (June 30)FoxyTunes, a plug-in for controlling different media players (July 1)Yahoo RSS Alerts (July 1)Yahoo Neighbors Beta, for helping people find out what’s going on in their neighborhood (July 8)AltaVista (July 8)Yahoo Stars India, a celebrity news aggregator (July 25)Yahoo Downloads Beta, an application for third-party downloads (July 31)Yahoo Local API, which gives developers access to local business information (Sept. 28)Yahoo Term Extraction API, for extracting terms and keywords from websites (Sept. 28)

With AltaVista soon officially no more, Yahoo is encouraging users to visit the regular Yahoo Search page. Earlier on Friday, it announced a new feature for setting up search alerts.

Yahoo is highlighting other products to help fill the gaps elsewhere. Citizen Sports may be gone, but Yahoo says people can still get the latest sports news on the Yahoo Sports homepage, play fantasy sports like Fantasy Football, and stay up-to-date on the go with its mobile Sports app.

In recent months, Yahoo has said it is focused on products and services geared toward daily habits, such as email, weather, sports, finance, and photos.

In some of those areas it’s not doing badly. Yahoo’s new mobile weather app, for instance, has a 4.5-star rating in Apple’s App Store, based on about 4,000 reviews.

During the company’s annual shareholder meeting earlier this week, CEO Marissa Mayer said she likes to think of Yahoo as a big startup.

“We are making investments, and we’re going to continue to make investments, because that’s what drives growth,” she said.

Yahoo recently paid more than $1 billion to buy social blogging site Tumblr.

12 missing features we'd still love to see in Windows 8.1

Windows 8.1 is Microsoft's chance to regain the goodwill lost in the contentious release of the new-look Windows 8 operating system—and by and large, the feature-packed re-do smooths out the OS's more onerous rough edges. (Boot to desktop, and a better Windows Store? Yes, please!) Sure, Windows 8.1's improvements are more about refinement than revolution, but this is an update, not a whole new OS.

 

While Windows 8.1's new apps and hidden features should leave you mostly sated if you've already bought into Microsoft's modern-style vision of the future, the update still isn't…quite…perfect. In fact, after spending more than a day tinkering with Windows 8.1, we can think of a dozen additions we'd love to see.

 

With the official release of Windows 8.1 likely still months off, Microsoft has time to add these features to the update. Fingers crossed!

 

The simple return of the Start button, even in its bastardized "drop you on the Start screen" form, fixes one of the major interface woes found in the original Windows 8.0 release, especially when paired with the new All Apps button. But Microsoft shouldn't stop there.

 

Windows 8.1 is still chock-full of hidden menus that appear only if you know the secret handshake—which corner to touch or gesture to make. Many of the most crucial system functions are buried in those elusive screens. Give us subtle visual clues for hot corners! Give us the ability to pin the Charms menu open! Drag those crucial elements into the light!

These valuable options shouldn't be buried in an obscure submenu.

Windows 8.1 goes a long way toward making Microsoft's revamped OS more palatable to the desktop fanatics (like me!), but it does so grudgingly. Sure, you can shut down your PC from the new Start button, but only if you think to right-click on it and sift through a long list of administrative options. Likewise, helpful additions like the ability to boot to the desktop or have the Start button bring you to the All Apps screen are buried under a submenu found only by right-clicking on the taskbar. Really, Windows?

 

It'd be great to see these options highlighted in the Settings charm's Personalize options, or maybe even offered as part of the initial installation process. Don't hold your breath, though: Since Microsoft has clearly tied its future to the modern UI, the desktop will be lucky if it receives benign neglect, as opposed to being eliminated entirely.

 

Speaking of which, the Personalize section really should have many, many more options for users. You'll find only preset Start screen backgrounds and background/accent color options in Windows 8.1's Personalize screen. Microsoft should seize the opportunity to make it a one-stop DIY shop.

 

Toss in the aforementioned desktop personalization options, screensaver and lock-screen choices (including the ability to set app notifications), the ability to swap out your profile picture, and heck, maybe even the Personalization syncing options found in the new SkyDrive submenu in the modern PC Settings. Not only would it make sense, it would make me happy.

