Hasta La Gadget!

Apple has vehemently denied conspiring with publishing industry heavyweights to artificially inflate ebook pricing, countering Department of Justice claims that Steve Jobs attempted price fixing with the argument that Apple and the rights holders were in fact strongly opposed throughout negotiations. Apple, representatives from which appeared in a New York court on Monday this week

Read The Full Story

Starting tomorrow, Apple will be part of a trial in which federal and state authorities have suggested the latter company was part of ebook price-fixing. This trial will work with allegations that Apple has conspired with publishers to artificially raise the price of ebooks for sale in the iTunes Store for devices like the iPad and the iPhone. This trial was originally set to include five of the six largest book publishers in the US and was originally filed in April of 2012.

Since this case was filed, the five publishers in question exited the situation by agreeing to eliminate prohibitions on wholesale discounts – and to pay $164 million USD as a penalty, this cash going to benefit consumers. Instead of seeking damages against Apple, this case would have Apple blocked from “engaging in similar conduct”, according to Rueters, though future damages could be charged against Apple if they’re found liable. These charges would be filed by either state attorneys general or class action suits pushed by consumer groups.

“I believe that the government will be able to show at trial direct evidence that Apple knowingly participated in and facilitated a conspiracy to raise prices of e-books, and that the circumstantial evidence in this case, including the terms of the agreements, will confirm that.” – U.S. District Judge Denise Cote

It would appear that Apple is not going in to this battle with as much confidence from the judge hearing the trial as they’d like – Judge Denise Cote will be hearing the case without a Jury starting June 3rd. This comment was made by the judge on May 23rd at a pretrial hearing.

Each of the five publishers that’ve settled, Hachette Book Group Inc, Pearson Plc’s Penguin Group, CBS Corp’s Simon & Schuster Inc, News Corp’s HarperCollins Publishers Inc, and MacMillan, have appeared to be relatively silent on the matter since they exited the proceedings before they began.

Again according to Rueters, Apple has said that they acted independently when they entered the e-book marketplace with iBooks, and that they were unaware of any efforts by publishers to conspire beforehand. The Justice Department, on the other hand, says that Apple “provided assurances” to each publisher that their rivals would join iBooks with the deal they offered.

Apple ebook trial set to begin Monday is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Owners of self-driving cars may have to undergo extra testing in order to “upgrade” their license to handle the next-gen vehicles, the NHTSA has suggested. Tentative enthusiasm for self-driving cars by the US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration comes with the possibility of more stringent drivers license testing, with the new challenges of safely interacting with autopilot systems deemed sufficiently novel that the existing test would be insufficient.

Advocates of self-driving technology, such as is being tested by Google among others, welcomed the NHTSA’s new public stance on automated vehicles, announced this week. The government agency set out five levels of potential autonomy, ranging from fully manually operated cars as are on the road today, dubbed “Level 0″, through to models that can handle the entire trip with no more human interaction than setting the required destination.

Such “Level 4″ vehicles aren’t yet in testing, the NHTSA points out, with cars like Google’s test fleet falling into “Level 3″ where a driver might be called upon to take over should the autopilot deem itself insufficiently capable to handle the current road conditions.

It’s that potential to be summoned back into the driver’s seat that has the NHTSA concerned, however, with suggestions that while the technological aspect of such cars is being heavily researched, the human factors are still poorly understood. That could include how a human driver monitors the performance of the autopilot, so as to ensure any problems are quickly spotted, and the transition between self-driving and regular modes.

The NHTSA has begun the evaluation process to address these questions and more, which is expected to be completed – in its first phase, at least – within the next two years. “One of the main end products of this initial research program would be recommendations for what requirements are needed for the driver-vehicle interface,” the NHTSA says, “to allow safe operation and transition between automated and non-automated vehicle operation.”

However, the agency is already making one recommendation, which is that drivers in the few states where self-driving cars are already permitted for real-world testing should add in an extra endorsement – if not an entirely separate license – to authorize them to get behind the semi-autonomous wheel. That testing process should include a minimum number of hours in a self-driving car, as well as having received instruction from the vehicle’s manufacturer as to how it works and how to safely operate it.

