Latest News: From all Sources
The Bookseller's Last Stand
Julie Bosman
NYTimes.com – January 30, 2012: ...Inside the great publishing houses " grand names like Macmillan, Penguin and Random House " there is a sense of unease about the long-term fate of Barnes & Noble, the last major bookstore chain standing. First, the megastores squeezed out the small players....Then the chains themselves were gobbled up or driven under, as consumers turned to the Web. B. Dalton Bookseller and Crown Books are long gone. Borders collapsed last year....[But]it is Amazon.com, the dominant force in books online and the company that sets teeth on edge in publishing. From their perches in Midtown Manhattan, many publishing executives, editors and publicists view Amazon as the enemy " an adversary that, if unchecked, could threaten their industry and their livelihoods....Which is why Barnes & Noble, once viewed as the brutal capitalist of the book trade, now seems so crucial to that industry's future. Sure, you can buy bestsellers at Walmart and potboilers at the supermarket. But in many locales, Barnes & Noble is the only retailer offering a wide selection of books. If something were to happen to Barnes & Noble, if it were merely to scale back its ambitions, Amazon could become even more powerful and " well, the very thought makes publishers queasy.... ...Full Story
Apple expected to adopt gigabit WiFi standard ahead of schedule
Chris Foresman
Ars Technica – January 30, 2012: A new gigabit-speed version of WiFi isn't set to be fully ratified by the WiFi Alliance and IEEE until the end of 2012, but Apple may still be working to support the standard across its product line this year. The faster WiFi standard, known as 802.11ac, is already supported by chipsets from Broadcom...that can use three antennas to transfer data as fast as 1.3Gbps while being as much as six times more power efficient than existing 802.11n chips. Such chips are also backwards compatible with 802.11n and other existing WiFi standards.... ...Full Story
Memorandum Issued to U.S. Government Leadership on Federal Engagement in Standards Activities
ANSI.org – January 27, 2012: A memorandum clarifying principles for federal engagement in standards activities to address national priorities has been released by the Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP), the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), and the Office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR).
Issued to the leadership of U.S. federal executive departments and agencies, the memorandum describes the approach decided upon by the federal government to implement the National Science and Technology Council™s (NSTC) recommendations outlined in the October 2011 report, Federal Engagement in Standards Activities to Address National Priorities....The memorandum makes a number of important points regarding government reliance on the private sector:
- Most standards developed and used in U.S. markets are created with little or no government involvement.
- Consistent with the administration™s commitment to openness, transparency, and multi-stakeholder engagement, all standards activities should involve the private sector.
- Once a national priority has been identified, it is important for the federal government to engage private-sector stakeholders early in the process of identifying technology, regulatory, and/or procurement objectives.
- To the extent feasible and appropriate, agencies should also provide continuous support for their technical experts™ participation and leadership activities in mission-critical standards-setting activities and standards organizations, including standards organization"specific training and mentoring.... ...Full Story
ANSI Accreditation to Support Smart Grid Testing and Certification Framework
ANSI.org – January 27, 2012: The American National Standards Institute (ANSI), coordinator of the U.S. standards and conformity assessment system, is playing a key role in the national push for a robust, reliable, and interoperable smart grid for the United States. Ranking among the Obama Administration™s top priorities for the nation, the smart grid is a planned nationwide network that integrates information and communication technologies, enabling two-way flows of energy and communications to deliver electricity efficiently, reliably, and securely.
Taking the next step forward in the grid™s development, the Smart Grid Interoperability Panel (SGIP) " a joint effort of the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and the private sector " released today version 2.0 of the testing and certification framework for the North American electric power industry.... ...Full Story
Patent Trolls and Technology Diffusion
Catherine Tucker
NBER – January 25, 2012: Abstract: Patent assertion entities, sometimes known as ‘patent trolls,™ do not manufacture goods themselves but profit from licensing agreements that they often enforce via the threat of litigation. This paper explores empirically how litigation by one such patent troll affected the sales of medical imaging technology. It finds evidence that relative to similar products, made by the same firm, but not covered by the patent, imaging software sales declined by one-third. This was not due to a suppression in demand by hospitals but instead is linked to a lack of incremental product innovation during the period of litigation. ...Full Story
To Select or Not? Dealing with Competing Standards in Public IT Procurement
Tineke M. Egyedi
Delft Univ. or Technology – January 24, 2012: Management Summary
This report addresses the problem how governments should deal with competing standards, that is, two or more functionally equivalent standards, in the context of public IT-procurement. The focus is on (open) committee standards. The research questions are:
- In the context of public IT procurement, should governments choose between standards that have the same functionality?