Reading List is an awesome feature, but it'd be more awesome if it supported the desktop version of IE 11. (Click to enlarge.)

You know what's awesome? Read-it-later apps that let you save an online article to, well, read it later. You know what's even more awesome? Windows 8.1 includes a read-it-later app dubbed Reading List, which is populated by articles sent using the Share charm in Internet Explorer 11. You know what's not so awesome? That Share function works only in the modern version of IE 11—not its desktop counterpart. I can haz bookmarklet?



In Windows 8.1, as with plain-Jane Windows 8 before it, you can't use the modern-style version of Internet Explorer 11 whatsoever if you have a non-IE browser (like Chrome or Firefox) set as your default. That's just heavy-handed crap. I love the modern IE browser on touchscreen devices, but since Chrome is my desktop default I can't use modern IE whatsoever. How does this help, Microsoft?

 

I get it, Microsoft. You want SkyDrive to serve as the beating, cloud-connected heart of the Windows 8.1 experience: "Windows everywhere" and all that. But the world's not quite ready to spend all its time in the sky—especially in the wake of the NSA scandal. A modern-style file explorer app would save touchscreen Windows users, including all Windows RT users, from having to suffer the tedium of pecking through the desktop file explorer.

 

Windows 8.1's overhauled modern PC Settings bake in more finger-friendliness for the people who have bought into Microsoft's touchscreen future. A modern file explorer would be the cherry on top.

 

Though Windows 8.1 Preview ships with the optional $10 Media Center pack (and its DVD-playing capabilities) installed, Microsoft has still given no indication that the release version will restore the ability to play DVDs. And you can't even install the Media Center pack unless you're running the $200 Windows 8 Pro, which costs $80 more than the vanilla version of Windows 8.



That's a steep price for optical-disc support. Unfortunately, the odds of Microsoft's restoring default DVD playback to Windows 8 are pretty slim, as the company would have to shell out a few bucks for every single Windows license if it wanted to include that functionality. But hey, here's hoping anyway. (Pssst! Try out the completely free VLC media player. A modern VLC app is on the way, too.)

 

The Windows 8.1 preview available Wednesday didn't include Mail or Calendar updates, so we can't be sure what's in store for those apps, which still need some work before they're up to snuff with top-tier communications options. I'm holding out for two big additions: POP mail support in the Mail app, and CalDAV support in the Calendar app so that it plays nice with Google Calendar again. Alas, I'm not optimistic about seeing either.

 

The new super-big and super-small sizes for Start screen tiles is a small tweak that makes a big difference to Windows 8.1's feel, but again, why stop there? The Start screen still feels so locked down. I'd love to be able to rename tiles, or change their icon and background color. Judging by the emails some of you have sent me, I'm not the only one.

 

Another helpful feature would be the ability to group tiles into "stacks" that fan out at a touch or click. Think of them as modern-style folders. You have the ability to name groups of tiles as-is, but these so-called stacks would really help make the Start screen more efficient—and more personal.

A demo of the Natural ID touchscreen fingerprint recognition technology.

DO IT.

 

Now I'm just getting a bit ridiculous, to be honest. But hey—Windows 8.1 already gave Microsoft's native biometric support a big shot in the arm, and technology that can read your fingerprint on a touchscreen is out there. It'd be an awesome feature on such a touch-focused OS. Just sayin'.

Stardock's ModernMix software in action.

If Stardock's superb ModernMix program can run modern apps in desktop Windows, why can't Windows 8.1? There would be no better way to coax diehard desktop fanatics out of their shells than to add this low-pressure functionality that would enable the best of both worlds.

 

Because I'm just not going to shut up about it until there's a native way to see the date and time on the Start screen at a glance without having to do anything extra. I loathe having to open the Charms bar to see the time if I'm on the Start screen. No, seriously: Loathe.

 

Microsoft had the perfect opportunity to introduce a clock to the start screen with Windows 8.1's new Alarms app. Just make its live tile show the time! Did that happen? Nope. Could it happen? Yup, and probably pretty easily—maybe even "In time for the official Windows 8.1 release" easily. Just sayin'. (You can do it, Microsoft!)

