Items tagged with money
Didn't make that Forbes Billionaire list this year? While you're aiming to get on it next year, perhaps you're at least fortunate enough to find yourself working for a company that's listed on the 2014 edition of Barron's "World's Most Respected Companies" list. The list, which is outputted annually, is based on a survey of professional money managers concerning their views of the planet's 100 largest companies by market value. Mind you, money managers are focused more on the financial upside of a company than softer items like workplace culture and benefits, but it's still not a slight to find your company on the roster. Out of 100, a few key technology firms were listed, with one of them being...
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We all make mistakes, but as it turns out, some of them are more significant than others. As the Silk Road and Bitcoin saga continues, it appears that a list of bidders who were hoping to place bids for the ~$18 million in seized assets from Silk Road's closure have been made public. For a bit of background, around 30,000 Bitcoins were confiscated from Silk Road after it was seized and shut down for illegal practices. The U.S. Marshals Service was helping to handle a nine block bidding process, whereby the $18 million in assets could be re-entered into the market via legal means. Unfortunately, an email with those bidders was sent around, and Blind Copy wasn't used. Thus, identities were leaked,...
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If you stop a random stranger on the street and ask that person what a Bitcoin is, you might get a confused stare. Try asking that same question a year from now and maybe every person you ask will say, "It's a digital currency that's decentralized and uses cryptography to use control transactions to prevent double-spending." Or they'll simply tell you it's a digital currency. Either way, Bitcoins are growing too large to ignore. Bitcoins have nearly doubled in value in the just the last month alone, going from $125 at the start of October to around $310, depending on where you look. The virtual currency is currently trading at an all-time high, and that has some scratching their heads and others...
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Of all the current Internet curiosities, Bitcoin is one of the most fascinating. The digital/virtual currency is decentralized, has no change fees, and no state oversight to speak of, and nobody seems to know exactly what to do with it even as it grows in popularity and value. Case in point: On Mt. Gox, a major Bitcoin trading site, the value of Bitcoin exploded from about $100 to $265 in less than a day. Before the day was out, however, the price dropped sharply to $200. A few hours hence saw the value bottom out at $125 and then bounce around from to $180 to $140. (Click to enlarge) Then, Mt. Gox got hit with a DDoS attack--or maybe not. According to Mt. Gox, it was a victim of its own success....
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USAA and Chase already got involved in cashing checks via mobile scanning, but when PayPal gets involved, that's huge for the industry. PayPal's iPhone app has recently been updated, and the new version allows users to scan their checks in order to have the funds deposited immediately in their PayPal account. The catch, of course, is that the money is deposited in the PayPal account and not directly into your checking account. You'll still need to login and request a withdrawal in order to actually have the funds transferred to your bank account. The service works like this: you take a photo of the front and back of your check, and then they show up in your PayPal account. PayPal also recommends...
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If your childhood was anything like ours, we are assuming that your mother, father, sister, brother or some combination of any of those were constantly telling you to get away from the game console and step outside. Something about "rotting your brain" or some other nonsense. Now, it's going to be even more difficult for frustrated parents to convince their offspring to put away the gaming and engage in other activities, as one such gamer just netted himself one million dollars for doing nothing more than being exceptionally great at a video game. Pro gaming has been around for years now, and just like pro gambling, it's one of those career choices that no one really encourages you to pursue....
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PayPal revealed a new Send Money application for the iPhone and iPod touch. With version 2.0, you'll get secure mobile access to your PayPal account as well as Bump money transfers, Split Check, and Collect Money features. With Bump, you simply put two iPhones together to transfer money from one owner's account to the other's. The Split Check feature makes it easy to divide and split the cost of dinner with a friend. If you're trying to collect money from multiple people for a joint gift, the Collect Money feature can help. International transactions are also possible with the new app. PayPal Launches New Send Money App for iPhone Version 2.0 Brings Fast and Secure Mobile Access to Money SAN...
