Amazon to open Tel Aviv office to support cloud services

TEL AVIV (Reuters) - Amazon.com will open an office in Tel Aviv to support its cloud computing offering called Amazon Web Services (AWS), the company's chief technology officer said on Tuesday.

The office is expected to begin operating at the start of 2014 and support companies from start-ups to large organizations as they move to cloud computing services offered by Amazon.

Companies in Israel, which has a large concentration of technology start-ups, were among the first to turn to cloud computing when AWS was established in 2006, the CTO said.

"If you start a business today you no longer buy IT (information technology). You spend your money on getting better engineers and product builders," Werner Vogels told a news conference.

AWS, which is the market leader in cloud computing, according to the latest Gartner research, rents remote computing and storage to other companies, providing over 30 different services.

Vogels said Amazon is focused on driving costs down and has lowered the price for its services 37 times since 2006.

"We've always know that this is not a winner take all market. There is room for many providers with differentiating products," he said.

(The story has been filed again to clarify that company is market leader according to research firm Gartner in paragraph five.)

(Reporting by Tova Cohen)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/amazon-open-tel-aviv-office-support-cloud-services-105047053--finance.html
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Trouble's brewing in Android land

The Android OS dominates the mobile landscape, outselling all rivals combined in most countries. The only serious challenger, Apple's iOS, earns much more money for Apple than Android earns for Google and all its hardware partners combined, but when it comes to market share, Android is king. So why does the Android ecosystem appear to be troubled?

HTC is in disarray, as its Android sales struggle in the face of the dominant Samsung, which is the only Android device maker to profit from Android. Google's Nexus devices have so-so sales, perhaps because they tend to be middle-of-the-road devices that don't inspire large populations the way Samsung and Apple do. Ditto for its Motorola Mobility unit. In fact, Google seems to have backed off on Android, focusing instead on Chrome OS and its array of data-mining services, which is where the company actually makes its money.

[ InfoWorld picks the best office apps for Android. | Keep up on key mobile developments and insights via Twitter and with the Mobilize newsletter. ]

Then there's Samsung, which sells by far the most Android devices and makes real money from them. Yet it apparently has stolen secret Apple information in defiance of the courts, cheats on industry benchmarks, and abuses the patent system to undermine Apple, a key customer if also a key competitor. It also stoops to announcing all-but-nonexistent products, such as the curved-glass Samsung Round last week, a pathetic attempt to pretend to be first. (HTC plans a similar product, so Samsung cobbled together a prototype that may never actually reach the market.) Such actions reek of desperation, not success.

What's going on in Android land is a series of sometimes unrelated events that intertwine in ways that aren't good for Android's future.

HTC's desperation to matter again
For example, HTC's troubles are not so much about Android but about not delivering compelling products regularly. HTC was the first company to offer a compelling Android device, the Droid Eris, in 2009, then all but disappeared in terms of innovation for the next three years. Its products were run-of-the-mill, inspiring little passion. And users have complained for years that HTC smartphones tend to break after a year of operation. Although this year's HTC One is a stylish smartphone that's a personal favorite of mine, it has done little to make HTC a leader in the Android market.

As a result, the company is in chaos, according to news reports. It's losing money, has laid off employees, and may need to get an infusion of cash from another company, ending its independence.

Samsung's misguided and perhaps unethical strategy
Samsung holds the leadership role in Android, thanks to strong efforts in 2011 and 2012 to make innovative, compelling products, such as the Galaxy Note series of smartphones, the Note series of tablets, and the very nice Galaxy S III. This year's Galaxy S 4 may have jumped the shark, despite its improved physical design, because of its mishmash of partially completed software, but Samsung still has plenty of momentum from those earlier products in buyers' minds.

Source: http://akamai.infoworld.com/d/mobile-technology/troubles-brewing-in-android-land-228603?source=rss_mobile_technology
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Confederate Flag Guy Identified (Little green footballs)

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Canada to grant honorary citizenship to Malala Yousafzai

OTTAWA (Reuters) - Pakistani teenage activist Malala Yousafzai, who was shot in the head by the Taliban for campaigning for girls' education, will be granted honorary Canadian citizenship, the Canadian government announced on Wednesday.