 

But for all my griping, Windows 8.1 truly does a decent job of paving over Windows 8's worst flaws. Will it convince haters to stop worrying and love the Live Tiles? Not at all. But it does make the experience far less jarring than the initial Windows 8 release.

 

Don't take my word for it, though. While the release date for a final version of the update has yet to be announced, you—yes, you—can try out the preview version of Windows 8.1 today, assuming you're the adventurous type who doesn't mind giving prelaunch operating system builds a whirl. Check out our guide to installing the Windows 8.1 preview—but prepare your PC for that OS-level tinkering first.

 

 

Study: Management blocking IT projects due to rampant "fear"

There are lots of things in this world to be afraid of. Spiders. Terrorists. Clowns.

 

Now it seems you can add IT projects to that list. Online storage provider Mozy recently released results from a study which note that 55 percent of IT managers complain that the companies they work for "perceive the adoption of technology as a risk" and that 57 percent of company executives are "fearful of new technology implementations."

 

37 percent of respondents to the survey said that IT projects had been axed or blocked due to this fear.

 

Fear? Fear of what, exactly?

Mozy

Fear in the workplace is a topic that is far more complex than a simple phobia involving snakes or walking under ladders. At the office, workers have a veritable minefield to navigate. According to the study, they worry over just about everything: accidentally sending an email to the wrong recipient (25 percent), being on the mark during presentations (15 percent), and even clicking on an "inappropriate link" during Internet searches on the job (21 percent).

 

Some workers really end up in the weeds. 13 percent worry about accidentally setting off the alarm in the office, 8 percent are afraid of the coffee machine, and another 8 percent believe that the office photocopier is "plotting against them."

 

That's a lot to be afraid of, but it doesn't really touch on the biggest fear of all: Getting fired.

 

The fear of losing your job is not an irrational one in today's market — although 23 percent of workers say they are "always" thinking that they are about to get fired — considering how stillborn the national economic recovery has been, particularly in the arena of employment.

 

For IT workers, that fear expresses itself in a different, more subtle way. IT projects are undertaken based on the promise that they will make a company more competitive, more productive, or more profitable, but as many IT managers know, calculating a legitimate ROI can be elusive. Business managers, in turn afraid of losing their own jobs should a project they approved ultimately fail, keep their cards close to the vest. Unless a project can be proven to be absolutely vital to the ongoing existence of the company, management is likely to simply say no.

 

Of course, those fears also have a flipside. If a tech project fails it could bring the company down… but if it succeeds, it could isntead make the manager that approved it irrelevant and cost him his job in a different way. It isn't hard to see how, for many, approving a tech project really is a no-win situation.

Mozy

Coping With Fear

 

IT managers are slowly learning how to overcome these fears and push their projects through, and Mozy Senior Director Gytis Barzdukas has identified a number of ways that IT managers can help this process. To wit:

For starters, consider the buzzwords you use. Certain terms and phrases go in and out of fashion, often with alarming speed. Today's best buzzwords: Cloud, collaboration, on demand, and virtualization. Bad buzzwords: Gamification and …as a service. (The fact that "cloud," "on demand," and "as a service" mean functionally the same thing should not be lost on the reader.) While both terms are positive, "cloud" is currently a far better choice than "on demand."Drive from the bottom up: Get employees to suggest technologies that the companies need and encourage their adoption, then build proposals around them.Start small: Pilot programs keep risks — and the level of fear — to a minimum.It's all about the money: Any tangible financial benefits should be placed front and center in any project proposal.

Highlights from the study can be found at the above link. The full report, Mozy says, will be released in the next few days.

 

 

Facebook, Foursquare, and Flipboard lead a flood of big-name Windows 8 apps

Don’t be fooled by all this blabber about Windows 8.1 being Microsoft’s grand chance for a re-do—talk I’m admittedly guilty of myself. Windows 8.1 does a terrific job of refining Microsoft’s modern-style vision, but as an operating system built from the ground up to revolve around an app-based experience, it—and specifically the Start screen—can never truly shine unless the Windows Store is stuffed.

