'World's fastest' lift to be built

22 April 2014 Last updated at 13:50 By Dave Lee Technology reporter, BBC News

Hitachi has said it will install a lift capable of reaching speeds of 72km/h (45mph) into a skyscraper in Guangzhou, southern China.

The lift, the fastest in the world, would take 43 seconds to go from the first to 95th floor in the Guangzhou CTF Financial Centre, the company said.

The skyscraper is scheduled to be completed in 2016.

Currently, the Taipei 101 building in Taiwan holds the record for fastest lift - it can travel up to 60.6km/h.

Hitachi promised a "comfortable ride" even at high speeds in the new lift.

The lifts would prevent ear blockages, Hitachi said, by artificially altering air pressure in the car.

'Some pain'

Dr Gina Barney, an expert in lift technology, said protecting passengers from discomfort was a big challenge for high-speed lifts.

"When you're travelling that distance, you're going to get pressures on your ears changing," she told the BBC.

"That's probably the most significant problem with high-speed travel in buildings - people suffer some pain."

Hitachi said guiding "rollers" that adapted to warping caused by wind pressure would mean the ride remained smooth.

And brakes able to resist extreme heat would activate in the "unlikely" event of a malfunction.

The building will have in total 95 lifts, two of which will be operate at the ultra-high speed.

Twenty-eight "double-decker" lifts will also be installed into the building.

The Guangzhou CTF Financial Centre will house office, hotel and residential space.

Global race

If the Hitachi lift performs as well as the company has said, it will comfortably top the global chart for fastest lift.

Today's record is held in Taiwan, where passengers in the Taipei 101 building are flung from the fifth to the 89th floor in 37 seconds, a speed of 1,010m (3,313ft) per minute.

The Yokohama Landmark Tower in Japan moves its passengers at 750m per minute, while the world's tallest building, Dubai's Burj Khalifa, has a lift that moves at 600m per minute.

London's Shard, the tallest building in Western Europe, has lifts that move at 360m per minute.

Follow Dave Lee on Twitter @DaveLeeBBC

23.43 | 0 komentar | Read More

Reddit revolt over censored posts

21 April 2014 Last updated at 15:59

Social news site Reddit has downgraded the status of its "technology" section after a censorship row.

The category is no longer a "default subreddit", meaning it stops being one of two dozen communities promoted to new account holders.

It follows a report by the Daily Dot that revealed headlines posted to the area had been secretly deleted if they featured certain words.

The subreddit's own moderators now acknowledge that this was a "disaster".

Reddit describes itself as "the front page of the internet".

Continue reading the main story

The moderation team lost focus of what they were there to do: moderate effectively"

End Quote Victoria Taylor Reddit spokeswoman

It had about 115 million unique visitors last month, according to its own data, and more than 6,500 active subreddit communities, all moderated by independent volunteers.

Members can submit links to articles to each community, for which they provide their own headlines.

Other members then up-vote or down-vote the links, which determines how prominently they feature both in each individual section and on a core list of the most popular posts. Users can also submit comments, leading to lively discussions.

The site is majority-owned by media group Conde Nast's parent Advance Publications, and has proven particularly popular with 18-30 year-old males.

This audience-profile closely matches that of many of the major tech blogs and, as such, articles that have attracted interest on the technology subreddit have helped drive traffic to these third-party sites.

However, the section will now be much less visible to people who have either not edited their "subscriptions" to include it or have visited Reddit without logging in.

After a similar action was taken against Reddit's "politics" community last year it experienced a steep decline in activity.

Reddit said that it had acted because the technology community's moderators had become distracted by "petty squabbles".

"We decided to remove /r/technology from the default list because the moderation team lost focus of what they were there to do: moderate effectively," the site's director of communications Victoria Taylor told the BBC.

"We're giving them time to see if we feel they can work together to resolve the issue.

"We might consider adding them back in the future if they can show us and the community that they can overcome these issues."

