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Oz Lagging on Connectivity: UN

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NEW YORK – Australia ranks 21st among world nations for the percentage of the population connected to the Internet, with 79 percent now online Down Under, according to a new survey by a United Nations agency.
That suggests 21 percent of the population remain without connection to the Net.

This places Australia well behind top-ranked northern European nations such as Iceland (95pc connected), Norway (94pc) and Netherlands (92pc) – not to mention trans-Tasman neighbour New Zealand which came in at ninth place with 86 percent of Kiwis connected.

On the other hand Australia finished ahead of the USA, (23rd with 77.9pc), Singapore (27th, 75pc) and Russia (61st, 49pc).

The State of Broadband 2012: Achieving Digital Inclusion for All report, issued by the UN Broadband Commission for Digital Development, evaluates the roll-out of broadband in 177 countries around the world.

It tracks progress towards achieving targets set by the commission in 2011 for boosting broadband affordability and uptake.

Tablet Market Still Shrinking

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Tablet shipments are expected to decline as the market loses momentum amid saturation among consumers in developed regions, according to a growing number of analysts.

Shipments of tablets and two-in-one devices will decline to 221.8 million units this year, down 3.8 percent from 2014, according to IDC.

Another forecaster, IHS Technology, predicts that the tablet market will decline in 2015 and remain flat in 2016 but should return to growth in 2017.

And according to ABI Research, tablet shipments declined in the first quarter by 35pc, compared with Q4 2014 and by 16pc compared to the first quarter of 2014.

Facebook Spy Drone Set To Fly But Could Be Shot Down

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Facebook says it has completed building its first full-scale drone, to be used in bringing Internet connection to certain remote parts of the world – though, given fears of US cyber-espionage, it may not be welcome in quite a few of them, and indeed may be shot down if it ventures into hostile space.

The drone has the wingspan of a Boeing 737. Facebook says it plans to put the device through its paces in the USA later this year.

The plane weighs 400kg, and can hover between 20 and 30km above the altitude of commercial aircraft, so that it is not affected by problematic weather or flight plans.

The drone, which was built in 14 months, is able to fly for 90 days at a time, a Facebook  executive said. Helium balloons will be attached to the aircraft to float it up to operating height. The drones have a wingspan of 42 metres.

Because the planes must constantly move to stay aloft, they will circle on a 3km radius. During the day, they will float up to 90,000 feet (3km) and at night will drift down to 60,000 feet (20 km) to conserve energy – that is, if hostile nations do not shoot them down.

What Downturn? PC Shipments Booming

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Don’t worry about the recession. Worldwide PC shipments will grow by 12.8 percent in 2008 to hit 302 million units, says IDC. And growth is set to continue in double digits in 2009, though the figure will drop to 11 percent, the research firm says.

Don’t worry about the recession. Worldwide PC shipments will grow by 12.8 percent in 2008 to hit 302 million units, says IDC. And growth is set to continue in double digits in 2009, though the figure will drop to 11 percent, the research firm says.

After that, growth will be in the “high single-digit” range, with annual shipments reaching 426 million units by 2012. Yes, unit prices are likely to fall ­ but that will be offset by the swing to portable PCs, which generally carry higher prices than desktops.

IDC forecasts total value of PC shipments to grow 7.4 percent in 2008 to nearly US$280 billion ­ and this should keep growing at 4 percent a year through 2012, reaching nearly $330 billion in 2012.

 

Asia-Pacific in particular is going mad for notebook PCs, with increases of more than 50 percent predicted for 2008. That compares with growth of 36pc worldwide.

“The deteriorating economic environment can certainly put a damper on PC growth,” said Loren Loverde, director of IDC’s Worldwide Quarterly PC Tracker. “However, fourth-quarter growth was the fastest since mid-2005 and we should see continued portable adoption and PC acquisition by both commercial and consumer segments.”

CBA Goes Mac – Via Windows

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The Commonwealth Bank has ordered no fewer than 6000 MacBook Air lightweight notebooks from Apple to replace Dell desktop PCs – but will set the Macs up to open up in the ageing Windows XP rather than Mac OS X.


Click to enlarge

The Macs are able to run Windows via VMware’s $49 Fusion virtualisation software.

CBA CIO Michael Harte revealed the move to Mac as the jumbo bank moved 6000 staff into the large new Commonwealth Bank Place at Sydney’s Darling Harbour.