 

That’s a big problem, since both the quantity and the quality of the Windows Store’s selection has been lackluster thus far. Microsoft seems to be tackling the issue head-on, though: Not only did the number of apps in the Windows Store spike in the weeks ahead of Build 2013, but Microsoft took advantage of the developer conference to announce a slew of high-profile apps coming to Windows 8’s virtual marketplace.

 

Here’s a rundown of the biggest apps destined to land on the Windows Store’s currently dusty shelves.

Yes! A Facebook app is coming to the Windows Store.

Finally—finally—a proper Facebook app is coming to Windows 8, where we hope it will embrace the modern style as wholeheartedly as the Windows 8 Twitter app. While no official launch date was announced, you can look forward to a day where “Pin an IE shortcut to the Start screen” isn’t Microsoft’s official answer to the missing Facebook-app question.



Yes, the popular social check-in service is coming to Windows 8 at some unspecified point in the future, Microsoft announced yesterday. Live Tile fanatics will no longer have to rely on third-party alternative apps to become the mayor of their favorite taco carts! The few screenshots Microsoft showd really seem to nail the modern motif.

MicrosoftFlipboard was one of three apps Steve Ballmer specifically mentioned at Wednesday’s Build 2013 keynote.

Don’t worry, we’ll get to apps that don’t start with F soon.

 

Flipboard is a newsreader app with an image-heavy style that should translate well to Windows 8. It’s similar to the Microsoft-exclusive New Bento. Flipboard pulls in not just news, but also posts from your various social feeds, making it close to a one-stop, up-to-the-minute news shop. It’s incredibly popular on iOS and Android, so look for the app to make waves in the Windows Store whenever it launches, too.



Streaming music services haven’t exactly stampeded to Microsoft’s camp. Aside from Slacker Radio, Nokia Music, a couple of apps that play digital streams of terrestrial radio, and Microsoft’s own baked-in Music app, all has been quiet on the Windows front. Microsoft’s storefront still doesn’t have dedicated Pandora, Spotify, MOG, or Rdio apps—but now, it does rock one of the most storied names in streaming music: Rhapsody.

 

Available now, the Rhapsody app is free, though you’ll need a premium Rhapsody subscription to use it. Don’t have one of those? You can sign up for a free trial right from the app’s starting screen.



OpenTable lets you make real-time reservations at tens of thousands of restaurants across the country, making it handy-dandy for Windows-tablet-wielding foodies. Seriously, if a restaurant has any sort of Web presence whatsoever, you can probably find it on OpenTable—and you can find the OpenTable app in the Windows Store right now.



Rockmelt is kind of like Flipboard, but with a few extra wrinkles. In addition to displaying the sites, YouTube feeds, and social feeds you follow (in modern-tinged visual fashion, natch) on the opening screens, Rockmelt lets you check out the latest news in more than a dozen preset categories, like Cars, Business, Travel, and Tech & Geek. It’s a pretty nifty app, and it, too, is available in the Windows Store right now.

 

Now we know what all those NFL coaches are doing with all those Surface tablets: Playing fantasy football! At the Build keynote on Wednesday, Steve Ballmer announced that NFL apps are Windows 8-bound, starting with a Fantasy Football app. The exact release date is yet to be announced, but here’s hoping we’ll see it before opening day (September 5, in case you were curious).



The somewhat creepily named Where’s My Mickey? is already available in the Windows Store, but that’s just the tip of the torrent. Microsoft announced that Avengers: Initiative, Monsters University, Temple Run: Oz, Toy Story Smash It!, and Wreck-It Ralph apps are all inbound this fall.

 

That’s a flood of fairly big-name apps. In the weeks and months ahead of Build 2013, we saw additional high-profile Windows Store releases like MLB.tv, Nokia Music, Twitter, Vevo, and a Discovery Channel app. Build also brought a momentous under-the-hood announcement when the uber-popular Unity game engine announced support for Windows 8, along with Windows Phone 8 and Xbox One. And of course, Windows 8.1 packs a few new native apps of its own, like Reading List and Health & Fitness.