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Microsoft may just have acknowledged that digital distribution of software, long (relatively) used for distribution and sales of games, may just be ready to hit the big time. In an understated announcement on a newsgroup, by an MVP, Microsoft has announced it is going to halt the sale of boxed copies of its Quicken competitor, Money Plus. Additionally, they have decided to skip a 2009 version. Here's the news from the newsgroup post: Microsoft Money Plus continues to be a valuable tool for our customers; however the feedback we are hearing is that the incremental updates to the software don't merit a new product every year. Given this, we have decided against releasing a 2009 version of Money...
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E-Trade is offering its account holders a free application for their BlackBerry smartphones that allows them to get real-time stock information and execute trades on their phones. Now if you're walking down the street in a big city and see executives throwing themselves out of the windows of some skyscraper, you can read the name on the building, launch your E-Trade account and key in "Sell Mortimer! Sell!"High-end phone users have for a while been able to access E-Trade's Web site and those of most banks and brokerages, but the online firm is the first major U.S. brokerage to provide a mobile application with cash transfers and real-time quotes.Online trading through the free application, called...
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There was a fire in LG Chem's plant in South Korea in March of this year. "So what?" you might ask. Well, that plant makes lithium-ion batteries, and that's helping to limit the supply of laptop computers. "I think maybe the battery shortage may hurt every brand," said J.T. Wang, chairman of Acer, at the company's investor conference two weeks ago.But the head of the world's largest independent notebook battery maker, Simplo Technology, said he expects the lithium-ion supply to return to normal in the third quarter and allow battery makers to substantially increase production. "The LG Chem problem has had a big impact on supplies, but we're working with customers and they understand," said...
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Apple recently came to an agreement with a group of film studios including the 6 largest that would enable the Cupertino firm to release movies via iTunes the same day that they are available on DVD. The problem is that Apple might actually be taking a loss on them for the short term:“Apple said that starting this week, iTunes customers will be able to purchase newly released movies for $14.99, while most catalog titles are $9.99.The Wall Street Journal reported that Apple is paying the studios nearly $16 for each sale, but a source close to the negotiations told CNET News.com that Apple is paying closer to $15.50 than it is $16.”It’s not unheard of for companies to take a loss on new products,...
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Chris Anderson at Slate takes the long view on the effects that ultra-cheap bandwith, processors, and storage will have going forward, and comes to the conclusion that to make any money in the Internet economy, you'd better give whatever you've got away, and make money from ancillary items or services. And as consumers get used to the concept, other industries better get used to customers that demand a lot --for nothing.The huge psychological gap between "almost zero" and "zero" is why micropayments failed. It's why Google doesn't show up on your credit card. It's why modern Web companies don't charge their users anything. And it's why Yahoo gives away disk drive space. The question of infinite...
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Just kidding. But his box spring is probably made from gold bars. Maybe not. But one thing's for sure: Apple is swimming in cash. $15 billion in cash, to be precise. You'd have to be crazy to think that won't grow a lot with Christmas right around the corner. Unlike companies like Microsoft, Apple doesn't pay a dividend to their stockholders, so their big profit margins leave mounds of cash in their vaults. What to do with it? If the past is any guide, Jobs & Co. could very well use some of the money to swallow smaller companies. In 2001 Apple bought education software company PowerSchool; in 2002 it went on a binge and snapped up audio production company Emagic, video effects company...
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Universities and research institutes routinely need to swap huge amounts of information. Many of them have relied on two non-profit Internet networks, Internet2 and National LambdaRail, to supply them with the dedicated superfast network connections they require. Talks aimed at merging the two have been sporadically attempted. The latest round of negotiations has fallen apart again, and it appears the idea is dead now. What would non-profits who serve essentially the same users with the same service fight about, anyway? Money.Talks resumed this year, and a committee with top leaders from each network worked out a compromise in August.Internet2's board approved it, despite misgivings...
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Japan's Sony Corporation crawled up out of the puddle of reddish ink it was dog-paddling in last year and posted a substantial profit for the last quarter. The quarterly profit news allowed Sony to raise its forecast for the year by six times last year's number. The number is based mainly on strength in LCD TVs, computers, and digital cameras; and of course there were no flaming laptop battery recalls this year to eat away at the bottom line. But Sony is still unable to make any money selling its flagship Playstation 3 gaming console and Blu-ray player. ...its PlayStation 3 (PS3) videogame console continued to lag Nintendo Co Ltd's hot-selling Wii, and the game division fell deep into the...