She will join an elite group of foreign honorees who include South Africa's Nelson Mandela and Myanmar's Aung San Suu Kyi.

"Canada recognizes the courageous and inspiring example set by Malala Yousafzai in risking her life promoting education for young women," the government said in a speech setting out its priorities for the next two years.

"She faced down evil and oppression and now speaks boldly for those who are silenced."

After receiving death threats from the Taliban for defying the Islamist militant group with her outspoken views on the right to education, Yousafzai was shot a year ago while on a school bus near her village in Swat in northwestern Pakistan.

(Reporting by Randall Palmer; Editing by Eric Walsh)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/canada-grant-honorary-citizenship-malala-yousafzai-221439818.html
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Microsoft Yanks Windows RT 8.1 Update “Temporarily” Following Discovery Of A “Situation”

If you are a Windows RT user looking forward to moving to Windows RT 8.1, you can’t, at least for a little while. Today Microsoft removed the update from the Windows Store following the uncovering of a “situation” that was “affecting a limited number of users updating their Windows RT devices to Windows RT 8.1.”

So, the code is now unavailable “temporarily” while Microsoft fixes whatever the heck is wrong. The issue appears to impact the booting cycle of some machines after they update.

Microsoft is likely pissed that it had to yank the update – it was hoping for a very smooth Windows 8.1 update cycle. Still, if the error had been present in the vanilla Windows 8.1 update, and not its RT flavor, the embarrassment would have been greatly magnified. Windows RT, of course, is a sliver when compared with Windows 8.

Aside from this error, the Windows 8.1 release cycle has been mostly smooth. There were reports of individual user problems, and a general meme was that the update process took longer than expected, but worked. Until today.

How many Windows RT users are there? I don’t know, but given that the majority are presumably Surface RT users, Microsoft is delaying those who both bought into its hardware efforts as well as its new software platform. That’s not a very good Saturday for the company.

Peter Bright of Ars Technica has the best analysis of the situation:

To call this embarrassing for Microsoft is something of an understatement. While x86 PCs have extraordinary diversity, in terms of hardware, software, and drivers—all things that can prevent straightforward upgrading—the Windows RT devices are extremely limited in this regard. Upgrading Windows RT tablets should be absolutely bulletproof. It’s very disappointing that it isn’t.

Precisely.

We’ll have preliminary market share numbers for Windows 8.1 upgrade cycle next week, though I don’t expect this specific bug to move those numbers too much.

Top Image Credit: Dell Inc.

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Kerry Hopes Syria's Chemical Weapons Are Shipped Out Of The Region

Secretary of State John Kerry flies over Afghanistan on Oct. 11. He met with President Hamid Karzai to work out an agreement on U.S. presence in the country.

Jacquelyn Martin/AFP/Getty Images

Secretary of State John Kerry flies over Afghanistan on Oct. 11. He met with President Hamid Karzai to work out an agreement on U.S. presence in the country.

Jacquelyn Martin/AFP/Getty Images

Syria's chemical weapons could be consolidated and moved out of the country, Secretary of State John Kerry suggested in an interview with NPR.

Weapons inspectors are still in Syria assessing the country's stockpile and how to destroy it, in accordance with a United Nations Security Council resolution approved in September.

Asked by Morning Edition host Renee Montagne whether the agreement ensures that Syria's President Bashar Assad will remain in power, perhaps for many more months, Kerry replied:

"The fact is that these weapons can be removed whether Assad is there or not there because we know the locations, the locations have been declared, the locations are being secured. And my hope is that much of this material will be moved as rapidly [as] possibly into one location, and hopefully on a ship, and removed from the region."

Where such a ship would go is unclear, NPR's Michele Kelemen reports, and even the logistics of dealing with the weapons inside Syria are complicated.

"The Chemical Weapons Convention bars countries from moving their stockpiles — but in Syria's case, a U.N. resolution allows it and urges member states to help," Kelemen says.

Ralf Trapp, a consultant in chemical weapons disarmament, tells Kelemen that the idea of moving the material has been under discussion. However, he adds:

"It's a big, big logistical operation, and just doing this under peacetime conditions is not an easy job, so doing this under the conditions of Syria today is a challenge."

