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Facebook 2009 Revenue Over $500 Million

Grant — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 02:00:32 +0000

According to a board member of Facebook in a Monday interview, Facebook’s 2009 total profits are expected to be around or more than $500 Million! Wow! In the interview, Facebook board member Marc Andreessen said that in a few years, the site can expect profits into the billions. Wow again.

Facebook, being the 4th most visited site on the internet, earns much of their revenue through the use of non-traditional, non-intrusive ads on their site and through the sale of virtual gifts that members can purchase for one another.

[Webware] (Traffic Data From Alexa)

California Governor Tweets Airplane Problems

Grant — Sat, 20 Jun 2009 14:42:05 +0000

It was one of those things where people first found out on Twitter- California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger had some problems with his private plane and Tweeted what had happened which is how most of the public came to find out. In a Tweet that the Gov sent out last night, he said “A little adventure just now when my plane made an emergency landing. All’s ok, though.” He also included a TwitPic of the ordeal here.

The plane made an emergency landing just outside of its scheuled destination of Santa Monica, CA when smoke was reported to be coming out of the insturment panel in the cockpit.

iPhone OS 3.0 Comes Out Today

Grant — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 21:04:22 +0000

Apple’s new iPhone OS 3.0 is out today, soon to be followed by the new iPhone 3GS this Friday. As we covered in an earlier post the day of the Worldwide Developers Conference, the new device software includes new compatibility for upcoming apps and hardware for the devices, copy & paste and several other new enhancements.

Visit iTunes today to get the update- sorry iPod Touch users; this update will set you back about $10!

Video Game Sales No Longer a Billion-Dollar Industry

Grant — Mon, 15 Jun 2009 13:09:20 +0000

According to new industry numbers released this month, sales of video game consoles are down last month by 30% compared to May of last year. While experts say that the sales of games might follow shortly, they noted that for the first time since August of 2007, the video game console industry is no longer a billion-dollar one.

Weekly Recap: New iPhone, Bing Criticised, DTV Transition

Grant — Sun, 14 Jun 2009 23:50:38 +0000

It’s been a great week here at the GrantBlog and in the tech industry this week- we saw a new iPhone along with software to go with it and upgrades to some of Apple’s most popular products, we also saw some criticism directed at Microsoft’s Bing search engine for going after explicit content and a new era of television came in on Friday when digital television took over the national airwaves. Here’s what made news in tech this week:

Trend Micro’s Servers Go Offline

Grant — Sat, 13 Jun 2009 14:12:12 +0000

Large virus software maker Trend Micro had a hiccupp this morning when almost their entire web site went offline except for the support part. On their site now, you recieve a “Server too busy” error, while other pages give you a multi-lingual “Trend Micro is currently unavailable” error. This is not good for a software product maker with millions of users (including me!).

Welcome To Digital Television!

Grant — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 16:16:01 +0000

After a lot of planning by the FCC, digital television is here and is taking over the airwaves by midnight tonight. While a lot of TV stations, at least here in Los Angeles, are making the switch during the day and not at the last minute, if you’re not ready for the switch, you don’t have much time. Although the coupons are still going to be available from here, they take a little while to get and you won’t have them for a few weeks if you get accepted.

The switch to digital was pushed back to today from February because of the government’s fears that many millions of people weren’t ready, but now the FCC, by way of a study conducted by Nielsen research (the big TV ratings company), says that most households will be ready for the switch.

If you or a friend needs help with their DTV box or coupon, visit or call the Federal Communications Commission at dtv.gov or call 1-888-Call FCC (1-888-225-5322).

Google Isn’t Afraid of Microsoft’s New Bing Search

Grant — Thu, 11 Jun 2009 19:01:58 +0000

Google’s CEO Eric Schmidt, in a video interview with the Fox Business Network, said that “I do not think Bing’s arrival has changed what we are doing.” and also said “It’s not the first entry for Microsoft. They do this about once a year”. Schmidt also talked about mobile phones, and said that this is their year. “We try to do things that really change the discussion” he said; “We are about Search and we are about making things enormously successful, by virtue of innovation”.

There’s almost no doubt you’ve seen the recent ads for Bing, either in print or on TV, promoting the way that “search has evolved” and is too congested right now. Bing was launched only a few weeks ago, and Microsoft hopes it might eventually put a dent in Google. We’ll see how Bing fairs against Google’s thousands of searches per second. Might take a little while, Microsoft…

[Via Webware]

Spying On Printers Via The Sound They Make?!?!?

Grant — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 20:27:33 +0000

At Saarland university, students and researchers now say they can, with up to 70% accuracy, detect what a printer is printing only based on the sounds that they make while they print. That’s scary. Although it took a while because they had to match word in the dictionary to words that could be printed, they say that in their demo (with an anonymous patients), they were able to tell what perscription was being printed at a doctor’s office.

[Via Lifehacker on Google Blogscoped]

New Search Method: Google Squared Goes Live

Grant — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 15:27:34 +0000

Google’s latest Labs graduate is none other than the new Google Squared, a col new way to search which creates different tables for your results based on a main category you search for. Say you searched for “Characters In The Office” (by the way my favorite TV show)-your result would probably be a table with the names of most of the major characters in the show, and in little colums, a little thumbnail of them, a short bio and who portrays them. It’s really neat!

Google Squared seems like a really interesting concept, and certainly a handy tool for anyone looking for a neat list of a central category for a project, other list, etc. Although some of the squares I created and saved to my Google Account weren’t ver acurate at all, I think the service will surely evolve along (just like Gmail, which is still in beta) and turn into a great usable service in the not-so-distant future.