“The training course should be submitted to the state agency that issues driving licenses for approval prior to the taking of that course by any person seeking a driver’s license endorsement certification. The course should include providing an understanding of the basic operation and limits of self-driving vehicles, and knowledge of how to resume control of such a vehicle in the event that it cannot continue to operate automatically” NHTSA

The suggestions in the Agency’s policy document are all voluntary at this stage, and it’s early days for any actual laws – or even proposed laws – to emerge. Nonetheless, it looks likely that as we wait for “Level 4″ cars to arrive, there’ll be some extra requirement on top of current licensing procedures for drivers to undertake, given the new and unusual ways that self-driving cars will interact with those behind the wheel.

VIA: WSJ

Self-driving cars might demand new license tests for drivers is written by Chris Davies & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Facebook’s billion dollar IPO didn’t just leave a lot of investors frustrated, it also left NASDAQ under the glare of a US Securities and Exchange Commission investigation, which has culminated in a $10m penalty. The fine comes as the SEC deems that NASDAQ ill-prepared for the Facebook floatation, not taking into account the likely demand by investors, and leading to significant disruptions on the day.

“Exchanges have an obligation to ensure that their systems, processes, and contingency planning are robust and adequate to manage an IPO without disruption to the market. According to the SEC’s order instituting settled administrative proceedings, despite widespread anticipation that the Facebook IPO would be among the largest in history with huge numbers of investors participating, a design limitation in NASDAQ’s system to match IPO buy and sell orders caused disruptions to the Facebook IPO. NASDAQ then made a series of ill-fated decisions that led to the rules violations” SEC

As the SEC sees it, NASDAQ was fully aware of the flaw in its market code before the IPO, but a high-level meeting saw executives decide to go ahead nonetheless. That’s despite actually addressing it being the simple matter of “removing a few lines of code” the SEC highlights.

The result was in excess of 30,000 Facebook stock orders frozen in limbo in NASDAQ’s computer systems, with the instructions lingering for more than two hours whereas they would normally be acted on immediately: either with a purchase or a cancellation.

NASDAQ subsequently admitted that it was “humbly embarrassed” by the goof, with executives later conceding that “in retrospect it was incorrect” for the exchange to go ahead with the IPO. A knock-on effect saw sales of shares in other companies, such as Zynga, delayed as well.

“This action against NASDAQ tells the tale of how poorly designed systems and hasty decision-making not only disrupted one of the largest IPOs in history, but produced serious and pervasive violations of fundamental rules governing our markets” George S. Canellos, Co-Director, Division of Enforcement, SEC

According to the investigation, NASDAQ compounded the mistakes by then shorting Facebook stock using an unauthorized error account, making a profit of $10.8m in the process. In total there were at least five rule transgressions, the SEC concludes.

The $10m penalty imposed is the largest ever against an exchange, and reflects the severity of the blunder, the SEC says. NASDAQ has agreed to pay it, though is yet to make any other comment.

Facebook IPO blunder sees NASDAQ hit with record $10m SEC fine is written by Chris Davies & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Facebook is no stranger to causing controversy with its content policies, having only recently banned decapitation videos after months of turning a blind eye, for example. Once again, some users have taken to virtual picketing of the social network, stating that its content policy allows users to post content that is demeaning and threatening to women, as well as a host of other unsavory content. In light of the growing complaints, Facebook made a post on its blog today discussing its content policy and some changes it is making.

Facebook goes into a long explanation of its content policy, particularly its focus on hate speech and how it has no concrete definition. As such, Facebook has its own definition for hate speech, which encompasses something that is a direct threat to a protected group or a specific individual, such as bullying. Dark humor, controversial images and statuses, and things of a similar nature are allowed, however, to facilitate an open environment.

The social network goes on to state that “in recent days,” it has come to realize that its hate speech removal system is flawed, having failed to deal with some of the hate speech on the site, specifying gender-based hate speech in particular. As such, Facebook says it is going to be rolling out some changes to help remedy the situation, including a total review of and updating of its User Operations guidelines.

The teams that are used to review flagged content and make a decision about whether it should be removed will undergo updated training, with the training updates being done in conjunction with both legal experts and women’s coalition members, among others. Likewise, the social network plans to “establish more formal and direct lines of communication” with group representatives for women’s groups and others.

One particular change is designed to allow the community to direct its ire over certain content towards the content creator rather than towards Facebook. Such a change is made by forcing a content creator that publishes a “cruel or insensitive” statement or image that is reported but not in violation of guidelines to stand behind their content. With this change, the creator will have to apply their real name to the image or status rather than hiding behind a page name, for example.

The changes are said to be happening immediately.

SOURCE: Facebook

Facebook acknowledges content policy is lax on hate speech is written by Brittany Hillen & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.