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Samsung reveals Galaxy Tab's real sales are 'quite small'

Samsung admits Galaxy Tab sales poorer than claims

Samsung during the call for its fall quarter results admitted that its actual sales of the Galaxy Tab weren't nearly as strong as claimed. Although it had said it sold 1.5 million Galaxy Tabs in 2010 and two million by this month, company official Lee Young-hee when pressed said that these were only sales to carriers and retail stores, not real customers. She wouldn't say how many had shipped but was aware that it was "quite small" relative to the number reaching stores.

The sales performance was "quite OK," Lee said, but also "wasn't as fast as we expected." She was hopeful for 2011 tablet sales but saw the category as too fresh to make predictions.

Samsung's disclosure could significantly alter the real market share for Android tablets, which Strategy Analytics said had jumped to 22 percent in the fall owed almost entirely to the Galaxy Tab. Apple when it reports iPad shipments also isn't talking sales but can assume that the majority of shipments are being sold and has usually just three to four weeks of inventory left at most.

No attempt was made during the call to explain the relatively poor uptake. Critics have usually cited the lack of a Wi-Fi-only model that wasn't made available until this year and Samsung's frequent reliance on carrier-discounted 3G versions. While it superficially lowered the price of the Galaxy Tab below that of the iPad it was designed to beat, the frequent requirement for a contract at that price would often leave a buyer spending hundreds of dollars more in service, even if they only needed 3G sporadically. In the US, a Galaxy Tab is only $30 less than a 3G iPad when bought off-contract despite the smaller screen and shorter battery life.

The device's nature as a stopgap tablet may also have played a part. Many fans were already aware that Google's true tablet OS, Android 3.0, was due early this year. Such knowledge could have left many waiting for the next-generation Galaxy Tab to avoid buying a short-lived product. Since the current model doesn't have the 720p screen or dual-core processor that has been a staple of Android 3.0 tablets shown so far, it could be left running at best Android 2.3 and more likely 2.2.

Only one other major mobile platform maker has used a similar strategy in recent months. Microsoft has so far refused to discuss real Windows Phone 7 sales for the fall in favor of talking only about sales to carriers. It's commonly thought to be using a similar strategy to Samsung, where declining to mention the number of real activations helps mask significantly lower demand from customers. [via WSJ]

Read more: http://www.electronista.com/articles/11/01/31/samsung.admits.galaxy.tab.sales.poorer.than.claims/#ixzz1Cdl9VFyD

Project uses smartphones to improve cochlear implants

(PhysOrg.com) -- Many cochlear implant users may soon be able to easily modify the settings on their hearing devices using a smartphone interface, selecting one setting for a bustling restaurant, another for a hushed library.

Ten health-care and research facilities across the U.S. are slated to participate in clinical trials of the technology, pending Food and Drug Administration approval, says Dr. Philip Loizou, director of the Cochlear Implant Lab at UT Dallas and principal investigator for the $2.5 million project, which is funded by the National Institutes of Health.

The technology, which centers on creating an interface between mobile devices and FDA-approved cochlear implants manufactured by Cochlear Ltd., replaces the speech processor that cochlear implant users wear behind the ear.

Attached to the inner ear of profoundly deaf people by an array of 16 to 22 electrodes, cochlear implants have restored partial hearing to more than 180,000 people.

Several audio-processing techniques have been developed over the years that improved the benefits derived from cochlear implants, enabling moderate levels of speech understanding today. Loizou’s research focuses on developing new speech- and sound-processing strategies that further improve the levels of speech performance, particularly in noisy environments.

“The new technology will provide a great deal of flexibility to cochlear implant users to change the programs in their device as they please and thus to optimize their listening experience in different environments,” Loizou said. “Current implant patients do not have such flexibility.”

The new technology will also enable cochlear implant users to get additional help by recording speech and other environmental sounds that they find particularly challenging.

“These real-world recordings can be brought to our lab for detailed analysis and further optimization of their device,” said Loizou, a professor of electrical engineering in the Erik Jonsson School of Engineering and Computer Science and holder of the Cecil and Ida Green Chair.

Collaborating on the project are two of Loizou’s electrical engineering colleagues, Dr. Nasser Kehtarnavaz and Dr. Hoi Lee. Researchers at Arizona State University and the University of Wisconsin-Madison are also collaborating on the clinical trials. Clinical trial sites will include Duke University, the University of Washington, Arizona State, New York University and Ohio State University.

Provided by University of Texas at Dallas (news : web)

Your FB data now open to your legal opponents!

