Facebook Inc has blocked users from accessing the NBC.com website following reports that the site is infected with a computer virus.
Facebook users were told “This link has been reported as abusive” on Thursday when they attempted to access the NBC.com website.
Several security bloggers warned on Thursday that the site was infected with malicious software, advising computer users to avoid the site.
Officials with NBC could not immediately be reached for comment.
The founders of Google, Facebook and other tech giants have announced a new multi-million-dollar prize for scientists who are working to cure the world’s most devastating diseases. Mark Zuckerberg, his partner Priscilla Chan, Google co-founder Sergei Brin, 23andMe founder Anne Wojcicki and Russian venture capitalist Yuri Milner will launch 15 million dollars annual Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences in hopes of curing cancer and other diseases
Five scientists will be given three million dollars for ‘recognizing excellence in research aimed at curing intractable diseases and extending human life,” the New York post reports. Zuckerberg said in a statement that he believes the Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences has the potential to provide a platform for other models of philanthropy, so people everywhere have an opportunity at a better future.
According to the paper, the inaugural year of the prize, however, has gone to 11 scientists who will each receive three million dollars to further their scientific research. Among this years winners were Charles L. Sawyer, who the committee singled out for his work on cancer genes, and Shinya Yamanaka, whose research focuses on stem cells. Art Levinson, chairman of the board of Apple and Chairman and former CEO of Genentech, will serve as the Chairman of the Board of Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences Foundation, which will distribute the prize money each year, the report said.
The first 11 recipients of the Breakthrough Prize are:
– Cornelia I Bargmann
– David Botstein
– Lewis C. Cantley
– Hans Clevers
– Napoleone Ferrara
– Titia de Lange
– Eric S. Lander
– Charles L. Sawyers
– Bert Vogelstein
– Robert A. Weinberg
– Shinya Yamanaka
All prize winners have agreed to serve on the Selection Committee of the Foundation to choose recipients of future prizes.
“We are thrilled to support scientists who think big, take risks and have made a significant impact on our lives. These scientists should be household names and heroes in society,” said Anne Wojcicki. “Curing a disease should be worth more than a touchdown,” said Sergey Brin. “Priscilla and I are honored to be part of this,” said Mark Zuckerberg. “We believe the Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences has the potential to provide a platform for other models of philanthropy, so people everywhere have an opportunity at a better future.” “Solving the enormous complexity of human diseases calls for a much bigger effort compared to fundamental physics and therefore requires multiple sponsors to reward outstanding achievements,” said Yuri Milner.
Tech giant Apple has said its computers were attacked by the same hackers that targeted Facebook last week.
The US-based firm said a small number of its machines were affected, but added there was ‘no evidence’ of data theft.
Last week Facebook said it had traced a cyber attack back to China, which had infiltrated employees” laptops, the BBC reports.
In a statement, the iPhone maker said that it has ‘identified malware which infected a limited number of Mac systems through a vulnerability in the Java plug-in for browsers.’
It added that the firm is working closely with law enforcement to find the source of the malware.
Source:http://www.indianexpress.com/news/apple-computers-targeted-by-facebook-hackers/1076926/
Teams within Microsoft are reportedly debating whether the company should release a native version of Outlook for Windows RT devices or not. The company has reportedly completed and testing a final version of Outlook for Windows RT devices.
Microsoft is reportedly testing a native version of MS Outlook for Windows RT-based devices. Dubbed as Outlook RT, the e-mail client would run on Microsoft’s ARM-based Surface RT devices as well as any ARM-based Windows RT slates and PCs.
According to CNET, Microsoft hasn’t yet decided the date for commercial availability of Outlook RT, as odds are the company may never release it. The teams within Microsoft are still debating whether the company should release the app or not.
The report further quotes sources at Microsoft claims some people at the Windows unit want to retain the Mail/Calendar/People app as it bundles currently. There are some other people who want to simply rename the existing Mail app in Windows RT as Outlook. There are also suggestions to launch Outlook as a separate native app.
“Microsoft currently has its own Mail client for Windows 8 and Windows RT — a product that is not seen as very robust or solid by many of us Surface RT/Windows RT users. The Windows RT Mail client is not even as good as the Mail client that’s part of Windows Phone, many of us feel,” writes Mary Jo Foley in the report.
“Quite a few of us would rather have the option to run Outlook on our Surface RTs and other Windows RT devices. But for now, Microsoft doesn’t include Outlook as part of the Office Home & Student 2013 RT suite that it bundles with the Windows RT operating system. Only Word RT, Excel RT, PowerPoint RT and OneNote RT are included. (It’s worth noting that these four apps are Desktop apps, not “Metro-Style”/Windows Store apps. There are only two members of the Office suite that currently exist in Metro-Style form: OneNote and Lync.),” she adds.
Microsoft is yet to comment on the rumours of a native Outlook app for Windows RT.
Source: http://www.thinkdigit.com/Apps/Microsoft-testing-Outlook-app-for-Windows-RT_13224.html
Bangalore: With the abundance of information on the social media, we can find out where the hottest girl in the college spends her weekends and who the coolest hunk in the campus is dating. But a recent study conducted in Germany shows that such information comes at a price. When we see pictures of people who are beyond our friend circle, partying in a beach or dancing at a happening club in the city we often feel that their lives are much more entertaining or better than ours.
