It’s no secret that Nokia is in trouble. It lost close to US$1,5bn in 2011, its market share, particularly in the profitable smartphone market, continues to plunge and its big bet — a partnership with Microsoft — has yet to produce significant revenues. So when I received a review model of Nokia’s newest phone, the Lumia 800
“You’re being irrational.” No one likes to hear those words. They are the verbal equivalent of a pat on the head. But, like it or not, we are fundamentally irrational beings. And the area in which we should be the most clear-headed, our personal finances, is usually
Just over a year ago I asked whether Facebook was really worth US$50bn. On Thursday I got my answer: no, it’s worth more like $100bn. After years of flirting with the market, Facebook has finally opened its kimono and started the process of offering its shares for public trading. On 1 February
You could almost feel sorry for Google’s management team lately. Their every move draws stinging criticism from the media, regulators and customers. The latest kerfuffle? Google is changing its privacy policies on 1 March. Now, website privacy policies are generally like Ayn Rand novels and the Government Gazette
It seems such an obvious truth now: the Internet can be catalyst for political and social change. But until the Arab Spring of 2011 few people fully realised or believed quite how powerful it could be. Now the US government, accustomed to celebrating the democratising power of the Internet, is getting a taste of
It’s become a rite of passage for the world’s biggest technology companies. As soon as you’ve fought your way to the top and become the darling of both stock markets and customers, regulators begin to cry “monopoly”. It happened to IBM in the 1960s
It has been a lively year for technology, despite the bad state of the world’s economy. Technology is now so intrinsic to both business and personal life that it might appear recession-proof. But this high-level view masks the Darwinian ferocity of the battles raging between the tech titans. The year 2011 will be remembered as
Something momentous happened on Wednesday — something most people will never even hear about. Adobe, a software firm, announced that it is ceasing development on the mobile version of its Flash platform. That probably doesn’t sound very momentous
The only consistent thing about the Internet is its ability to surprise us by changing virtually over night. It’s a Darwinian market that crushes the weak and elevates the strong within months rather than years. That makes investing in online businesses a roller coaster ride
The mobile phone industry is a brutal business. There may be gold in them thar hills, but it can be painful to extract. Witness the howls of rage from tens of millions of BlackBerry customers around the world who were cut off from services like BlackBerry Messenger
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