Jan 27 (Reuters Legal) - It's the latest litigation tactic in the online age: U.S. lawyers are trying to mine the private zones of Facebook and other social-media sites for photos, comments, status updates and other tidbits that might contradict what their opponents are saying in court. And increasingly, judges in civil cases are granting access to online caches that had formerly been considered off-limits.

Defense lawyers in personal-injury cases, in particular, are finding social networks to be a rich source of potentially exculpatory evidence. In one recent case, a New York woman who claimed to be bedridden after falling off a defective chair showed up in family Facebook photos smiling happily in front of her house.

While judges have long allowed information gleaned from public portions of networking sites to be used as evidence in civil trials, materials that are password-protected or reserved for selected "friends" have been given a greater level of protection. But in recent months, two state courts have granted defendants broad access to "private" photos and comments. A federal court issued a similar ruling in 2009.

This shifting legal balance between privacy and evidence-gathering reflects the broader debate that has been raging over what level of privacy, if any, citizens can expect as they put more and more personal information online. And privacy, at least on this front, seems to be losing. "This is beginning to catch on across the country," said Jim Dempsey, vice president of public policy at the Center for Democracy and Technology, a liberal think tank. "You do have a right of privacy in your private Facebook postings. But in the context of litigation, that right can be overcome."

COURT-ORDERED CONSENT

Postings on social networks are generally governed by the federal Stored Communications Act, which regulates how private information can be disseminated in non-criminal matters. The law has been interpreted to mean that the sites don't have to hand over users' personal data in response to a civil subpoena. Defense lawyers, though, have devised a strategy to work around this roadblock: They ask judges to order plaintiffs to sign consent forms granting defendants access to their private material. The defendants then attach these consent forms when they subpoena the sites. In these subpoenas, the plaintiffs are essentially authorizing the sites to hand over printouts of the private portions of their pages to the defendants.

A personal-injury case in Erie, Pennsylvania, shows how online musings intended as private can now make their way into litigation. In 2007, a racecar driver named Bill McMillen sued the owners of a local track, Hummingbird Speedway, claiming that he was seriously injured and lost "the enjoyment of life" as a result of an accident on the track. The lawyer for the speedway, Gary Bax, said he checked out McMillen on Facebook and found comments and photos suggesting that after the accident, McMillen went on a fishing trip to Florida and attended the Dayton 500.

Bax filed a motion to compel McMillen to turn over his Facebook and MySpace user names and passwords, so Bax could dig deeper. In September, Jefferson County Court of Common Pleas Judge John Henry Foradora granted the motion, noting that Facebook and News Corp's MySpace are specifically designed for sharing personal information. "While it is conceivable that a person could use them as forums to divulge and seek advice on personal and private matters," Judge Foradora wrote, "it would be unrealistic to expect that such disclosures would be considered confidential." A trial has not yet been scheduled.

SMILEY FACES

A similar ruling was handed down in the case involving the woman who claimed she fell off a defective chair. Kathleen Romano alleges she suffered "serious permanent personal injuries" due to the negligence of Grand Rapids, Michigan-based furniture company Steelcase. But according to Steelcase lawyer James Gallagher, Romano's MySpace postings regularly included smiley faces, suggesting that she was happy. Gallagher, a partner at Gallagher & Faller in Garden City, New York, said he also tracked down the Facebook page of Romano's daughter, which, he said, included postings and photos indicating that the family had traveled to Florida, contradicting Romano's claims that she is homebound. "We figured something smells here," Gallagher said, "and we wanted to see what else was in there."

New York Supreme Court Judge Jeffrey Arlen Spinner granted Gallagher's motion to compel Romano to provide access to the private portions of her Facebook and MySpace pages. "Plaintiffs who place their physical condition in controversy," Judge Spinner wrote, "may not shield from disclosure material which is necessary to the defense of the action."

Defense lawyers in both the Romano and McMillen cases said they will file subpoenas with Facebook and MySpace that incorporate the consent forms. Romano's attorney, Robert S. Kelner, said that if the case doesn't settle, he will appeal Judge Spinner's decision as overly broad. "If you have a private page, you may invite very few people and you may disclose very few things," Kelner said. "That is not something that should ever be open to a blanket authorization."

In this case, Facebook is trying to stay out of it: The company filed a motion arguing that defense lawyers should seek access to plaintiff's online material directly -- and not via a subpoena to the site. Facebook acknowledges, though, that litigants can be compelled to turn over private communications. "If a person believes that their Facebook materials are relevant to a case, they may have a duty to preserve and produce those materials," company spokesman Andrew Noyes said in an e-mail to Reuters Legal. MySpace did not file a response to the motion in the Romano case and did not respond to a request for comment.