In an interview airing Thursday on Morning Edition, Kerry emphasized that the way forward in Syria would have to be diplomatic and that maintaining state institutions is key to future progress.

"There is no military solution. Absolutely not. There is only a continued rate of destruction and a creation of a humanitarian catastrophe for everybody in the region if the fighting continues," he said.

His remarks follow a two-week trip abroad, including two days in Kabul, where Kerry met with Afghan President Hamid Karzai. The leaders reached a deal on the terms of U.S. presence in Afghanistan after its combat mission ends.

"Everything that will be necessary to a successful agreement is in the agreement. We succeeded in defining exactly what the limits would be for American participation in the future," Kerry said.

But a council of public and tribal leaders, known as the Loya Jirga, still has to sign off on the issue of jurisdiction over Americans who would be working in Afghanistan.

"Needless to say, we are adamant it has to be the United States of America. That's the way it is everywhere else in the world," Kerry said. "And they have a choice: Either that's the way it is or there won't be any forces there of any kind."

Source: http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2013/10/17/235664114/kerry-hopes-syrias-chemical-weapons-are-shipped-out-of-the-region?ft=1&f=
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Activists: Bomb near Syrian capital kills 16

BEIRUT (AP) — Syrian rebels assaulted a checkpoint in a pro-government suburb of Damascus on Saturday, setting off a suicide vehicle bomb that killed 16 soldiers, activists said.

The violence came a day after nine Shiite pilgrims from Lebanon kidnapped in Syria last year were freed as part of a negotiated hostage deal that could see two Turkish pilots held by Lebanese militants and dozens of Syrian women held in Syrian government jails released.

Lebanese Interior Minister Marwan Charbel said that the Syrian opposition had demanded that the female detainees be taken to Turkey. He said once that that issue was resolved then the complicated, multilateral exchange would be complete.

"We are speaking with the Syrians about this issue and, God willing, when this logistical matter ends the whole process will end," Charbel told the Al-Manar TV channel of Lebanon's Hezbollah group.

While details about the deal remained murky, it appeared to represent one of the more ambitious negotiated settlements to come out of Syria's civil war, now in its third year, where the contenting sides remain largely opposed to any bartered peace.

The pilgrims, who according to Charbel crossed into Turkey late Friday, were part of a group of 11 hostages taken by a rebel faction in northern Syria in May 2012. Two were later released, but the nine had been held since, causing friction in the region and sparking the August kidnapping in Beirut that saw two Turkish Airlines pilots abducted.

The two Turkish Airlines pilots, previously identified as Murat Akpinar and Murat Agca, were kidnapped after flying into Beirut from Istanbul on Aug. 9. Lebanon's state news agency reported that a group called Zuwaar al-Imam Rida, a name implying a Shiite affiliation, claimed responsibility for the kidnapping. The group said the pilots "will only be released when the Lebanese hostages in Syria return," referring to the Shiite pilgrims.

The pilgrims were kidnapped while on their way from Iran to Lebanon through Turkey and Syria. Militants kidnapped them shortly after they crossed the Turkish border into Syria.

Meanwhile, outside Damascus, rebels led by the al-Qaida-linked Jabhat al-Nusra or Nusra Front set off the bomb while assaulting a checkpoint near the town of Mleiha adjoining the suburb of Jaramana, the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported. It reported heavy fighting after the blast.

The state news agency SANA confirmed the suicide blast in Jaramana and said it wounded 15 people, most of them seriously.

Rebels control much of the countryside around Damascus but Jaramana, a Christian and Druse area, is mostly loyal to President Bashar Assad. Opposition fighters have previously targeted it with bombings and mortar rounds.

Assad has drawn support from Syria's ethnic and religious minorities, including Christians and members of his Alawite sect. The rebels are dominated by Syria's Sunni Muslim majority.

At least 100,000 Syrians have been killed in the civil war.

• Politics & Government
• Unrest, Conflicts & War
• Marwan Charbel

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/activists-bomb-near-syrian-capital-kills-16-080955381.html
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