The study “Envy on Facebook: A Hidden Threat to Users’ Life Satisfaction?” by Humboldt-University Berlin, Germany, shows that such an open forum with access to a whole plethora of information leads to “social comparison and envy on an unprecedented scale.” Most of us would notice our friends who are very active on the social media forum saying, ‘I got 100 likes on my status today and people posted such nice comments.’ While you smile and say to yourself, ‘I’ve got a big hammer at home I’d like to smash your head with, I got only two likes and my sister is the only one who commented on my profile picture!’
We are getting lost in this field filled with likes, shares, and comments. The most popular guy in college is no longer in the college basketball team, he is the one with the best pictures on Facebook, no matter how bad he is in sports or academics. Most of us put so much of our time in updating and maintaining our social profile for a handful of people that we neglect the other portion of our life – reality. Ever heard your friend saying, ‘I’m feeling damn good today, the cute girl from my class liked my picture,’ or ‘such a horrible day man, got only five comments today and that ugly ramu got 50 likes!’ our lives are governed by the satisfaction we receive from the positive reaction of our peers on social media platform and the comparisons we make in order to feel worthy.
(Reuters) – Microsoft Corp (MSFT.O) Chief Executive Steve Ballmer is not the right leader for the world’s largest software company but holds his grip on it by systematically forcing out any rising manager who challenges his authority, claims a former senior executive who has written a book about his time at the company.
“For Microsoft to really get back in the game seriously, you need a big change in management,” said Joachim Kempin, who worked at Microsoft between 1983 and 2002, overseeing the sales of Windows software to computer makers for part of that time. “As much as I respect Steve Ballmer, he may be part of that in the end.”
As a senior vice president in charge of a crucial part of the company’s business with direct access to co-founder Bill Gates, Kempin is the most senior former Microsoft executive to write a book critical of the company, which is famous for the loyalty of its ex-employees.
His criticism echoes that of investor David Einhorn of Greenlight Capital, who called for Ballmer to step down in 2011.
Kempin left Microsoft under a cloud in 2002 as some of the aggressive contracts he crafted with PC makers were seen as fodder for the U.S. government’s antitrust prosecution of the company, which started in 1998 and was largely resolved by 2002.
His book, titled ‘Resolve and Fortitude: Microsoft’s “secret power broker” breaks his silence’, is scheduled to be published on Tuesday. He talked with Reuters by phone on Monday.
DEFEND THE THRONE
Kempin charges Ballmer with purposefully ousting any executives with potential to wrest him from the CEO seat, which he has occupied since 2000.
He said he saw the process first with Richard Belluzzo, a former Hewlett-Packard (HPQ.N) executive credited with launching the Xbox game console who rose to chief operating officer at Microsoft but left after only 14 months in the post, in the same year Kempin left.
“He (Belluzzo) had no room to breathe on the top. 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.”
Microsoft representatives declined comment. Attempts to reach Belluzzo were not successful.
Several leading executives, touted by outsiders at one time or another as potential successors to Ballmer, have left the company in the last few years, most recently Windows unit chief Steven Sinofsky, who departed in November.
Before Sinofsky, Windows and online head Kevin Johnson went to run Juniper Networks Inc (JNPR.N), Office chief Stephen Elop went to lead phone maker Nokia Oyj (NOK1V.HE), while Ray Ozzie, the software guru Gates designated as Microsoft’s big-picture thinker, left to start his own project.
“Ozzie is a great software guy, he knew what he was doing. But when you see Steve (Ballmer) and him on stage where he (Ozzie) opposed Steve, it was Steve’s way or the highway,” said Kempin.
Kempin said he spoke to Ballmer around two years ago and expressed his concerns about his management style and direction of the company, but has seen no changes since. He said he sent Ballmer and Gates copies of his new book but has yet to get a reply.
“Steve is a very good business guy, but make him a chief operating officer, not a CEO, and your business is going to go gangbusters,” said Kempin. “I respect that guy (Ballmer), but there are some limitations in what he can and can’t do and maybe he hasn’t realized them himself.”
MISSED OPPORTUNITIES
In his book, Kempin writes about how Microsoft foresaw the major moves in technology in the last decade, but bungled its entry into tablets, phones and social media, ceding leadership in the technology world to Apple Inc (AAPL.O) and others.
“They missed all the opportunities they were talking about when I was still in the company. Tablets, phones…we had a tablet going, we had tablet software when Windows XP came out, it was never followed up properly,” said Kempin.
He also claims the decline of PCs is partly due to Microsoft’s mismanagement of hardware makers, an area that Kempin oversaw at Microsoft.
“Just think about the insult of Microsoft coming out with a tablet themselves, trying to mimic Apple, and now they are going to come out with a notebook on top of it,” said Kempin, referring to Microsoft’s Surface RT tablet and soon-to-be-released Surface running Windows Pro.
Several PC makers went public with their unease about Microsoft’s decision to make its own computers last year.
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