In his September ruling, Judge Spinner cited a 2009 decision in U.S. District Court in Colorado involving two repairmen who sued Wal-Mart after an electrical accident in one of the company's stores. In the federal case, Magistrate Judge Michael J. Watanabe ruled that the plaintiffs' private comments on Facebook, MySpace and Meetup.com were subject to subpoenas sought by Wal-Mart. The content of the sites are not protected by doctor-patient privilege or subject to a protective order, Judge Watanabe ruled, because the subpoenas were "reasonably calculated" to discover evidence that might be relevant to the lawsuit.

To be sure, not all defense requests for access to private postings are being granted. In November, a New York State Appeals Court denied a defense request to compel the plaintiff in an insurance dispute to turn over photographs from the private portion of her Facebook profile. The court found that the request amounted to a "fishing expedition," though it ruled that a more narrowly targeted request could be filed.

More White Elephant Sightings!

The elusive white iPhone has been spotted in a few more locations across the globe. Apparently a Japanese paint process has finally allowed Apple's Chinese manufacturer Foxxcon to finally begin producing the almost mythic device.

Read more details here.

Glass is Breakable?

I bought some new Bodum wine glasses a few weeks ago and I loved them, until I realized they were defective!! At a recent party a guest of ours dropped one of these beautiful glasses from a height of three feet. The result, shattered glass everywhere. Obviously Bodum is not informing its customers of the defects in their products.

Needless to say I am currently working with my lawyers to bring a class action lawsuit against this company for not informing me and many others of the inherent flaws in their design.

If you want to know what I'm talking about check this out!

International Holocaust Remembrance Day

January 27th is celebrated around the world as International Holocaust Remembrance Day.

The decision to adopt this date to honor the victims and survivors of the Holocaust was taken by the United Nations General Assembly in November 2005, almost two months before the 61st anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camps by Russian troops.

The Death March

Although the camps at Auschwitz-Birkenau were liberated on January 27th, 1945, for most prisoners freedom was still a long way away. Thousands of the inmates were not free yet, as hours before the camps were liberated, the majority were forcibly marched out of the camps at gunpoint. Their march through western Poland and into Germany became known as the Death March.

It was winter and bitterly cold. Many prisoners died on the way and many more suffered from frostbite. Others who fell and were too weak to proceed due to malnutrition and exhaustion were shot and their bodies were left lying in the snow. Some prisoners did manage to escape during the night, as they had briefly stopped and slept in a barn on the way.

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The Death March continued across the border into Germany and for some it terminated at Ravensbrück – another Nazi concentration camp. Ravensbrück was liberated by the Red Army on April 30th, 1945, more than three months after the liberation of Auschwitz.

We Must Remember the Holocaust

As many of the survivors of the Holocaust have now died and many more will pass away in the years to come, it is the duty of the younger generations to keep their memory alive. As Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon said during the observance of the Holocaust Victims Memorial Day on January 19th, 2008:

"The International Day in memory of the victims of the Holocaust is thus a day on which we must reassert our commitment to human rights. [...] We must also go beyond remembrance, and make sure that new generations know this history. We must apply the lessons of the Holocaust to today’s world. And we must do our utmost so that all peoples may enjoy the protection and rights for which the United Nations stands."

Commemorating the Holocaust

The Holocaust has been commemorated around the world in many ways. There are statues, museums and monuments dedicated to its memory in many countries of the world. Auschwitz is now a museum and thousands of people visit the infamous site every year where they come face to face with the inhumanity of the conditions suffered by the inmates of the camp. Ravensbrück is also a memorial site dedicated to the memory of the Holocaust.

Established in 1953 Yad Vashem is the Jewish people's living memorial to the Holocaust in Jerusalem. It safeguards the memory of the past and preserves it for future generations. It is a dynamic center for inter-generational and international encounters.

In New York The Garden of Stones is a memorial to the survivors and victims of the Holocaust at the Museum of Jewish Heritage. Designed by the British artist Any Goldsworthy it consists of 18 boulders within which miniature oak trees have been planted. It brings together the permanent and the transitory, the hard and the soft, the new and the old.

The best memorial is the living memory in the hearts and minds of people who care. The more the new generations take the trouble to remember the horrors of the holocaust, the less the possibility of another holocaust being perpetrated by one nation upon another.

References:

Muller, Filip. Eye Witness Auscwitz: Three Years in the Gas Chambers. Routledge & Kegan Paul Ltd. Chicago: 1979.

