Google may be planning to use blimps, balloons and other “high-altitude platforms” over developing markets in Africa and Asia to provide wireless Internet access to areas that are currently not well served. High-altitude platforms, or Haps, can be manned or unmanned aircraft, balloons or blimps that operate between 17km
Is it 1999 again? The heady days of the dot-com boom are long past and yet Yahoo’s sudden binge of acquisitions – some of them of dubious value – betray the same irrational exuberance and hope. This year so far, Yahoo has snapped up 10 companies. This is not that
Just as the music industry was getting used to the idea of another shift in formats – from compact discs as the distribution mechanism to digital downloads over the Internet – another huge change in the way people listen to music looks set to shake the business to its foundations. A decade after Steve Jobs
It’s Google, Google and more Google – and a bit of BlackBerry – in the latest episode of TechCentral’s weekly podcast. Your hosts Duncan McLeod and Craig Wilson talk about the big news coming out of last week’s Google I/O developer conference in San Francisco. They also
It has an arcane name and involves complex communications technology, but there’s every reason you and I should be getting very excited indeed about “television white spaces”, the gaps in spectrum between broadcast television channels. Google and Microsoft are pouring millions of dollars
Among the plethora of announcements at Google’s annual I/O developer event was one that should have music fans excited. The company is launching Google Play Music All Access, a streaming music service, beating rival Apple, which is said to be planning a similar product, to market. However, the
Microsoft plans to work with the CSIR and the State IT Agency (Sita) to launch a trial network in South Africa’s Limpopo province that will test the feasibility of using so-called television white-spaces spectrum to offer more affordable wireless broadband access. The trial will be the third white-spaces trial
A piece on US technology website ZDNet earlier this month, written by columnist Steven Vaughan-Nichols, suggested that Windows 8 represents Microsoft’s “New Coke moment”. Others quickly jumped on the idea. The Financial Times led with a story on the subject, saying the fact that Microsoft
Last year, Google announced something extraordinary: it was working on a wearable computer. Geeks around the world immediately began salivating at the very thought. Earlier this year, the company began sending early versions of the device to developers and technology commentators. Reactions have ranged
Last week, Yahoo released new applications for mobile phones and tablets. Android tablet and iPad users got an e-mail application, while iPhone users received a weather app that makes Apple’s equivalent look rudimentary and crude by comparison. These are just
