Hasta La Gadget!

Microsoft has detailed its much-rumored reorganization plan, with Steve Ballmer describing the strategy as “One Microsoft” and forming four main areas: operating systems, devices & studios, applications & services, and cloud & enterprise. The new teams – which will be led, respectively, by Terry Myerson, Julie Larson-Green, Qi Lu, and Satya Nadella – will take a more over-arching approach to engineering Microsoft products, rather than seeing things like Xbox gaming, entertainment, and Windows all silo’d off into separate divisions. Ballmer says that the company will adopt a more direct communication strategy with him as CEO, following the five tenets of being nimble, communicative, collaborative, decisive, and motivated.

“Going forward, our strategy will focus on creating a family of devices and services for individuals and businesses that empower people around the globe at home, at work and on the go, for the activities they value most” Ballmer wrote in an email to all staff sent today. He also confirmed that Kurt DelBene will be leaving Microsoft, that Craig Mundie will be solely occupied in “a special project for me through the end of this calendar year”, and that Rick Rashid will shift away from Microsoft Research and instead take on “driving core OS innovation in our operating systems group.”

The reorganization basically means that Windows and Windows Phone have been merged into a single group, the Operating Systems Engineering Group, which will also handle the software that runs on Xbox, back-end systems, and core-cloud services for OSes. Hardware, meanwhile, will be tackled by Julie Larson-Green’s Devices and Studios Engineering Group, covering design, engineering, and supply chain.

Larson-Green’s team will also tackle the various studios experiences, such as games, music, and video.

“We are going to focus on completely reinventing experiences like creating or viewing a creative document and what it means to communicate socially at home or in meetings at work. We are going to immerse people in deep entertainment experiences that let them have serious fun in ways so intense and delightful that they will blur the line between reality and fantasy. And as we develop these new experiences, we will also support our developers with the simplest ways to develop apps or cloud services and integrate with our products” Steve Ballmer, CEO, Microsoft

According to Ballmer, working in divided ways is no longer a possibility. “Each major initiative will have a champion who will be a direct report to me or one of my direct reports” the Microsoft CEO writes. “The champion will organize to drive a cross-company team for success, but my whole staff will have commitment to the initiative’s success.”

The full organizational structures and the new divisions are detailed below, and you can find the updated titles and other information at Microsoft’s senior leaders page.

Operating Systems Engineering Group. Terry Myerson will lead this group, and it will span all our OS work for console, to mobile device, to PC, to back-end systems. The core cloud services for the operating system will be in this group.

Devices and Studios Engineering Group. Julie Larson-Green will lead this group and will have all hardware development and supply chain from the smallest to the largest devices we build. Julie will also take responsibility for our studios experiences including all games, music, video and other entertainment.

Applications and Services Engineering Group. Qi Lu will lead broad applications and services core technologies in productivity, communication, search and other information categories.

Cloud and Enterprise Engineering Group. Satya Nadella will lead development of our back-end technologies like datacenter, database and our specific technologies for enterprise IT scenarios and development tools. He will lead datacenter development, construction and operation.

Dynamics. Kirill Tatarinov will continue to run Dynamics as is, but his product leaders will dotted line report to Qi Lu, his marketing leader will dotted line report to Tami Reller and his sales leader will dotted line report to the COO group.

Advanced Strategy and Research Group. Eric Rudder will lead Research, Trustworthy Computing, teams focused on the intersection of technology and policy, and will drive our cross-company looks at key new technology trends.

Marketing Group. Tami Reller will lead all marketing with the field relationship as is today. Mark Penn will take a broad view of marketing strategy and will lead with Tami the newly centralized advertising and media functions.

COO. Kevin Turner will continue leading our worldwide sales, field marketing, services, support, and stores as well as IT, licensing and commercial operations.

Business Development and Evangelism Group. Tony Bates will focus on key partnerships especially our innovation partners (OEMs, silicon vendors, key developers, Yahoo, Nokia, etc.) and our broad work on evangelism and developer outreach. DPE, Corporate Strategy and the business development efforts formerly in the BGs will become part of this new group. OEM will remain in SMSG with Kevin Turner with a dotted line to Tony who will work closely with Nick Parker on key OEM relationships.

Finance Group. Amy Hood will centralize all product group finance organizations. SMSG finance, which is geographically diffuse, will report to Kevin Turner with a dotted line to Amy.

Legal Group. Brad Smith will continue as General Counsel with responsibility for law and corporate affairs and will map his team to the new organization.

HR Group. Lisa Brummel will lead Human Resources and map her team to the new organization.

Microsoft reorganization official: OS teams merge, Hardware unified is written by Chris Davies & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2013, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Back on January 28, we heard a rumor that China was considering lifting a ban on gaming consoles, something that was reported by Reuters. It has been six months, and now we’re hearing this again, only the sources claim that the lift will go in effect with a stipulation that game makers must produce the consoles in Shanghai’s free-trade zone.

In the summer of 2000, the Chinese government elected to ban video game consoles due to concern of the effects they could have on the mental health of its young citizens, particularly concerning violent video games. Under the ban, video game consoles can not be sold, with only components being authorized for importing for devices meant to be exported again out of the country.

As such, the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, Wii, and other modern gaming devices have not been officially available in the country. This hasn’t prevented many users from acquiring them anyway, but for more than the last 12 years, those buyers have been required to buy the devices and games off the black market. This will be changing in the near future, assuming the sources are correct.

Said one of the unnamed sources: “[The video game makers] still need approval from the culture ministry and other relevant government bodies for their products, which I think is reasonable, because the government wants to make sure the content of your games is not too violent or politically sensitive for young people.”