Steinbacher, Sybille. Auschwitz: A History. HarperCollins Publishers Inc. New York: 2005.

Kuperberg, Icek. Memoirs of a Holocaust Survivor. Universal Publisher. Parkland, FL: 2000.

Netflix Crunches the Bears Green Bay Packers Style

The heavily shorted stock of Netflix (NFLX) is once more going to create some pain for the bears in the name, after a surge Wednesday evening in after hours following its earning report. While gross margins were pressured, and the churn rate increased, investors are overlooking any warts because of outperformance on net subscriber additions. For instance, this quarter the company actually had less gross profit($205M v $209M) than it had last quarter, despite revenue jumping $43M . When those type of things are ignored by the investor masses, that's what drives a short nuts. Marketing expense dropped by nearly $20M this quarter, which helped the EPS keep growing.

In terms of guidance, Netflix is pulling an interesting tactic in terms of going much more vague going forward. Usually this is seen as a red flag but for now the company is getting the benefit of the doubt. As the company surpasses 20M subscribers, it will be important to move into foreign countries not named Canada to keep up the growth rate, as the law of large(r) numbers will begin to kick in. As with all growth stories, eventually a wall will be hit - deceleration of growth momentum begins - and the stock takes a beating. Only then will valuation truly matter. But the shorts in this name have been making that bet for quite a few quarters, only to be kicked in the teeth.

The stock is indicating $206 in premarket, with $209s being the 52 week high. EPS came in at 87 cents versus 71 expectation; at this premarket level the stock will be trading at 60x-ish 2010 earnings. 2011 estimates are just under $4.00; assuming they can beat that significantly and do $4.50, this is still a premium 45x forward estimates.

Full report here Via AP

• Netflix Inc.'s video subscription service topped 20 million customers during the fourth quarter to help push its earnings beyond analyst expectations and burnish its reputation as a stock-market star. Its shares surged 10 percent on the news. The shares tripled last year to give Netflix a market value of nearly $10 billion -- more than some of the studios that supply the content for its DVD-by-mail and Internet video streaming service.
• The lofty valuation has intensified the pressure on Netflix to keep attracting subscribers at a rapid pace. Netflix delivered in the fourth quarter by reeling in 3.1 million subscribers, by far the most during any three-month period since its service launched in 1999. The company, based in Los Gatos, said it believes the current quarter could be even better. It expects to gain as many as 3.7 million more subscribers in the U.S. and Canada by the end of March.
• In a departure from its past practice, Netflix didn't provide a full-year forecast, partly because executives say it's becoming more difficult to accurately forecast the company's rate of growth over such an extended period.
• Another variable clouding the outlook: Netflix unveiled plans to enter its second international market during the second half of this year after expanding into Canada last fall. The company didn't identify which new market it's targeting, but said it anticipates an operating loss of about $50 million on its international operations in the second half of the year. The Canada service is supposed to start making money during the third quarter.
• Netflix earned $47.1 million, or 87 cents per share, during the final three months of last year. That was a 52 percent increase from $30.9 million, or 56 cents per share, last year. Analysts surveyed by FactSet expected earnings of 71 cents per share.
• Revenue rose 34 percent to $596 million from $445 million a year earlier. That figure merely matched analyst estimates.
• For all of 2010, Netflix earned $161 million, or $2.96 per share, on revenue of $2.16 billion. That compared with net income of $116 million, or $1.98 per share, on revenue of $1.67 billion in 2009.
• Netflix spent $174 million on video streaming rights in the fourth quarter, a nearly eight-fold increase from $23 million at the same time in the prior year.
• It also raised its DVD prices and introduced an $8-per-month plan for U.S. subscribers who only want to stream Internet video. The company said about one-third of its new customers are signing up for the streaming only plan, with most others opting for a $10-a-month plan that includes one DVD rental at a time. Most existing subscribers are sticking with the plans they already had.
• As Netflix has prospered, it has turned into a bigger threat to cable TV services, particularly premium channels such as HBO and Showtime. HBO has steadfastly refused to sell its streaming rights to Netflix and Showtime isn't making as much material available as it once did.

Stocks Move Up, While Gold And Silver Get Bludgeoned: Here's What You Need To Know

Great day for equities, and horrible day for commodities.

But first, the scoreboard:

Dow: 2.46
NASDAQ: 15.70
S&P 500: 2.74

• Well, we'll start the day around 3:30 AM, when S&P came out with an unexpected credit downgrade of Japan. That whacked the yen, as well as the rest of the "risk on" assets. For a moment, it seemed the day would take a bearish turn.

