E-commerce

Congressman raises privacy concerns over Amazon Silk

Amazon's anticipated tablet, the Kindle Fire, is still a few weeks away from release, and it's raising legal issues and questions in every direction.

Today the Fire's flames are being fanned by the Silk browser, which on the front end is touted as a much faster browser using cheaper hardware because all Web activity is filtered through Amazon's cloud-based Amazon Web Services.

But that has been a hot topic in the last few weeks because, essentially, the Silk Web browser can track everything a user does on the Web and keeps a permanent record.

Now Congress … Read more

Facebook, eBay unveil plans to drive future of commerce

Facebook, the world's largest social-networking platform, is tapping eBay's commerce platform to create new social shopping experiences for hundreds of millions of consumers.

Specifically, eBay is integrating Facebook's new Open Graph 2.0 functionality into its global commerce systems, which come under the umbrella of a new business unit called X.commerce, and include eBay, PayPal, and Magento (which has built shopping sites for 100,000 merchants). The news was announced at Innovate, eBay's developer conference, being held today through Friday in San Francisco.

"Facebook is now linked into the largest commerce ecosystem," Matthew … Read more

eBay CEO: We're at an 'inflection point' in commerce

SAN FRANCISCO--We will see more change in how consumers shop and pay in the next three years than what we've seen in the last fifteen, according to eBay's CEO and president John Donahoe.

"The lines between online and offline are blurring," Donahoe asserted. "What's that doing is expanding the opportunity for innovation."

eBay is trying to meet the demands of that opportunity with its new X.commerce open platform, an ecosystem made up of the online auction site and its subsidiaries. X.commerce is intended to bring together the full suite of commerce … Read more

Foursquare turns on Radar for iOS 5 users

Foursquare has launched a new feature, called Radar, that helps iOS 5 users find out what's going on around them.

To get the feature to work, users can start following lists. Based on the focus of a respective list--Foursquare gave "101 Best Dishes of 2011" as an example--the application will find locations or establishments nearby that might relate to it and alert users. The service also lets users know when and where a group of friends might be meeting up nearby.

"The app doesn't even have to be open, it just works," Foursquare wrote in a blog post … Read more

New Facebook app delivers local deals to Wal-Mart fans

Facebook is cozying up to major brands in a big way.

The latest is Wal-Mart.

The social-networking giant announced it's teaming up with the world's biggest retailer with an aim to make shopping more local and personal. Together, they introduced "My Local Walmart," a new Facebook app designed to give millions of Wal-Mart shoppers information on their favorite and closest Wal-Mart stores nationwide.

More than 3,500 Wal-Mart store-specific pages are launching on Facebook, allowing consumers to more easily locate the right store nationwide via ZIP code. The app aims to deliver the latest deals, product … Read more

Facebook finally launches iPad app

Facebook took a giant leap into its mobile future today by launching the highly anticipated Facebook for iPad app.

Facebook's app joins other popular social-networking apps on the iPad including Twitter, Flipboard, and Gowalla, all of which had a heady lead on Facebook.

Facebook for iPad was rumored to arrive at F8, the company's developer conference held late last month, and then it was rumored to arrive at Apple's launch event for the iPhone 4S last week. It was a no-show for both events.

According to Facebook, the "full Facebook experience" is on the iPad--driven … Read more

Parsing Facebook's new lexicon (Q&A)

Facebook is expanding its vocabulary.

Recently at f8, Facebook's developer conference, the company introduced a series of action verbs into its social platform. "Read," "Watch," and "Listen," Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg explained, were added to help build a "language for how people connect."

The one missing word, of course, was "Buy." That's really why Facebook and its army of content partners from news, publishing, music, and film and TV are rushing to set up shop on the famous platform with 750 million users. The overriding idea is that … Read more

Amazon Kindle Fire: Profit or loss for retailer?

Is Amazon losing money or earning a profit from the sale of each Kindle Fire tablet? Analysts seem to be at odds over that question.

In an investor note issued last Wednesday, Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster calculated the manufacturing cost of each Kindle Fire at $250, leaving Amazon with a $50 loss on each $199 tablet that it sells. Munster said he based that estimate on the cost of the iPad.

But other analysts have chimed in with different opinions and estimates.

UBM TechInsights believes Amazon is actually making a profit on each Kindle Fire. Estimating manufacturing costs as low as $150, the research firm pegs Amazon's profit per tablet at $49.

In comparison, RIM spends around $170 to make its BlackBerry PlayBook tablet, which reportedly gave Amazon some "design clues" for the Fire. The retailer was able to cut its costs by eliminating certain features found in the PlayBook, according to EE Times, which is published by UBM's parent company.… Read more

Kindle Fire leads Amazon onslaught (roundup)

Taking direct aim at competitors like Barnes & Noble and Apple, Amazon announces three new e-readers and its first ever tablet, all priced below $200.

SNL's Seth Meyers pours cold water on Kindle Fire Amazon's new Kindle Fire is clearly important enough to deserve a joke on "Saturday Night Live." It doesn't come out too well. (Posted in Technically Incorrect by Chris Matyszczyk) October 2, 2011 2:25 p.m. PT

Amazon is not a hardware company For all the great things about the Fire, including the low price, it's important to remember that … Read more

Facebook time is tops abroad, with Singapore No. 1

Here at the epicenter of social networking, birthplace of Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn, it's easy to lose sight of just how much the rest of the world loves our homespun social-media creations.

As it turns out, social networking is enjoyed overseas even more than here at home in Silicon Valley. Underscoring this notion is a newly released international study from Experian Hitwise tracking the top eight countries spending the most time on Facebook and other social networks.

Here's the lowdown: Singapore loves Facebook more than any other country. In August, people in Singapore spent the most time on Facebook 38 minutes and 46 seconds per session, while those in New Zealand spent 30 minutes and 31 seconds. Australians spent 26 minutes and 27 seconds; next, folks in the United Kingdom spent 25 minutes and 33 seconds; and the United States came in 5th place with 20 minutes 46 seconds, followed by France, India, and Brazil.

Not surprisingly, Facebook was the most visited social network in the United States in August, leading with 91 percent of all visits. Second place went to Twitter with 1.92 percent of all social-networking visits. San Francisco-based Tagged.com came in third place for the first time with 1.04 percent of all visits, overtaking MySpace. … Read more