4 minutes estimated reading time
Beyonce
Beyonce Sells 1 Million Albums on Apple’s iTunes in Five Days – Peter Kafka – Media – AllThingsD – non-piracy aspects at work affecting the sale of the latest Beyonce album.
Beyonce is arguably the most popular performer in the music industry right now. Beyonce has amplified her work through making visual albums. Despite all this even her music has become devalued as background rather than something to be actively enjoyed. Secondly the music industry focuses on blockbusters rather than the tail which would have put more pressure on her more experimental works.
Business
Why Shell nixed a $20 billion gas-to-liquids project – CSMonitor.com – shale and fracking isn’t as promising as believed or as commercially viable yet…
Daiwa Securities increases target price on MediaTek – The China Post – interesting contrast with Qualcomm
oDesk and Elance Merge to Create One Big Freelancer Company – Liz Gannes – News – AllThingsD
Consumer behaviour
The Beauty Implications of a Chinese Baby Boom – Euromonitor International – expect more girl consumer power
Finance
82% Chinese Netizens Held Credit Cards — China Internet Watch
China Mobile Payment User Behavior Report 2013 — China Internet Watch
How to
Differences Between US and International SEO: Interview With Andre Alpar | Search Engine Journal
Google’s changing recommendations on SEO for mobile – Smart Insights Digital Marketing Advice
Innovation
Information Processing: The dawn of genetic engineering? – Blade Runner style replicants next stop?
FedEx thinks Amazon’s drone plans are hilarious – Quartz
Between a quarter and a third of everything on the web is copied from somewhere else
The man who invented the karaoke machine never patented it – Quartz
Can Companies Keep Their Entrepreneurs In-House? – Corporate Intelligence – WSJ – basically not much chance
Legal
Facebook, Zuckerberg, banks must face IPO lawsuit: judge | Reuters
Luxury
Jing Daily: Five trends for China’s outbound travelers in 2014
Chinese Students in U.S. Boost Luxury Car Sales – Businessweek
Burberry Scales Back Social Media | L2’s The Daily – did social media make the brand too accessible?
Nike Launches Christmas-Themed Shoes for Kobe, LeBron, and Durant – Businessweek – is the market being over-exploited
Media
Picture quality might be an issue for HKTV | South China Morning Post – interesting that they are running an a game around the terrestial licence process and going straight to mobile OTT services and online delivery (paywall)
China spent more on mobile ads than US in Q3 2013
Online
Trends in Social Sharing: The Rise of Pinterest | Gigya’s Blog – some interesting data on social sharing by platform
Tweets loud and quiet – O’Reilly Radar
微视 8秒无限欢乐 – Weishi is a Chinese application similar to Vine that makes 8-second videos, connects into your WeChat account. It is being promoted by having celebrity accounts on there
Why is Asia so awesome at Facebook engagement?
Yahoo Introduces New Style Of Flickr Embeds To Seed Content Outside Of The Site | TechCrunch
Retailing
Facebook Screwed Lots Of Retailers – Business Insider – and you are surprised because?
Security
Password Managers Exposing Passwords Everywhere – depressing reading
A Few Thoughts on Cryptographic Engineering: An update on Truecrypt
Research shows how MacBook Webcams can spy on their users without warning – attack the microcontrollers not the CPU
Sources: Target Investigating Data Breach — Krebs on Security
Software
This company is betting millions that you’ll use cartoon bears instead of English – Quartz – the bit that the authors don’t seem to get is that stickers are a social lubricant rather than a language per se
Spotiamp – nice ode to WinAmp
“Backbreaking” OpenStack migrations hinder enterprise upgrades — Tech News and Analysis
BitTorrent takes step toward secure serverless chat
One chart that shows how you pay for free apps with your privacy – Quartz
Technology
ongoing by Tim Bray · Is 4K BS? – yes you can do without them. They are also impressive close up, you can notice the difference in retina and normal screens on phones, however I do think there is a law of diminishing returns at work
Web of no web
Wireless
Weibo: Huawei, ZTE chase ‘cool’, Xiaomi chases Apple | South China Morning Post – following in this case looks slow and ungainly
Apple – Press Info – China Mobile & Apple Bring iPhone to China Mobile’s 4G & 3G Networks on January 17, 2014 – interesting that there is no pricing information yet
HKT to acquire CSL New World Mobility in US$2.425 billion deal | South China Morning Post – (paywall)
China Mobile chairman says still in talks with Apple on iPhone deal | Reuters