The Facebook chief was quizzed on a variety of important privacy concerns that have been highlighted in recent months. Zuckerberg admitted that over time Facebook’s privacy settings had become too complex. “Privacy is a really important issue for us and for the Internet. We spend a lot of time thinking about these things.”, Zuckerberg said.
When questioned on opt in or opt out settings, Zuckerberg was insistent that Facebook asks users to control their privacy settings. “We ask that people review their settings and make a choice for what they want their settings to be”, he said. Zuckerberg admitted the company has a hard time building products that people use to share information and ensuring that all the products have privacy settings that users can control.
Zuckerberg also looked back on previous controversies surrounding Facebook. He revealed that 10% of Facebook users protested against the news feed when it was originally introduced. Zuckerberg says news feed is critical to Facebook now and that it would be “pretty crazy” if you signed up to Facebook and had to choose individual features to turn on.
The Facebook CEO looked visibly uncomfortable and sweated profusely according to The New York Times who said Zuckerberg was very much in the hot seat.
Zuckerberg defended the perception that Facebook is on a course to push people’s information into a position where it’s visible across the Internet. “In terms of the settings that we have, I think that there are some misperceptions, umm, and then some of it I think is in line with what we’re trying to do. There have been misperceptions that say that we’re trying to make all of the information open or something like that, that’s completely false.”
“My prediction would be that a few years from now, we’ll look back and wonder why there was ever this time when all these websites and applications whether they are mobile applications or websites weren’t personalised in some way. Whether it’s through social plugins or connect or instant personalization or whatever programs other companies come out with. I just think that the world is moving in this direction where things are going to be designed more around people and I think that it’s going to be a really powerful direction.”
The lowercase ‘i’ has become rather famous over the years, through the work of the Cupertino based company, Apple. From the iPod, iPhone and iMac to iWork and iLife (and others), it’s certainly a recurring trend. However, Apple CEO Steve Jobs originally wanted a different name for the iMac.
Last November, it was revealed that the iMac wasn’t the original choice for Apple’s main desktop computer. Of course, the title itself wasn’t revealed, but was said to be “blood curdling”, leaving many to speculate. Some pretty bad ones were suggested, but Jobs had one much worse in mind, according to Gizmodo: MacMan.
A company named Midiman held the name back when a title was being chosen, which was used for a serial-to-MIDI adapter. It was said that Apple went to Midiman with an offer for the name, though the owner declined, and thus another name had to be chosen (thankfully). It’s certainly an interesting reveal, providing it is true, and goes to show what atrocities could pop up even in some of the world’s biggest companies. Now with Apple’s supposed upcoming ‘iSlate’, we’ll see what the official name for the tablet really is, though hopefully it isn’t nearly as bad as MacMan.
Microsoft and HP both announced a joint deal today that will see the software and hardware giants collaborate on future engineering road maps to eliminate the complexities of IT management.
Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, HP chairman and CEO Mark Hurd, held a joint teleconference call this morning to announce the agreement. According to Ballmer the agreement, that spans both hardware, software and services, “will transform the way large enterprises deliver services to their customers, and help smaller organizations adopt IT to grow their businesses.” Microsoft and HP believe a combined effort will offer a lower total cost of ownership for business customers.
Microsoft is using the tag line “simplify technology environments for businesses of all sizes” to describe the new deal. In short it appears Microsoft and HP will share ideas and technologies based on Microsoft’s Cloud infrastructure and virtualization efforts. The deal isn’t cheap and 250 million incremental dollars will be invested into the initiative. The two companies will also partner on some support solutions and marketing campaigns. During the joint teleconference call Ballmer stated “we’re able to build on our incredible 25 year partnership of the two companies put together to drive things forward.”
Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer has a lot to be excited about, with the great success that is Windows 7. Steve Ballmer announced at the shareholders meeting that Windows 7 has sold more than double of any previous version of Windows ever sold, in a comparable time.
“Since launch, we’ve already sold twice as many units of Windows 7 than any other operating system we’ve ever launched in a comparable time,” Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer said.
Steve Ballmer used the word “fantastic” to describe Windows 7 sales in both Japan and North America, saying “Windows 7 is the simply best PC operating system we have ever built.” Microsoft is also closely watching the netbook market, since they result in less revenue on a per-unit basis, compared to laptop and desktop PCs for the company.
As manufactures will begin to report their numbers, Ballmer’s claim will be verified for sales of Windows 7 with new hardware. Dell already confirmed that Windows 7 sparked demand for new PCs among business consumers.
