Google to get new space age home

Google is to get a new home after signing a 40-year lease to build a high-tech campus on land owned by Nasa.

The 1.2m sq ft site will include a huge office complex, and research and development facilities.

The search giant will pay an initial base rent of $3.66m a year for the undeveloped land at the Nasa Ames Research Centre in Mountain View.

Google says it needs the space for the thousands of workers it expects to hire as the company expands its business.

"This long-term lease agreement is a key component of Google's strategy for continued growth in Silicon Valley," says David Radcliffe, Google's vice-president of real estate and workplace services.

In the last four years, Google has added more than 17,000 employees to boost its payroll to 19, 156 workers.

This workforce expansion has spurred the company to lease or buy many of the smaller offices circling its Googleplex headquarters, a 1 million sq ft campus that Google bought for $139m two years ago.

The deal is being seen as a win-win situation for Nasa as it endeavours to establish itself as a high-tech centre of excellence

"With this new campus, we will establish an era of expanded collaboration with Google that will further enhance our Silicon Valley connections," says Ames director S. Pete Worden.

"This major expansion of Nasa Research Park supports Nasa's mission to lead the nation in space exploration, scientific discovery and aeronautics research."

Nasa will use the money for improvements and maintenance costs at the Research Park.

Mr Radcliffe agrees the agreement will enhance Nasa's reputation and allow the company to draw on the brain power that will be available on its new doorstep.

"We believe this collaboration between Google, Nasa and the city of Mountain View is emblematic of the mutually beneficial partnerships that can be created between the public and private sectors. "

Google has not said how much it will cost to build the new campus, which is also expected to include housing for employees, sports, conference, dining and child care facilities and perhaps some retail outlets.

Building work is expected to get under way no later than 2013 with the final phase of work starting in 2022.

After the 40-year lease expires, the agreement could be extended by as much as 50 more years.

Microsoft demos 'touch Windows'

Microsoft's next operating system (OS) will come with multi-touch features as an alternative to the mouse. It is hoped the successor will have a better reception than the much-maligned Vista OS, released last year.

Scheduled for release in 2009 the new fingertip interface lets users enlarge and shrink photos, trace routes on maps, paint pictures or play the piano.

"The way you interact with the system will change dramatically," said Microsoft chairman Bill Gates.

Speaking at the All Things Digital conference in San Diego, the Microsoft Chairman said Windows 7 would incorporate new forms of communication and interaction.

"Today almost all the interaction is keyboard-mouse. Over years to come, the role of speech, vision, ink - all of those things - will be huge."

Chief executive Steve Ballmer described the limited demo of the multi touch screen at the conference as "a small snippet" of the next version of Windows after admitting he wants "to do better" than Vista.

Even though Vista has suffered from a poor public image and a lukewarm welcome from many firms and users, Ballmer said the company has shipped 150 million copies of the programme.

Touch enabled

Industry watchers say Microsoft is hoping that Windows 7 can change the way people interact with PCs in the future.

"Touch is quickly becoming a common way of interacting with software and devices," writes Windows product manager Chris Flores in a blog post.

"Touch-enabled surfaces are popping up everywhere including laptop touch pads, cell phones, remote controls, GPS devices and more."

When challenged as to who will get to market first with a new touch screen device, Microsoft or Apple, Mr Ballmer said it was not much of an issue.

"We'll sell 290 million PCs and Apple will sell 10 million Pcs."

"They're fantastically successful and so are we and our partners. But it's a different job. Steve (Jobs Apple CEO) can flip his hand and sell a few models and I don't take a thing away from him."

Website Beta News reports that "beta testing of the product should begin later this year although a lack of touch-screen devices could slow widespread trials of the new interface".

We walked away

During the conference, CEO Steve Ballmer also talked about the company's failure to buy Yahoo, following its offer of $47.5 billion.

"Look, we made a bid for Yahoo. It was out there for three months and there was a difference between bid and ask."

"We thought we could accelerate our business. We were going to be financially disciplined about it. We walked away. We are talking with them about other ideas but we are not re-bidding on the company. We reserve the right to do so. That's not on the docket."

Gates said: "I've been supportive of everything Steve has done. Totally supportive."

bbc

Gamer anger at Nokia's 'lock in'

If a gamer changes or upgrades to a different Nokia handset they have to purchase the games again if they want to continue playing.

The issue was uncovered by website All About N-Gage.

"It's a bad idea for everyone... the N-Gage platform, gamers and third party publishers," the site said.

Nokia said it had made the decision to prevent piracy and to ensure its "partners receive their rightful revenues from our platform".

