Many Silicon Valley heavyweights have signed an open letter opposing an anti-piracy bill they say could wreak havoc on the Internet. The bill nevertheless seems likely to pass a committee vote today.
FORTUNE -- One of the problems with discussing SOPA and PROTECT IP, the wildly overreaching anti-piracy measures under debate in Congress, is that the proposed laws pit two industries against each other: media vs. tech. That makes it sound MORE
Dan Mitchell, contributor - Dec 15, 2011 10:33 AM ET
Apple is the top manufacturer (28.6% share), Android the top operating system (44.2%)
Click to enlarge. Source: Nielsen
Nielsen (NLSN), which is fighting hard to be for mobile media what it was for television, pulled out all the stops in its State of the Media report for the third quarter of 2011.
Drawing on monthly surveys of 25,000 Americans (300,000 per year), it found, among other things:
44% now carry smartphones. Ownership is highest MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Dec 15, 2011 9:00 AM ET
A proprietary survey finds demand for iPads and iPhones much stronger than expected
Click to enlarge.
The results of an AlphaWise survey of U.S. consumers conducted for Morgan Stanley the week after Thanksgiving was full of surprises, reports Katy Huberty in a note to clients issued late Wednesday.
iPhones are selling surprisingly briskly. Based on the survey and last week's comments from AT&T (T), Huberty estimates that Apple (AAPL) could ship anywhere MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Dec 15, 2011 6:53 AM ET
Fortune's curated selection of tech stories from the last 24 hours. Sign up to get the round-up delivered to you each and every day.
* The real story behind former Windows Mobile head Andy Lees' removal from his role. According to The Verge, Lees' lofty, public estimates for Windows Phone 7's success -- and the hard reality that it hasn't made much of a dent in the market -- created a rift. (The MORE
JP Mangalindan, Writer-Reporter - Dec 15, 2011 3:30 AM ET
Box.net CEO Aaron Levie argues that the reign of the enterprise oligarchy is coming to an end -- thanks to the democratic nature of the cloud.
By Aaron Levie, contributor
FORTUNE -- Grabbing market share through muscle, not innovation, has served Microsoft and other leading enterprise behemoths well: they play in a $250 billion-plus industry that asymmetrically favors a few vendors. But not surprisingly, this model has not been particularly effective in MORE
Dec 14, 2011 2:57 PM ET
With a new deal, online survey provider SurveyMonkey joins a growing -- but still exclusive club -- of small, privately-held Silicon Valley startups worth more than $1 billion.
FORTUNE -- You know what's cooler than 12 million dollars? One billion dollars.
Okay, that wasn't quite as snappy as Sean Parker's exchange with Mark Zuckerberg in the The Social Network. But consider this: Dave Goldberg's "cool" music startup, Launch Media, was sold to MORE
Miguel Helft, senior writer - Dec 14, 2011 2:29 PM ET
Its competitors say there's something to talk of how hard it may be for the company to turn a profit. They also say that won't always be the case.
FORTUNE -- Since Spotify's launch in Sweden three years ago, the music streaming service has become an industry darling by popularizing the "all-you-can-listen" business model. But it hasn't always been smooth sailing for the startup. Securing licensing deals with the big four MORE
JP Mangalindan, Writer-Reporter - Dec 14, 2011 1:54 PM ET
Samsung's "buzz score" has overtaken Apple's in a key demographic, says YouGov
Click to enlarge.
The chart at right says it all.
Starting around Nov. 28 -- six days after Samsung began airing its Galaxy Nexus ads mocking Apple's (AAPL) customer base (see here) -- the Korean conglomerate's "buzz" started rising and the iPhone's drifting down.
And on Wednesday, according to a press release issued by YouGov, something unthinkable happened:
"Samsung has just edged MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Dec 14, 2011 1:11 PM ET
Google's auction-based IPO didn't go over flawlessly. But that doesn't mean Facebook couldn't benefit massively from the alternative method if it so chooses.
By Richard Nieva, contributor
FORTUNE — How will Facebook's mega IPO go down? The social networking giant will likely go public next spring with an anticipated evaluation of $80 to $100 billion, possibly raising some $10 billion. It could be the highest the tech world has ever seen. MORE
Dec 14, 2011 12:23 PM ET
Comedian Louis CK is raking it in with a Web-based experiment that cuts out distributors. That should make media companies very nervous.
By Dan Mitchell, contributor
FORTUNE -- Comedian Louis CK said on Tuesday that he had taken in $500,000 in less than three days from selling his latest standup special directly to the public at $5 a pop. This should make media companies nervous because this is the future -- and increasingly, MORE
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| Company | Price | Change | % Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bank of America Corp... | 7.24 | -0.06 | -0.86% |
| Ford Motor Co | 12.26 | -0.48 | -3.75% |
| Frontier Communicati... | 4.22 | -0.25 | -5.59% |
| Juniper Networks Inc... | 21.62 | -0.75 | -3.33% |
| Cisco Systems Inc | 19.59 | -0.24 | -1.21% |
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| Dow | 12,663.49 | -71.14 | -0.56% |
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| Treasuries | 1.91 | -0.02 | -1.09% |
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