Google has settled a lawsuit brought on by shareholders after the company announced plans for a stock split earlier this year, Reuters reported. Investors were initially upset with Google and claimed the split would give founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin more control of the company. Google announced plans to issue a new class of nonvoting stock that would be issued as a dividend to investors, that would be used for future acquisitions and that would not take away from Page and Brin’s control of the company. Google’s current setup gives Class A shares one vote, while Class B shares, such as those owned by Page and Brin, carry 10 votes each. The settlement will give Class C stock holders a cash or stock payment if the stock’s value differs by more than 1% from the value of Class A shares.
Google is developing a new technology that will help search engines and other Internet companies collectively remove child pornography from the Web, The Telegraph reported. The database will remove images from the Internet that have been “flagged” by organisations such as the Internet Watch Foundation. A Google spokesperson explained that the “industry-wide global database” will “help all technology companies find these images, wherever they might be,” and “they will then be blocked and reported.” To assist in its goal of eradicating inappropriate images of children, Google also plans to set up a $2 million fund for independent software developers to aid them in creating new ways of preventing the spread of child pornography. The database is expected to be operational within a year.
Google has confirmed that its highly anticipated Moto X smartphone will launch later this year. The company has remained quiet about the handset’s specs and design, however. According to @evleaks, an anonymous Twitter account that has been accurate with mobile rumors in the past, the Moto X will be equipped with a 720p display, a 1.7GHz dual-core Snapdragon S4 Pro and a 10-megapixel camera. It is also rumored to include 2GB of RAM, 16GB of internal storage, a 2-megapixel front-facing camera and Android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean. The smartphone’s display size remains a mystery, although earlier reports suggested it will measure between 4.3-inches and 4.7-inches diagonally. The Moto X will be manufactured in the United States and will be available sometime this fall across multiple carriers.
We’ve known for a while now that Google has been planning to release a sequel to its Nexus 7 tablet, and now we might have gotten our first look at its specs. Engadget reports that specifications for an unknown Asus tablet have popped up on the Federal Communications Commission’s website and show what is likely a 7-inch tablet with a Qualcomm APQ-8064 S4 Pro quad-core 1.5GHz processor, front and rear-facing cameras, a 4,000 mAh battery and LTE connectivity. The two big reasons to suspect this might be the new Nexus 7 are that Asus similarly manufactured the original Nexus 7 and that the mystery tablet’s specs match up with earlier rumors we’ve heard about the device.
If there is one thing Google is good at, it’s finding new and exciting ways to use data. We can’t even begin to imagine what Google is working on behind closed doors at any given time, but every once in a while it releases a nifty new tool that gives the general public new ways to look at the mountains of data that pass through Google’s network every millisecond. Most recently, the company released a very cool new visualization tool tied to Google Trends that shows us popular searches happening at any given time. The tool can show global searches or regional data in any one of eleven different regions, and it is free to use on Google’s Trends site.
Google Fiber is certainly one of Google’s more audacious experiments and it’s now becoming clearer what the company’s long-term strategy is with its high-speed fiber Internet and television service. Barron’s points us to a new research note from Evercore Partners analyst Ken Sena, who just got back from seeing Google Fiber in action in Kansas City and who says that Google’s long-term goal with the service is to make television more of a web-based experience. More →
Why was Google willing to pay what several reports claim to be $1 billion or more for Waze? According to Waze CEO Noam Bardin, the answer is simple: As important is Google’s search product is to the Internet is as important as Waze is for searching the real world. “General navigation and maps, are really the ‘search’ for mobile,” Bardin told Forbes in a previously unpublished interview from January. While his comments didn’t pertain specifically to the Google deal, of course, they relate to the value Waze has to users and, ultimately, to Google. According to Bardin’s vision, people will “use a Google search bar to scour the web today, and Waze to search the real world tomorrow.” The CEO had plenty more to say in the interview, which is linked below, and Forbes’ unnamed sources claim that the Waze deal cost Google more than $1 billion.
European officials are investigating Google over allegations that it has anti-competitive deals in place with various smartphone vendors, the Financial Times reported. Microsoft and Nokia reportedly claim that Google is forcing Android vendors to delay the launch of smartphones based on competing operating systems. The commission will also investigate whether the company has agreements in place that require its manufacturing partners to preload Google’s services on their devices. A Google spokesperson denied the allegations, citing the open source philosophy of Android. A company spokesperson explained to the Financial Times that “handset makers, carriers and consumers can decide how to use Android, including which applications they want to use.”
Much as he dismissed the significance of the iPhone when it first released, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer also dismissed Google’s free-to-use Android platform when it launched because Google wasn’t charging any money for OEMs to use it. In the five years since launching Android, however, it’s clear that making money from the direct sales of Android devices was never part of Google’s plan. To understand why this is, take a look at eMarketer’s new report on mobile advertising showing that Google took home $4.61 billion in mobile advertising revenues in 2012, or more than half of all mobile advertising revenues in the world. More →
A new version of the Nexus 7 tablet was expected to be the highlight of Google’s I/O Developers Conference last month, but the device was a no-show. According to a report from Digitimes, the second-generation Nexus 7 will debut this summer instead. Oddly enough, the website claims the device will be priced higher than its current $199 price point to “avoid competing directly against entry-level tablets.” Earlier reports have suggested that the new Nexus 7 will be equipped with a 7-inch 1,920 x 1,200-pixel display, a 5-megapixel rear camera, a 4,000 mAh battery and support for Qi wireless charging. The second-generation Nexus 7 is reportedly scheduled to launch in July with the 16GB model starting at $229
Google is on a mission to bring high-speed data service to American homes at the lowest possible cost to the consumer. Why? Logic dictates that faster data means more Internet usage, and more Internet usage means more Google services (and ads). The real explanation might not be that simple, however, and Citigroup analyst Jason Bazinet has a theory: Google Fiber is actually a ploy to drive down the cost of cable TV service. More →
Millions of Internet users in Pakistan could soon lose access to Gmail to Google Maps unless Google bows to demands being made by the Pakistani government. The Times of India reports that Anusha Rahman Khan, Pakistan’s IT and telecommunication minister, said the government may block access to all Google sites unless the company removes “blasphemous and objectionable material” from YouTube. Pakistan has already been blocking access to YouTube since September, when the inflammatory video “Innocence of Muslims” sparked violent protests in several countries. The Pakistani government has so far been frustrated that Google has refused to provide filters for videos it deems offensive, although the new threat of a blanket ban may prompt the company to be more accommodating.