Nokia relaunched its N-Gage mobile gaming platform last month.

About 30 games are available on a limited range of Nokia handsets, which are bought and downloaded direct to the phone.

It is the company's second attempt at making mobile gaming a success. In 2003 it released a dedicated handset for gaming, but the device never took off.

But the new platform has provoked anger amongst gamers.

Writing on the official N-Gage forums, one gamer said: "Changes need to be made soon, and sticking one's head in the sand will not change anybody's mind."

When gamers sign up for the service they have to agree to terms and conditions, part of which explains that games cannot be transferred between devices.

It states: "Content shall be... limited to one private installation on one N-Gage compatible Nokia device only."

But gamers have complained that the detail is buried in the terms and conditions and it is not clear enough at the point of purchase.

A statement from Nokia said: "Our policy is that the N-Gage activation codes only work on the device where they were first activated.

"As with any digital media there is a potential risk of piracy and this policy is one of the ways we are dealing with piracy and ensuring our partners receive their rightful revenues from our platform.

"If users need to repair their device, the activation codes will be reissued."

Reuters

Intel seeks wireless unification

Intel is the biggest supporter of Wimax, which offers high-speed, long-range wireless connections designed for the mobile net.

"In our view they ought to be harmonised," said Sean Maloney, head of sales and marketing at Intel.

LTE is a technology based on existing mobile networks and has broad support from many mobile bodies.

Mr Maloney's comments are likely to be welcomed by the mobile industry, which fears the impact two rival standards could have on the market.

Earlier this year, Vodafone chief executive Arun Sarin said he believed the two standards could be brought together.

LTE is proving popular with handset manufacturers and mobile carriers because it is seen as an evolution to existing 3G networks.

By contrast, Wimax has won favour in the computer industry because its roots lie with wi-fi.

Both technologies have supporters who are in the two camps.

For instance Vodafone is currently trialling Wimax in Greece and Malta and its US subsidiary Verizon is trying out LTE.

The two systems are non-line of sight, and offer "optimal" broadband performance in a cell network between three and five kilometres in size.

LTE is also expected to offer higher speeds than Wimax, peaking at 100 Mbps download and 50 Mbps uploads.

Microsoft's cooperation with HP

In a bid to boost its Web search traffic, Microsoft Corp. on Monday announced a deal that will make its Live Search the default on Hewlett-Packard Co. personal computers shipped in the U.S. and Canada, starting in January.

The deal also calls for HP, the world's largest PC maker, to install copies of Internet Explorer with an extra Live Search toolbar on those computers. Microsoft said the toolbar also links to HP services such as its Snapfish digital photo printing site.

Since Microsoft called off its $47.5 billion offer to buy search competitor Yahoo Inc., the company has been under pressure to prove it has a new plan for attracting more people to Live Search.

Google Inc. fields more than 10 times Microsoft's search traffic and has parlayed that into billions of dollars in advertising. Yahoo, the No. 2 search engine in the U.S., attracts more than twice as much as traffic as Live Search.

Microsoft has already made a similar arrangement with the much smaller, China-based Lenovo Group, while Google has a distribution deal in place with Dell Inc. and Mozilla's Firefox Web browser.

"Every Dell machine we buy at home that comes with the Google toolbar, it's not a good day in my family when that happens," Ballmer said to a gathering of employees on May 1. He told them Microsoft is now willing to invest more in distribution deals.

Microsoft would not reveal financial details of the deal or say how much additional search traffic it expects to gain.

Angus Norton, a senior director in Microsoft's Live Search group, said about 40 percent of Web surfers use whatever search engine is set as the default on their PC.

The Washington Times

Google accused over privacy law

The search engine giant is being asked to write the word "privacy" alongside other information links.

"It's a short, seven letter word and in the world of privacy it's a very important word," said Beth Givens of Privacy Rights Clearinghouse.

Google says its policy is easy to find and it gives "accessible information".

The issue has been building momentum following a series of blogs in the New York Times questioning Google's compliance with the California Online Privacy Protection Act of 2003.

The law requires any commercial website that collects personal information about its users to "conspicuously post its privacy policy on its website".

Google maintains that it already does and that its privacy policy can be found by going through its search engine or by clicking on "About Google".

In a conference call, a coalition of privacy organisations told journalists that was not good enough and it has written to Google.

The groups involved include the Electronic Privacy Information Centre, the World Privacy Forum, Consumer Action, the Electronic Frontier Foundation and the ACLU of Northern California.

Reuters