media

Twitter gives government agencies in the United States at least some of the information they ask for on users 69 percent of the time.

That data and much more about how the social network responds to government requests for user information, as well as demands to remove tweets and reports of copyright violations was part of Twitter's second so-called transparency report, which it issued today "in celebration of" Data Privacy Day. Google issued such a report today as well.

"We've been thinking about ways in which we can more effectively share this information, with an … Read more

mixing gnarly basslines today vine.co/v/b55LOA1dgJU

I'll admit it, I misjudged Vine. Here's why.

One of the first things I read about Vine, Twitter's new stand-alone video app for iPhone and iPod Touch, was Jack Dorsey's gushing tweet about the service.

"Vine is the most exciting thing I've seen in a while," Dorsey, Twitter's co-founder (and also founder of Square), tweeted yesterday morning. "Not just because of the team, because it brings an entirely new art form to the world."

I … Read more

Ray Kurzweil's vision of the "singularity" -- when nanobots make humans immortal and computer progress is so fast that the future becomes profoundly unknowable -- is a bad idea.

That's the perhaps surprisingly contrary opinion of Joichi Ito, who as a high-tech investor and director of the MIT Media Lab might be expected to be a natural ally. The lab, after all, aims to be at the center of today's technology revolution.

Ito, speaking today at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, said he believes the singularity vision puts the wrong priorities first.

"… Read more

Twitter must hand over the identities of users in France who post racist tweets, a French court ruled today.

According to AFP, the court's ruling stemmed from a test case "that pitted the right to free speech against laws banning hate speech," and answered a petition made in October by the French Union of Jewish Students (UEJF), which had claimed that many anti-Semitic tweets had violated the law in the European country.

The UEJF had demanded that Twitter do a better job of policing obviously anti-Semitic tweets.

Twitter said today in a statement that "we are … Read more

Twitter today unveiled Vine, an app for iPhone and iPod Touch that lets anyone create and share short looping videos.

Twitter acquired Vine last fall, but anyone can use Vine regardless of whether they use Twitter. However, the service is clearly meant to be embedded anywhere, and there are plenty of examples of the videos being embedded in tweets. The service (see an example below) is being referred to by many as Twitter's "Instagram for video."

Holding hands at Tilden park vine.co/v/biTaEEwdq2n?1

Vine videos are limited to … Read more

Twitter is gearing up for an IPO in 2014, argued a New York analyst firm in a new report that cites the microblogging giant's recent management moves, its strategic partnerships, its growing mobile revenue, and other factors as evidence for the move.

In the report, titled "Twitter, Inc. on flight path to 2014 IPO (Summary, PDF)," Greencrest Capital laid out its theories for why the company might soon go public.

"Is Twitter positioning for an initial public offering (IPO) in 2014? The micro-blogging site has made a number of announcements since our last report, including management … Read more

Twitter's CEO may have teased the company's own hosted video service in a tweet this morning.

As Twitter has aimed to take more control over the services its users rely on, it has consolidated access to photo-sharing, restricted third-party clients, and clamped down on developers. It has also made acquisitions aimed at bolstering its own offerings. Among them have been those that have led to Twitter's official search tool, its purchase of TweetDeck, and others.

One recent acquisition, according to AllthingsD, was Vine, a video clip service that never launched.

Today, Twitter CEO Dick Costolo posted a tweet (… Read more

In a recent column, PC World editor Jon Phillips tackled this provocative topic: "Why PC users hate Microsoft."

Noting that few users would admit to anything like fondness for the company, Phillips suggests that because we're effectively stuck with Windows when we buy a new PC, Microsoft is the obvious scapegoat when things go wrong. "When Windows fails [users]," he writes, "they elevate Microsoft to boogeyman status: a craven, profit-hungry monopoly that runs an unreliable service."

True, but I think there's more to it than that. Much, much more. I say this … Read more

Before too long, techy women may just print out that little black dress instead of buying it at a store.

Don't believe me? Take a look at some of the 3D-printed gems strolling down the catwalk at the Paris Fashion Show this week. Dutch designer Iris van Herpen's haute couture show Voltage tapped the prowess of 3D-printing companies Stratasys and Materialise to create two pieces that look out of this world.… Read more