Banned words

The issue was brought to light by a Reddit user nicknamed Creq who posted a message to the site a week ago suggesting that 20 terms had been banned.

He said the list of censored words included: "National Security Agency", "GCHQ", "Anonymous", "anti-piracy", "Bitcoin", "Snowden" and "net neutrality".

It later became clear that other terms, including "EU Court", "startup" and "Assange" had also been blocked.

When the Daily Dot questioned one of the section's volunteer moderators about this, he confirmed that software was being used to automatically delete posts that featured "politicised" words in order to avoid the links making it to the core list of most popular topics.

The Daily Dot subsequently reflected that: "Many would argue those terms have an essential value to readers interested in technology, but the ban was never put up for discussion among the subreddit's millions of subscribers."

The news caused controversy with those users, prompting a U-turn.

"As many of you are aware the moderators of this subreddit have failed you," the volunteers wrote in a message to Reddit visitors over the weekend.

"While the intent of this system was, to the extent of my knowledge, not malicious it ended up being a disaster. We messed up, and we are sorry.

"The mods directly responsible for this system are no longer a part of the team and the new team is committed to maintaining a transparent style of moderation."

One of the changes taken, they added, was to allow the general population to view a configuration page that listed banned materials.

While links to pornography and petitions remain blocked, it reveals that most of the censored headline words can now be used again.

However, the move has failed to placate several of the subreddit's visitors who are now calling for a further two of the section's surviving moderators to resign.

"Please note that it's not the censorship the [Reddit] admins worry about," added the moderator of a censorship-themed subreddit.

"They've never spoken out against it.

"The problem is that there's zero transparency, zero accountability. That's the real story here."

23.43 | 0 komentar | Read More

Netflix reports rise in profits

21 April 2014 Last updated at 22:08

Netflix has reported profits of $53m (£32m) during the first quarter of 2014, and revealed plans for a subscription price increase.

The internet video streaming firm said it added 2.25 million new members during the period, bringing its total global membership to 48 million.

It also announced a potential "one or two dollar increase" in monthly rates for new members later this year.

Shares in the firm soared more than 6% in after hours trading.

Chief executive Reed Hastings said the success of Netflix's original programming was behind its membership increase, in particular highlighting Kevin Spacey-led drama House of Cards.

He said that increasing subscription rates would help the firm "acquire more content and deliver an even better streaming experience."

However, despite the firm's strong results, he set himself a larger target.

"We are approaching 50 million global members, but that is far short of HBO's 130 million," he wrote in a letter to shareholders, pointing to the US cable television leader.

"We are eager to close the gap."

23.43 | 0 komentar | Read More

Facebook boss wants women to act

22 April 2014 Last updated at 07:58

Facebook's highest-ranked woman has said women need to take action to create a more equal world.

Sheryl Sandberg, chief operating officer of the social network site, said women should hold half of the important positions in business.

"If you're thinking about doing something, ask yourself what you would do if you weren't afraid and then do it," she told the BBC.

Ms Sandberg became the first woman on Facebook's board in June 2012.

Last year, she wrote Lean In, a book advising women on how to make progress in the workplace.

"It's really important that since women make up half of the population, women start having half the seats at tables where the decisions are made and that's not where we are today," Ms Sandberg added.

She said women could make "unbelievably effective" business and government leaders, as well as entrepreneurs.

Talking about the wider challenges facing Facebook, Ms Sandberg said the world was going through a "huge technological shift".

"We are in the middle of the fastest adoption of disruptive technology the world has ever seen and that is the mobile phone," she added.

23.43 | 0 komentar | Read More

German media boss criticises Google

17 April 2014 Last updated at 14:20

The boss of one of Europe's largest media companies has strongly criticised Google in an open letter printed in a German newspaper.

Mathias Dopfner, chief executive of Axel Springer, says his company is afraid of Google and its power.