As such, it can be expected that some games will be barred from sale in the country, which isn’t surprising. As we mentioned, the game makers – such as Nintendo, Sony, and Microsoft – will be required to build their consoles in the Shanghai free-trade zone. Said one of the other sources: “You may think the game console is a small deal in the whole policy package for Shanghai, but it’s an interesting instance showing how China wants to open up to foreign investors.”

SOURCE: SCMP

China reportedly to lift ban on video game consoles is written by Brittany Hillen & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2013, SlashGear. All right reserved.

On May 7, we saw a leak showing the Google Maps redesign, with Google showing it off officially a little over a week later. That update has since been rolled out for desktop to those in the beta, and is now being pushed to those running Android 4.0.3 and higher. Thus far the Google Play store has been updated with the new change log, but it might be a bit before you see the actual update come your way.

Says the change log on Google Play, the update is “gradually” rolling out to Android 4.0.3 and higher over the next few weeks, while those who are running older versions of the mobile operating system will need to head over to Google to find out what versions their device will run. Google points users to a link on Google Play, but it currently leads to a 404.

The updated Maps features “enhanced navigation,” which encompasses dynamic rerouting, incident reports on situations in your area, and live updates on traffic. In addition, the exploration options have also been updated with this app, including a changed up means of browsing for locations, as well as discovery new places in various categories.

The new experiences feature is specific to tablets, allowing users to explore inside certain buildings. There’s also the 360-degree Street View, the ability to garner tailored recommendations, pull up past searches, save your favorite locations, and more. Google advises that not all features are available in certain countries, however.

According to those who have already nabbed the new version, there have been some changes that not everyone is happy with, among them being the elimination of offline maps and Latitude. Some are reporting that they can’t access their saved notes and maps after updating, as well, while others are having trouble locating offline options.

SOURCE: Google Maps

Google Maps update starts rolling out for Android 4.0.3 and higher is written by Brittany Hillen & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2013, SlashGear. All right reserved.

AT&T has announced the arrival of the BlackBerry 10.1 update for BlackBerry Z10 owners, who can head over to the carrier’s software update page now and nab the latest software. The announcement was made on Twitter, which has a link directing users to a software update page that does not, at the moment, appear to actually have a download option for the Z10.

The update will be appearing as an OTA option as well, however, so take solace in that. The BlackBerry Z10 was announced earlier this year when RIM rebranded itself as BlackBerry, rolling out the devices and unveiling BB 10 at a time when it struggles to reinvent itself and draw back in much-needed consumers. This particular update has been long awaited by subscribers.

The Z10 features a 4.2-inch LCD display with a resolution of 1280 x 768, while there’s a 2-megapixel camera above it and an 8-megapixel camera around back. Inside, users will find a 1.5GHz dual-core Qualcomm MSM8960 processor alongside 2GB of RAM, as well as 16Gb of storage space and a microSD card expansion slot (up to 32GB).

As far as connectivity goes, the Z10 features Bluetooth 4.0, 802.11 a/b/g/n, quadband LTE, UMTS/HSPA+ and GSM/EDGE. This accompanies an integrated mobile hotspot feature that allows users to share their 4G connection. The battery, meanwhile, is a fairly small 1800mAh that gives somewhere in the range of 11 hours of talk time on a 3G network.

According to the folks at CNET, this update will bring AT&T Z10 owners quite a few new features, among them being an HDR camera mode, support for Skype, BlackBerry Hub PIN-to-PIN messaging, unlocking with the power button when at the start screen, pasting phone numbers into the dialpad, an option for disabling individual app alerts, and more.

SOURCE: Twitter

BlackBerry Z10 on AT&T scores BB 10.1 update is written by Brittany Hillen & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2013, SlashGear. All right reserved.

According to an inspector general’s report, the government spent approximately $630,000 from 2011 through 2012 to increase the number of “likes” the State Department’s Facebook page received. While the initiative was successful, having increased the numbers on the page dramatically, many critics are speaking out against the action, calling it a waste of money.

Before the campaign was started, the total number of Facebook fans on four Bureau of International Information Program Facebook pages totaled about 100,000, a number the State Department considered too low for its intentions. In order to boost the number of likes, the bureau initiated an advertisement and social media program with the intention of increasing the number of likes its accounts collectively had.

As a result, the numbers increased to over 2 million “likes” per Facebook page held by the bureau, with the total cost exceeding half a million over a two-year period. Beyond that, the effort also drew a smaller amount of attention to the company’s non-English Facebook pages, having increased the collective numbers from approximately 68,000 to in excess of 450,000.

Such likes were achieved via advertising, which is where the funds were used, with the inspector general’s report also indicating the use of photos to garner additional followers. Said the report, which was released in May: “Many in the bureau criticize the advertising campaigns as “buying fans” who may have once clicked on an ad or “liked” a photo but have no real interest in the topic and have never engaged further. Defenders of advertising point to the difficulty of finding a page on Facebook with a general search and the need to use ads to increase visibility.”

While there are arguments on both sides, at the end of the day the numbers speak for themselves: the number of “fans” engaging with the four Facebook pages is reported as considerably lower than how many likes each page has. According to the report, the combination of numbers between fan commenting, sharing, and liking amounts to about 2-percent of the page’s total followers. The average status has less than 100 comments, and the average interaction with the pages come in the form of “likes”.

SOURCE: The Atlantic

State Department spent over half a million to boost Facebook page “likes” is written by Brittany Hillen & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2013, SlashGear. All right reserved.