• But it took just a few minutes for S&P to be reminded of its irrelevance. Japanese Bonds barely moved on the news, and it wasn't long before the entire move was totally erased. Kind of hysterical, actually.

• Europe was pretty quiet. Maybe everyone's too busy at Davos to say anything that would create another crisis.

• Egypt crashed. It fell over 10% after falling 6% yesterday.

• There really wasn't much economic news in the US. There was a big spike in initial jobless claims, and some are wondering if -- like with everything else right now -- the weather had something to do it.

• On the earnings front it was a mixed bag. Potash absolutely crushed it. Proctor & Gamble wasn't so hot, really. Microsoft earnings leaked early, and the stock is jumping on the news. Thanks to signs of margin pressure at McDonald's, Proctor & Gamble, and the like, there was major outperformance by the consumer discretionaries. After the bell, Amazon will be out. Update: Amazon is out and, it's weak. The stock is diving.

• Netflix exploded higher after yesterday's lights-out earnings report.

• Really the big losers of the day were the precious metals: Gold, silver, and the like just got crushed.

• Tomorrow should be very interesting between US GDP and expectations of big protests in Egypt.

• Click here for incredible photos of the protests in egypt >

• Tomorrow should be very interesting. There's an expectation of big protests in Egypt, and in the US there's GDP.

Gross!

Poorly Dressed: A Tube Top of Fish Scales

Fake Arkham City Trailer Offers Tantalising Glimpse Of Batman & Joker Teaming Up

Rocksteady Games, purveyors of exquisitely fine Batman games, or rather Batman game, since they only made one, may be cooking up a heart attack for the breathless multitudes defacing calendars during their wait for the sequel.

Is what I originally thought when first viewing the best fake Arkham City trailer featuring a Batman and Joker team-up you’ll see this week. Especially since it’s no slouch execution-wise.

The video appeared on a French gaming site, so it’s a good bet that the author is French as well and it’s that good. The only thing that lets it down is the anticlimactic ending. It almost seems like whoever made it almost got it done and then just gave up. Surrendered, if you will.

Unfortunately, Warner Brothers Interactive had to go and spoil everybody’s fun by confirming it was fake, but it had me going for a while there. About up to the time Batman starts performing contact acrobatics with Joker.

You can check out the fake trailer here. http://www.arkhamhasmoved.com/us/index.html

Deutsche Bank ditches BlackBerry for iPhone, Apple puts chink in RIM's enterprise armor

For years, suit-and-tie circles have bowed to BlackBerry as the king of corporate communication, but iOS has been creeping in on enterprise territory, calling into question RIM's sovereignty in the boardroom. The folks at Deutsche Bank Equity Research struck the most recent blow to RIM's enterprise dominance with the announcement that they'll buck BlackBerry for iPhone, following a trial using Good Technology's secure email app. The company tested the app in conjunction with Microsoft Exchange Server, delivering AES 192-encrypted email and calendar data to employees, and, according to the firm's research analyst, the iPhone proved an easier and faster solution to BlackBerry. Last summer, AT&T announced that 40 percent of iPhone sales are enterprise, and we just reported on RIM's possible move to devices beyond the BlackBerry. We're not saying it's off to the guillotine with the old standard bearer, but it definitely looks like there are new contenders for the enterprise crown.

Gmail Now Has Desktop Notifications Baked In for Chrome

Well this is awesome: Gmail just added desktop notifications for new mail and chats, baked directly into Chrome. Here's how it works.

Basically it turns Chrome into a desktop notifier for Gmail, so you don't have to run any separate notifier if you're big on getting the heads up when new email (or chats) arrive. Clicking a notification will either open up the new email in a new window or direct your back to your Gmail tab (which is what happened in the video above).

To turn them on, click on the Settings link in the top right corner of Gmail and scroll down to the "Desktop Notifications" section. If you just want to get notified about chat messages, or if you use Priority Inbox and only want to get notifications for important messages, you can customize your settings from there too.

Clearly this is also a good thing for Chrome OS, which isn't capable of running regular background apps, but can background web apps—and display their notifications. Spicy.

The new notifications ship with the option to toggle chat notifications and choose between notifications for any new mail, or just for Important mail (that is, email that hits your Priority Inbox). Right now the notifications are only available for Chrome users, but Google says they're working on bringing them to other browsers as well.

Use the new feature wisely. Nothing kills a productive work session like another pop-up notification. You can also adjust the way notifications work—including the position they appear on your screen—by clicking the wrench icon on the notification itself.

Desktop notifications for emails and chat messages [Official Gmail Blog]