He also asks in the letter, addressed to Google boss Eric Schmidt, whether Google intends to create a superstate where anti-trust and privacy laws don't apply.

Google has not commented on the letter.

Continue reading the main story

With the exception of biological viruses, there is nothing with such speed, efficiency and aggressiveness that spreads like these technology platforms"

End Quote Mathias Dopfner CEO Axel Springer

Axel Springer publishes more than 200 newspapers and magazines including German papers Die Welt and Bild. It also has a significant online presence and television and radio interests.

Mr Dopfner's letter was published in Germany's Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung newspaper - which is not published by his company - in response to a column by Google's executive chairman Eric Schmidt.

Mr Schmidt's column had referred to the advertising relationship between Axel Springer and the search company. He described how the relationship had been challenging at times but how now they had "walked down the aisle" and signed a multi-year deal.

Mr Dopfner acknowledged that he was pleased at the marketing relationship between the two companies and an admirer of Google's entrepreneurial success but went on to say that the company had little choice but to engage with Google as "we know no search engine alternative to increase our online reach".

Global monopoly

The company makes 62% of its profits from digital business, he said, and the internet is a great opportunity, but he explained that he was concerned about the role Google plays online.

He referred to a long-running dispute between Google and the European Commission, which involved accusations that the search company gave favourable treatment to its own products in search results.

Mr Dopfner said the resulting agreement between the two parties was not a compromise but instead the Commission had "sanctioned the introduction of a business model, which in less honourable circles is called extortion".

He said the agreement would still allow Google to discriminate against competitors in search results. At the time Google said its proposals to change the way search results were ranked were fair and wide-reaching.

Mr Dopfner went on to say in the letter that large technology companies like Google are far more powerful than people realise.

To prove the point, he quoted from a book written by Google's chairman: "Almost nothing, short of a biological virus, can scale as quickly, efficiently or aggressively as these technology platforms and this makes the people who build, control, and use them powerful too."

Mr Dopfner compared the company to the state monopolies that ran the German postal and telecoms services: "Today there is a global network monopoly. Therefore, it is of utmost importance that there are transparent and fair criteria in Google's search results."

Superstate

Mr Dopfner's comments were not just restricted to Google - the founder of social network Facebook also came under fire. He explained that he'd been at a conference when someone asked Mark Zuckerberg how Facebook stored data and protected users' privacy.

"And Zuckerberg said: 'I do not understand your question. Those who have nothing to hide, have nothing to fear.'

"Again and again I had to think about this sentence. It's terrible. I know it is certainly not meant that way. This is a mindset that was fostered in totalitarian regimes not in liberal societies. Such a sentence could also be said by the head of the Stasi or other intelligence service or a dictatorship."

Turning his attention to Google founder Larry Page, Mr Dopfner said: "He dreams of a place with no privacy laws and without democratic accountability."

Referring to comments Mr Page had made about the company wanting to develop ideas but being unable to because they were illegal, Mr Dopfner said: "Does this mean that Google is planning to operate in a legal vacuum, without the hassle of anti-trust and privacy? A kind of superstate?"

He finished the letter with a warning to Google that in the history of economics monopolies do not survive long.

23.43 | 0 komentar | Read More

SpaceX launches station cargo flight

18 April 2014 Last updated at 23:06 By Jonathan Amos Science correspondent, BBC News

Please turn on JavaScript. Media requires JavaScript to play.

The launch of the Falcon-9 rocket went smoothly

US company SpaceX has launched its latest re-supply mission to the International Space Station (ISS).

The California firm's Falcon-9 rocket successfully executed its ascent from Cape Canaveral, Florida, deploying the Dragon freighter on a path to the orbiting platform.

The capsule is carrying just over two tonnes of food, equipment and science experiments.

These stores are expected to arrive at the ISS on Sunday.

Astronauts will use a robotic arm on the station to reach out and grab the Dragon. It will then be pulled it into a free berthing position.

