Hasta La Gadget!

PayPal is the biggest, most popular, and most widely used online payment processor in the world today. The problem with PayPal for many users is that company has a history of incredibly overreaching fraud filters that ensnare legitimate users who are doing no wrong, leaving them unable to access their money. PayPal put fraud filters in place to be sure criminals weren’t abusing its digital payment system.

If legitimate users were caught by the fraud filters proving that you weren’t a scammer involved significant amounts of time and paperwork. PayPal has recently announced that it will be rolling out a major overhaul to its system over the next several months. The company isn’t offering much in the way of details on what exactly it will be doing.

PayPal senior director of communications Anuj Nayar promises, “these are aggressive changes.” Nayar wouldn’t go into specifics reports CNN, but did note that transparency will be a major focus. He promises that PayPal will be clearer about how people can get their frozen funds and explaining why the freeze actions were taken.

Anyone who dealt with PayPal in a frozen fund situation knows that typically the only information you’re given is that fraud was suspected. PayPal freezes funds and accounts for 21 days if they think there’s a fraud risk. PayPal can also extend that for up to 180 days. Often one of the requests by PayPal to be able to unlock the frozen funds would include several months worth of sales records. However not all legitimate sellers keep sales records.

[via CNN]

PayPal promises to overhaul overbearing fraud filters in the coming months is written by Shane McGlaun & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Joachim Kempin, former Microsoft executive, has penned a less-than-favorable book about the company and its current CEO, Steve Ballmer, who takes some flack from the author. According to Kempin, Ballmer ensures his position as top dog by bumping possible rivals out of the running. In order to pull out of its rut, says the author, Microsoft must make a change in management.

Kempin worked for Microsoft from 1983 until 2002 as a senior vice president, and according to Reuters, is the top-most former executive to publish such criticism of the company. The book in question is titled Resolve and Fortitude: Microsoft’s “secret power broker” breaks his silence,” and is set to hit shelves this coming Tuesday, January 22.

According to Kempin: “For Microsoft to really get back in the game seriously, you need a big change in management. As much as I respect Steve Ballmer, he may be part of that in the end.” And speaking directly of Ballmer’s destroy-potential-rivals attitude, he says, “When you work that directly with Ballmer and Ballmer believes ‘maybe this guy could someday take over from me’, my God, you will have less air to breathe, that’s what it comes down to.”

Several Microsoft executives have left the company over the years, including Steven Sinofsky and Richard Belluzzo. Kempin isn’t Ballmer’s only critic, with others having petitioned over the years for him to step-down from his position. Still, Kempin stresses that he doesn’t dislike Ballmer, stating specifically that he “respects [the] guy” and that he’s a good business man.

[via Reuters]

Former Microsoft executive’s upcoming book lambasts CEO Steve Ballmer is written by Brittany Hillen & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Last week, Blockbuster UK announced that it had entered administration, with Deloitte appointed as administrator. At the time, we weren’t sure what was going to happen to Blockbuster UK’s 528 stores and more than 4,000 employees, but today we’re getting a better idea. Deloitte has announced that a total of 160 stores will close, with an unknown amount of jobs being eliminated with this shutdown.

160 stores out of 528 doesn’t seem too bad, especially for a company that has been struggling as much as Blockbuster in recent years. It could definitely be worse, but this announcement doesn’t necessarily mean that the other 368 stores are out of the woods. Deloitte says that more closures may come by the time everything is said and done, so many employees are still bracing for the worst this morning.

The ultimate goal here is to turn Blockbuster UK into an attractive deal for potential buyers, and that’s obviously done by shutting down stores that aren’t making a profit as a means of saving money. Deloitte certainly has its work cut out for it, as Blockbuster – once the king of movie and game rentals – has been losing a lot of ground to digital retailers and streaming services like Netflix.

There doesn’t seem to be any word on which stores across the UK will be shutting down, but Deloitte will probably be ready to share that information soon. When Blockbuster announced that it was going into administration last week, it said that it would continue trading as usual, meaning that for the time being, nothing about Blockbuster’s business will be changing from a consumer perspective. Keep it here at SlashGear and we’ll keep you updated on Blockbuster UK’s bout with bankruptcy.

[via GamesIndustry International]

160 Blockbuster UK stores set to shut down is written by Eric Abent & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

According to none other than Kim Dotcom himself, Megaupload’s replacement Mega has attained 1 million users in the first day it’s been active. This of course includes those users that got early access, and the announcement was made at Dotcom’s own mansion in New Zealand at a conference clad with fireworks and scantily clad ladies. The event spoken of here took place early this morning (or at night if you were there in person) and was described as “insane” by some choice attendees.

The event that launched Mega – though it’d already been “soft launched” so to speak – had Dotcom on a stage with a massive monitor behind him with announcements of the service as well as the implications in and around the chosen launch date. While speaking about the anniversary of the day he and his colleagues were raided, helicopters tore in to re-enact the events. Explosions and dubstep music were included as well.

“We will protect the rights of everyone – today is the anniversary of something horrible, but now it is also the anniversary of something wonderful.

Mega believes in your right to privacy and has developed technology that keeps your data private and safe. By using Mega, you say no to those who want to know everything about you. You say no to governments that want to spy on you. You say YES to internet freedom and your right to privacy.” – Kim Dotcom

While this event was streamed over the web, not all of the show was revealed to the cameras the official team had on site. The photos you see above and below come from The Next Web who seem to be one of the only groups in the world with press in New Zealand. This event was both luxurious and wild – when we say “insane”, we mean it was rather over-the-top in its fabulous-ness.

Questions for Dotcom after the brief keynote included the obvious: will content storage turn into content delivery, and how will the team stop Megaupload’s fate from happening again? Dotcom assured that “content distribution was indeed “down the road” and that it was their goal for the future – he also made it clear that they had “scrutinized every pixel to ensure [Mega is] built from the ground up to adhere to the law.”

Sound like a good deal to you? Let us know if you’re using Mega now or plan to do so in the near future! Meanwhile have a peek at the timeline below to get up to date on all things Mega and Kim Dotcom through today!

Mega claims 1 million users on day one is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Rumor has it that Violin Memory has acquired GridIron Systems, with the information coming from unnamed individuals who are said to be familiar with the situation. According to the folks at AllThingsD, the acquisition will be officially announced on Monday, January the 21 sans any financial details about the deal.

Violin Memory manufactures enterprise-level storage arrays, while GridIron Systems, founded in 2007, tasks itself with helping “organizations remove performance bottlenecks in their data centers.” There aren’t any details about the acquisition aside from the tip that it happened and is pending announcement, and that Violin Memory nabbed about 20 GridIron employees in the process.

A few days ago, Scality’s Head of Product Strategy Philippe Nicolas had stated that an acquisition happened, and estimated that it took place for between $200 million and $300 million; we won’t know one way or the other, according to the sources, who say that the financial details will not be provided on Monday during the announcement.

Back in 2010, Violin Memory acquired Gear6, and later on in October 2012, the company filed for an initial public offering under an act that keeps the SEC filings out of the public eye. Stay tuned to Slashgear – we’ll be keeping an eye out on Monday for the announcement, and will be sure to snag the details when it happens.

[via AllThingsD]

Violin Memory rumored to have acquired GridIron Systems is written by Brittany Hillen & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.