The models concerned are the 11-inch MacBook Airs, which retail at a starting price of $1099 – suggesting a hardware bill of more than $6 million for the bank.

They have reportedly been configured by integrator Hewlett-Packard to boot directly into Windows XP – still standard OS at the bank, two years after introduction of the more advanced Windows 7.

Harte told Australian IT an internal survey had showed that MacBook Airs were its employees’ device of choice.

Trials were under way for a “bring-your-own device” (BYOD) program which he said would give workers further flexibility.

Ad-Blockers Cost Networks $22bn

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Ad-blocking software will account for $22 billion in lost advertising revenue this year, a 41 percent rise from 2014.

A report published by Adobe and PageFair, a Dublin-based start-up that helps advertisers thwart blockers, said one third of all Internet users now use some software to block ads.

Dozens of companies now make ad-blocking tools, which can detect online advertising and block the ads – many of which have already been paid for by advertisers. But not all the tools that block ads stop the underlying technology from collecting data about consumers.

The biggest users of ad-blocking tools are in Europe. In Greece and Poland, more 35 percent of Internet users have installed ad-blocking tools; in Germany, a quarter of users do. 

But in the US, only 15 percent of users have downloaded these tools.

Murdoch Admits Paywall Defeat

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In a rare retreat, Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp has decided to tear down the online paywall surrounding Britain’s biggest-selling newspaper, the Sun.

The scrapping of the online subscription, introduced in 2013, marks the failure of the Sun to carve out a niche online.

On the other hand, Murdoch’s fierce rival, the Daily Mail, boasts one of the world’s most popular Web sites.

The decision to remove the paywall is the first strategic change made by Rebekah Brooks since she returned to Murdoch’s British newspaper arm as chief executive.

 In Australia all eyes will be on what Murdoch plans for the equally struggling paywall surrounding The Australian, which has also failed to generate increased revenue. 

Aussie Cloud Services Growth To Outpace Global Performance

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Growth in public cloud services in Australia are projected to outpace global services at 17.5 percent in 2016, jumping from A$4.74 billion last year to $5.57 billion in 2016, according to a Gartner report.

The worldwide market over the same period is projected to grow just 16.5pc to total US$204 billion, up from $175 billion in 2015.

Gartner has forecast infrastructure-as-a-service to continue as the strongest-growing segment, projected to grow 38.4 percent globally in 2016.

IaaS in Australia is tipped to grow from A$313 million in 2015 to A$360.5 this year. Cloud advertising is predicted to be the largest money earner.

Gartner research director Sid Nag said the strong IaaS growth reflected enterprises moving away from datacentre build-outs and shifting their infrastructure needs to the public cloud.

Gartner predicts cloud application services to grow globally by 20.3 in 2016, to US$37.7 billion. The Australian market is tipped to reach over A$1.4 billion.

Big Business Joins IoT Group

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Looking to embrace the technology-based future, the Business Council of Australia (BCA) has joined the Internet of Things Alliance Australia (IoTAA), and will become a member of the Aussie alliance’s executive council.The IoTAA, chaired by John Stanton – also CEO of the

Communications Alliance – was created in 2015 as the voice of the IoT industry

in Australia.

Stanton yesterday hailed the BCA move, noting that it is made up of the CEOs of

more than 130 of Australia’s top companies. “We look forward to making use

of that horsepower to help ensure that Australia can benefit from the positive

disruptive force that is IoT,” he said.

He also noted that the alliance has created six workstreams working on issues

including spectrum availability, smart cities, network resilience, fostering

IoT start-ups, data sharing and privacy.

First Kiwi Convicted of Illegal Downloads

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AUCKLAND – The first New Zealander to be convicted of illegally sharing music online – a woman who has not been named – has been fined NZ$616 by the country’s copyright tribunal, more than 18 months after anti-piracy legislation with a three-strikes-and-out clause came into force.

Image credit: Music Piracy.com

The legislation stipulates that anyone found guilty of three or more illegal downloads must be charged, and can be fined up to $15,000.

The tribunal found the unnamed user’s account was used to download one song twice, and another song illegally, using peer-to-peer software.

The tribunal fined the defendant, who acknowledged downloading one of the songs, $6.57 to cover the cost of buying the infringing songs from iTunes, $250 to recoup costs incurred by rights holders in bringing the case, and a further $360 as a deterrent.