The crew will then be able to remove the freighter's contents.

This is the third cargo run being made by SpaceX under its $1.6bn contract with the US space agency (Nasa).

The US government handed the task of re-supplying the ISS to the private sector following the retirement of the space shuttles in 2011.

Virginia-based Orbital Sciences Corporation has a similar contract to SpaceX.

Friday's launch looked marginal for much of the day. Meteorologists had forecast only a 40% chance of favourable conditions.

But despite some threatening cloud, the Falcon got away exactly on time at 15:25 local time (19:25 GMT).

A camera mounted on the exterior of Dragon relayed video of the entire nine-minute ride to orbit.

Pictures also showed the freighter deploy its solar panels.

Dragon must now raise its altitude to bring it into the vicinity of the space station where Nasa astronaut Rick Mastracchio and Japanese astronaut Koichi Wakata can do their grab manoeuvre.

This particular mission has drawn interest because SpaceX again used the launch to try to advance the technology needed to recover and re-use Falcon rocket parts.

Engineers had fitted landing legs to the vehicle's first-stage - the segment that gets the rocket up off the ground.

Normally, this stage is discarded at about 80km in altitude, almost three minutes into a flight, whereupon it begins a destructive dive back through the atmosphere.

Following first-stage separation on Friday, however, the lower rocket segment was commanded to relight some of its engines to slow its fall to Earth.

It was then supposed to deploy 7m-long legs to execute a soft "landing" - although for this test, the attempted touch-down was actually to be done out over the Atlantic Ocean.

Initial data suggested the early phase of the descent was well controlled. Further data gathered via a tracking plane will need to be studied to learn exactly how the stage performed as it made its final approach towards the water's surface.

Chief designer at SpaceX, Elon Musk, said there was a heavy swell at the time, so it was unlikely that the stage could be recovered.

"Even though we probably won't get the stage back, I think we're really starting to connect the dots of what's needed," he told reporters.

"There's only a few more dots that need to be there to have it all work. I think we've got a decent chance of bringing a stage back this year, which would be wonderful."

The goal - if all testing goes well - is to try to return a Falcon first-stage to a remote piece of land at the Cape.

Jonathan.Amos-INTERNET@bbc.co.uk and follow me on Twitter: @BBCAmos

23.43 | 0 komentar | Read More

Whedon releases new film on demand

21 April 2014 Last updated at 12:24

Avengers director Joss Whedon has surprised fans by releasing his latest film online at the same time as it premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival.

Whedon, whose Avengers film made $1.5bn (£892m) at the box office, made In Your Eyes available to rent for $5 (£3).

It is the second release from his "micro studio" Bellwether Pictures, after 2013's Much Ado About Nothing.

"It's exciting for us because we get to explore yet another new form of distribution - and we get $5," he said.

In Your Eyes is a supernatural love story, starring Zoe Kazan and Michael Stahl-David as strangers who believe they share a telepathic connection.

Continue reading the main story

The fact that people like Joss are starting to think about direct distribution and connecting directly with their fans is exciting for us"

End Quote Greg Clayman, Vimeo

It is available to rent on video streaming website Vimeo, where fans have already left reviews.

Robyn Harris called it "supremely sad, fabulously funny, terrifyingly tender", while JP Gagen said the script's "original concept" was "executed beautifully".

Whedon is a cult figure in the sci-fi community, having created TV shows including Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Dollhouse and "space western" Firefly.

A co-writer of the original Toy Story, he was also a script doctor on movies such as Speed and Twister, before being asked to direct Marvel's Avengers Assemble in 2012.

The director has experimented with digital releases in the past - and his 2008 spoof superhero musical Dr Horrible's Sing-Along Blog one of the first high-profile Web series.

He wrote and produced In Your Eyes, handing directorial duties to Brin Hill.

Whedon sent a short video message, apparently recorded on the set of Avengers sequel Age of Ultron, to the Tribeca Film Festival.