 

Yes, there are still some prominent Windows Store no-shows, but the recent announcements show that Microsoft’s wooing of developers is finally starting to pay off. The Windows Store still has a long road to travel before it becomes a compelling destination, but at least it finally appears to be on the right track.

 

The next question: Can Microsoft keep up the momentum, or did it exhaust all its star power in a big Build blow-out? Keep an eye on the Windows Store in the coming months.

 

 

Lenovo IdeaCentre Horizon Cart review: Put your 27-inch tablet on wheels

Lenovo IdeaCentre Horizon Cart $299.00(When Rated) This cart is a very handy accessory for Lenovo's IdeaCentre Horizon, but you'll want to be aware of a couple design shortcomings before buying one.

 

 

I thought this cart for Lenovo’s 27-inch IdeaCentre Horizon tablet/all-in-one PC was pretty cool when I first laid eyes on the prototype, and I got even more excited when I heard the real thing would retail for $299. That’s a reasonable price for a specialized product that will never be mass-produced. I mean, I don’t expect Lenovo to sell millions of Horizons, and only a fraction of those buyers will pick up the cart to go with it.

 

Now that I’ve spent some time with the finished product, I’m not nearly as jazzed. Let me give you the upside before I bang on the cart’s shortcomings. The tablet itself weighs nearly 19 pounds, so it’s not something you can just tuck under your arm and move from room to room. And you definitely won’t want your kids lugging it to and fro. Mount it to the cart, on the other hand, and the combo can move effortlessly around the house—provided it’s rolling on tile, vinyl, cork, or hardwood floors or very low-pile carpet.

ROBERT CARDINThe cart lets you use the tablet as a roll-around all-in-one. The base renders the affair very stable, but you'll need to hold the keyboard on your lap.

Brakes on all four wheels keep the cart stationary when you arrive at your destination, and the base is wide enough that you don’t need to worry about it tipping over even if you push hard while the brakes are locked. Lay the computer flat in table mode, and you can play air hockey, arcade games, and board games using the provided paddles, joysticks, and E-dice.

 

Now for the other side of the scale: You can’t pivot the tablet into portrait mode, which means it’s no good for playing virtual pinball. And while you can tilt the tablet on its horizontal axis and use it as an all-in-one PC, you’ll need to hold the keyboard on your lap. The removable tray that mounts to the center column is suitable only for storing accessories. Also, you have no surface for operating the mouse, leaving you dependent on the touchscreen. Last, the cart is not height-adjustable—a big ergonomic no-no.

 

On the bright side, you twist just a single oversized knob to remove and reattach the tablet to the cart. So it’s easy to use the Horizon as an all-in-one PC most of the time, and as a roll-away arcade system on game nights.

 

 

Here's what an eavesdropper sees when you use an unsecured Wi-Fi hotspot

You’ve probably read at least one story with warnings about using unsecure public Wi-Fi hotspots, so you know that eavesdroppers can capture information traveling over those networks. But nothing gets the point across as effectively as seeing the snooping in action. So I parked myself at my local coffee shop the other day to soak up the airwaves and see what I could see.

 

My intent wasn't to hack anyone's computer or device—that's illegal—but just to listen. It’s similar to listening in on someone’s CB or walkie-talkie radio conversation. Like CBs and walkie-talkies, Wi-Fi networks operate on public airwaves that anyone nearby can tune into.

 

As you'll see, it’s relatively easy to capture sensitive communication at the vast majority of public hotspots—locations like cafes, restaurants, airports, hotels, and other public places. You can snag emails, passwords, and unencrypted instant messages, and you can hijack unsecured logins to popular websites. Fortunately, ways exist to protect your online activity while you’re out-and-about with your laptop, tablet, and other Wi-Fi gadgets. I'll touch on those, too.

 

I opened my laptop at the coffee shop and began capturing Wi-Fi signals, technically called 802.11 packets, with the help of a free trial of a wireless network analyzer. The packets appeared on screen in real time as they were captured—much more quickly than I could read them—so I stopped capturing after a few minutes to analyze what I had vacuumed up. Note: You can click on any of these screenshots to view larger versions that are easier to read.

My own website, captured via the hotspot packets and reassembled for viewing.