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Stop me if you've heard this one before: Tech visionaries have made a lot of money, and they'd like to spend it on vaguely Star Trek sounding things of doubtful utility until they run of cash. It's Internet 2.0 silly season; in space, this time. In announcing the Google Lunar X Prize on Sept. 13, Google co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin joined a growing brigade of tech luminaries who have put their Web wealth to work in an area where they've little expertise: trying to transform space travel from a largely government affair to a civilian, profitable business. Like the $10 million Ansari X Prize, the Google Lunar X Prize provides incentive for the emerging...
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Sony announced four new models of Blu-ray disc recorder/players today. The new models have big capacity -- up to 16 hours of hi-def programming on 50 GB discs. The most expensive model has a 500GB hard drive, to boot, but you'll pay for it -- $1752. Note to Sony: the room I watch movies in didn't cost that much to build. "With high-definition TVs spreading rapidly and more digital cameras and camcorders are becoming HD-ready, time is ripe for household recorders to move onto a next generation," Sony Executive Deputy President Katsumi Ihara told a news conference. "We intend to make all our recorders in the domestic market Blu-ray compatible," he said....
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If you're running Intuit's popular QuickBooks Online Edition, the US Computer Emergency Readiness Team is warning you that your ActiveX controls might be stabbing you in the back,at least if you visit a malicious webpage. Computer Emergency Readiness Team? That's what CERT stand for? Are they like code ninjas? Does someone project an html signal onto a cloud at night to summon them? Never mind. Fix your ActiveX controls. The vulnerabilities, rated “highly critical” by Secunia, can be exploited by a remote, unauthenticated attacker to execute arbitrary code on a vulnerable system. “By convincing a user to view a specially crafted HTML document (e.g., a web page or an HTML...
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In a report that has a certain odor of "duh" about it, Electronic Entertainment Design and Research tells us that video games that have an online capability are much more profitable than those that don't. They examine 219 retail titles for the Xbox, the Playstation3, and the Wii, and see who's making what when their users go online --or don't. "Developers who are not embracing online opportunities to a greater level are leaving money on the table," said Geoffrey Zatkin, president and chief operating officer of San Diego-based Electronic Entertainment Design and Research. Games that use some degree of multiplayer capability also tend to make nearly 25 percent...
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I'm beginning to think all of the world's industry is geared solely to part parents from their money by amusing their children. Now toy makers are getting wise to the fact that even very young children will spend lots of time online if you give them something soft and fuzzy to clutch while they're doing it. That's why toymaker Ganz won the Specialty Toy of the Year award for 2007 for their Webkinz stuffed toy/online game combo. "Kids are on the internet at a younger and younger age," said Ganz communications director Susan McVeigh. "They are comfortable in an online environment, more so than their parents. It just feels natural to them." Webkinz kick-started a trend in...
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It's a charming idea: Why not have municipal Wi-Fi in your town or city, just like municipal water? Well, a lot of municipalities are giving it a go --424 according to industry cheerleader Esme Vos of MuniWireless LLC--and they're discovering that it's expensive, and it doesn't work very well. Some municipal officials whose cities are launching Wi-Fi projects said they remain buoyant about the prospects for success. They added that they see political and economic concerns as being more important than possible technology roadblocks, although that’s partly because their projects are still in the early stages. But Michael Merrill, a selectman in Brookline, Mass., noted that creating a...
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We hardware fanbois at HotHardware always keep a close eye on the horserace between Intel and AMD. But you know who's making real money in the chip world? Analog chipmakers: Research firm iSuppli forecasts a 10.1% jump in analog chip sales this year, to $47.5 billion. ISuppli analyst Gary Grandbois says that analog sales growth will start to slow later this year, and then slow to 9% growth in 2008 and to 4.9% in 2009, before rebounding in 2010. He says the slowdown is part of the usual chip cycle. That's not the case now for many analog firms. Analog Devices, for one, has been on the fast-growth track lately. Nintendo chose one of its chips for its new Wii game console...
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