In it, he announced the screening was "not just the premiere of the film - it is the worldwide release date because, as of now, In Your Eyes is available on any internet-capable device".

The choice of Vimeo, a distant rival to YouTube, as the film's distributor is a huge coup for the New York-based firm.

"This is the most high profile title we've had on the platform, definitely," the company's Greg Clayman told Gigaom.

"The fact that people like Joss are starting to think about direct distribution and connecting directly with their fans is exciting for us, and a trend we think will continue."

"I like the surprise element," he added of the film's stealth release.

"It's a non-traditional way, for sure, but hey, it works for Beyonce."

23.43 | 0 komentar | Read More

UK scares sports piracy site offline

21 April 2014 Last updated at 15:51

A leading sports file-sharing site has shut down after a UK police force threatened its operators with jail.

The Sports Torrent Network had offered links to European football matches, US National Hockey League games, Formula 1 races and sports-related documentaries, among other content.

Torrentfreak reported TSTN had about 20,000 members, making it "possibly the largest site of its type".

The news site added police had emailed the service a fortnight ago.

"Pipcu has the lawful right to pursue action against you and against the thesportstorrentnetwork.co.uk website in order to prevent, detect and disrupt criminal activity," read the warning from the City of London Police Intellectual Property Crime Unit.

The message added that the operators faced up to 10 years' imprisonment if found guilty of encouraging and assisting the public to share pirated material.

Membership incentives

Like many other torrent trackers, TSTN did not host pirated media files itself but, rather, helped connect users wanting to share files over peer-to-peer networks.

Members had to tell the site's administrators the reason they wanted to join before being allowed access. They could, however, invite others if they had seeded enough content or made a big enough donation.

"We have received legal action against us," the operators wrote before taking their website and Twitter account offline last week.

"Thanks for being around with us for the last few years. Best regards, TSTN crew."

The City of London Police launched Pipcu in September last year after securing £2.56m from the UK's Intellectual Property Office.

Its officers act on tip-offs from industry groups to identify UK suspects and seek out websites offering illegal goods and downloads.

It has previously closed several other smaller sports-related sites - including boxingguru.co.uk and nutjob.eu - and arrested a man accused of selling set-top boxes that allowed illegal access to Premier League Matches.

It has also created a database of "illegal" websites that it has shared with the advertising industry in a effort to cut off revenue to the offending sites' operators, but has not made the sites' names public.

Pipcu's own funds are due to run out next year, but the prime minister's Intellectual Property Adviser, Mike Weatherley MP, has urged David Cameron to fund the unit on a permanent basis.

23.43 | 0 komentar | Read More

Airbnb in court over housing laws

22 April 2014 Last updated at 12:25

Airbnb, the website that allows homeowners to rent out properties online, is to appear in court in New York in a dispute over housing and hotel laws.

The New York attorney general has asked Airbnb to disclose information about its users who may be acting illegally by renting out their homes.

Airbnb says the laws in question were not meant to apply to people who occasionally rent out their properties.

It is challenging the request for data.

New York laws prevent homeowners renting out their entire homes for fewer than 30 days to prevent illegal hotels from operating. But according to reports, court documents filed by the attorney general say that more than 60% of Airbnb listings in New York City break that law.

The documents also show that some users were offering multiple properties for rent.

"Airbnb is simply looking out for its bottom line at the expense of a law that protects quality of life for building residents and safety for tourists," Matt Mittenthal, a spokesman for Attorney General Eric Schneiderman, said in a statement to Bloomberg.

Support homesharing

In a blog posted on the Airbnb website, the company's head of global public policy, David Hantman said: "The vast majority of our community members are regular New Yorkers just trying to make ends meet.

"Short-term rental laws were never meant to apply to New Yorkers occasionally renting out their own home."

Please turn on JavaScript. Media requires JavaScript to play.