I first searched for packets containing HTML code, to see which websites other hotspot users were browsing. While I did see activity from other patrons, I didn’t capture anything interesting, so I visited my own website—www.egeier.com—on my smartphone.

This is a copy of the email I sent (and subsequently received) using my smartphone connected to the hotspot.

The raw packets with HTML code looked like gibberish, but as you can see above, the trial network analyzer I used reassembled the packets and displayed them as a regular webpage view. The formatting was slightly off and some of the images were missing, but plenty of information still came through.

 

I didn’t find anyone else sending or receiving emails during my visit, but I did discover the test messages I sent and received via my smartphone while it was connected to the hotspot. Since I use an app to connect to my email service via POP3 without encryption, you could have seen my login credentials along with the message (I've blurred the username and password in the screenshot).

 

This is all the information someone would need to configure their email client to use my account and start receiving my emails. They might also be able to send emails from my account.

And these are the packets that went over the network when I sent an instant message using Yahoo Instant Messenger.

I also used Yahoo Messenger to send a message while I was capturing Wi-Fi signals. Sure enough, the tool plucked that information out of the air, too. You should never use an unencrypted instant-messaging service with any expectation of privacy.

 

If you still use FTP (File Transfer Protocol) to download, upload, or share files, you should avoid connecting to them over unsecured hotspots. Most FTP servers use unencrypted connections, so both login credentials and content are sent in plain text, where any eavesdropper can easily capture them.

These captured packets reveal the username and password securing my FTP server (I've blurred them in this screenshot).

While using my laptop to connect to my own Web server’s FTP server, I was able to capture the packets containing my login ID and password—details that would have enabled any nearby eavesdropper to to gain unfettered access to my websites.

 

Computers aren’t the only devices susceptible to eavesdropping. I also ran an app called DroidSheep on my spare rooted Android smartphone. This app can be used to gain access to private accounts on popular Web services, such as Gmail, LinkedIn, Yahoo, and Facebook.

 

DroidSheep looks for and lists any unsecure logins to popular websites. While it doesn’t capture the passwords to those sites, it can exploit a vulnerability that allows you to open the site using another person’s current session, giving you full access to their account in the process.

 

As you can see from the screenshot below, DroidSheep detected Google, LinkedIn, and Yahoo logins from other people who were connected to the hotspot, as well as the Facebook login I made on my other smartphone.

DroidSheep detected other users' log-ins, which means those accounts were vulnerable to hijacking.
.

I couldn’t legally access other people’s logins, of course, but I did open my own Facebook login.

Using DroidSheep, I was able to access my own Facebook page without providing a user ID or password. I could have done the same with any other patron's accounts if they were logged in.

Once I’d done that, I could magically access my Facebook account on that rooted Android phone (see the screen at lower right) without ever providing my username or password from that device.

 

Now that you’ve seen just how easy it is for someone to eavesdrop on your Wi-Fi, here's how you can use a public hotspot with some degree of security:

Every time you log in to a website, make sure that your connection is encrypted. The URL address should start with https instead of http.You also need to make sure that the connection stays encrypted for all of your online session. Some websites, including Facebook, will encrypt your log-in and then return you to an unsecured session—leaving you vulnerable to hijacking, as discussed earlier.Many sites give you the option of encrypting your entire session. You can do this with Facebook by enabling Secure Browsing in the Security settings.When you check your email, try to login via the Web browser and ensure that your connection is encrypted (again, look for https at the beginning of the URL). If you use an email client such as Outlook, make sure your POP3 or IMAP and SMTP accounts are configured with encryption turned on.Never use FTP or other services that aren’t encrypted.To encrypt your Web browsing and all other online activity, use a VPN, or virtual private network (this article will show you how).Keep in mind that private networks have similar vulnerabilities: Anyone nearby can eavesdrop on the network. Enabling WPA or WPA2 security will encrypt the Wi-Fi traffic, obscuring the actual communications, but anyone who also has that password will be able to snoop on the packets traveling over the network. This is particularly important for small businesses that don’t use the enterprise (802.1X) mode of WPA or WPA2 security that prevents