Airbnb's chief executive Brian Chesky spoke to the BBC's Joe Lynam earlier this year about claims that his firm was breaking the law

The attorney general issued a subpoena last year to find out if Airbnb was being used by the operators of illegal hotels and whether users were paying the appropriate state tax.

The company has called the attorney general's request for data on its users a "government-sponsored fishing expedition" and is in court to challenge the subpoena.

It announced this weekend via another blog on its site that it had removed the accounts of users who had multiple listings on the site and that they would not be allowed to relist, although bookings already made would be honoured.

Last week the New York Post reported that apartments for rent on Airbnb in Manhattan were being used as temporary brothels. The company said it was co-operating with the police on the matter.

"The entire hospitality industry deals with issues like this, and we have zero tolerance for this activity," it said in a statement.

In Mexico, one hotel owner has listed all its rooms on Airbnb in place of a traditional booking system.

"Airbnb doesn't actually have a category for a hotel," said Stu Waddell. "I call myself a hotel. When I explain it, I say it's between a hostel and a boutique."

Airbnb's website explains that it is the responsibility of the homeowner to ensure they are not breaking any local laws or regulations.

"We are working with governments around the world to clarify these rules so that everyone has a clear understanding of what the laws are. In the meantime, please review your local laws before listing your space on Airbnb. By accepting our Terms of Service and activating a listing, you certify that you will follow your local laws and regulations."

Mr Hantman points out in his blog that other cities are changing their laws to "support homesharing".

"Hamburg, then Amsterdam, and now France have all changed their laws and to support homesharing. San Francisco might be next. Someday, New York will join them," he said.

It was recently reported that Airbnb had secured investment of $450m (£266m) which would value the home-sharing site at $10bn.

23.43 | 0 komentar | Read More

Russian social network founder fired

22 April 2014 Last updated at 16:46

The founder of Russia's most popular social network site says he has been fired and that allies of President Putin have taken over his site.

Pavel Durov who ran VKontakte had previously announced he was leaving the company but said he had withdrawn his resignation.

The company denied it had been withdrawn.

Mr Durov had previously refused requests from the Russian government to censor posts on his site.

In a statement Mr Durov said that he only found out about the loss of his job from press reports: "Today I was fired as general director of VKontakte. It's interesting that the shareholders didn't have the bravery to do this directly, and that I learned about my firing from the press.

"Today VKontakte goes under the complete control of Igor Sechin and Alisher Usmanov. Probably, in the Russian context, something like this was inevitable, but I'm happy we lasted seven and a half years. We did a lot. And part of what's been done can't be turned back."

Clean conscience

Mr Sechin is the chief executive of state-owned oil company Rosneft and was President Putin's former deputy chief of staff.

Mr Usmanov, who is the richest man in Russia according to Forbes, made his money in iron ore and steel and until recently held a stake in Facebook. He has a large shareholding in VKontakte via his internet company Mail.ru.

Mr Durov announced his resignation publicly on 1 April but two days later said it was an April Fool's joke.

The Russian news agency Interfax reported that Vkontakte said they had acted on Mr Durov's resignation letter of 21 March as he had not withdrawn it officially within an allowed one-month grace period.

In an interview with news site TechCrunch Mr Durov said he was no longer in Russia and had no plans to return.

"Unfortunately, the country is now incompatible with internet business at the moment.

"I'm afraid there is no going back [to the company], not after I publicly refused to co-operate with the authorities. They can't stand me," he said.

The site has more than 100 million users and had been subject to several government requests for information.

Mr Durov had been asked by the Russian authorities to hand over the details of Ukrainians who had used the site to create groups related to anti-government protests. He was also asked to close down a group that supported Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny.

He refused the request and said he sold his shares in the company so that he could continue "to make the right decisions".

"I have a clean conscience and ideals that I am willing to defend," he said in a post at the time.

Reports suggest that a replacement for Mr Durov will be elected at the next VKontakte board meeting.

23.43 | 0 komentar | Read More