If so, what factors should be taken into consideration?
...This report aims to contribute towards discussion about competing standards and help those concerned with public IT procurement and procurement policy account for their decision(s). To this end it synthesizes scientific literature from different disciplines, in particular, economic, innovation and technology management studies. It interrelates the partly disparate themes of market impact of standards, standards wars, standards dynamics and converter solutions.... ...Full Story
New IEEE P1908.1(TM) Working Group to Develop Virtual Keyboard Standard for Indic Languages
Press Release
IEEE.org – January 24, 2012: IEEE...today announced that a new Working Group (WG) is being established after the first project approval by the recently formed IEEE Standards Association (IEEE-SA) India Standards Interest Group (SIG). IEEE P1908.1(TM) -- Virtual Keyboard Standard for Indic Languages is being launched with an inaugural meeting via teleconference scheduled for 25 January 2012, which is open to all interested parties from across the world to participate in by phone.
Once the standard is developed and adopted, IEEE P1908.1 will make it possible for the first time to display Indian language characters dynamically on smart phones and tablet computers, which is expected to lead to the increased usage of Indian languages....This project is an outcome of the study group whose members included representatives from government, research institutions and industry, all of whom are passionate about Indian language computing.... ...Full Story
OASIS Forms TOSCA Technical Committee to Advance Open Standard for Cloud Portability
Press Release
OASIS.org – January 24, 2012: The OASIS international consortium has launched a new open standards initiative to enhance the portability of cloud applications and services. The OASIS Topology and Orchestration Specification for Cloud Applications (TOSCA) Technical Committee will advance an interoperability standard that will make it easier to deploy cloud applications without vendor lock-in, while maintaining application requirements for security, governance, and compliance....TOSCA will enable the interoperable description of application and infrastructure cloud services, the relationships between parts of the service, and the operational behavior of these services (e.g., deploy, patch, shutdown)--independent of the supplier creating the service, and any particular cloud provider or hosting technology. TOSCA will also make it possible for higher-level operational behavior to be associated with cloud infrastructure management.... ...Full Story
The OGC Forms IndoorGML Indoor Location Standards Working Group
Press Release
Open GeoSpatial Consortium – January 24, 2012: The Open Geospatial Consortium announced the formation of a new OGC Technical Committee Standards Working Group(SWG) to advance the candidate OGC IndoorGML Standard. The OGC members invite the public to comment on the SWG charter...and will consider comments received before 10 February 2012.
This SWG aims to provide a common schema framework for interoperability between indoor navigation applications, which cover a wide spectrum of application areas such as indoor LBS, indoor web map services, indoor emergency control, guiding services for visually handicapped persons in indoor space, and indoor robotics. Several commercial services for indoor spatial information have been recently launched such as Google Maps and Bing Indoor Maps. In order to meet the market demands from these application areas, we need indoor navigation information as an essential component. There are also strong demands for indoor navigation information from other standardization organizations including ISO/TC204 and IEEE RAS to extend existing standards to cover indoor space as well as outdoor space in a seamless way.... ...Full Story
ITU receives Emmy Award for new audio broadcast standard
Press Release
ITU.org – January 23, 2012: ITU [received] the prestigious Emmy Award from the US National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences at the 2012 Consumer Electronics Show today in Las Vegas for the “Standardization of Loudness Metering for Use in Broadcast Audio”....
The annual Technology and Engineering Emmy Award recognizes the ground-breaking work on the worldwide standardization of loudness metering for use in broadcast audio, which the Academy considered as outstanding and showing excellence in engineering creativity....The pertinent algorithm and the agreed parameters are now contained in the ITU-R Recommendation approved by ITU Member States, giving worldwide guidance on loudness metering.... ...Full Story
DLNA Premium Video standard brings connected devices into the walled garden
IPTV.com – January 23, 2012: The Digital Living Network Alliance (DLNA) has introduced a new standard called DLNA Premium Video, which enables pay-TV subscribers to stream content to DLNA Certified products such as digital TVs, tablets, smartphones, Blu-ray disc players and video game consoles.
The standard means that TV shows and movies delivered by service providers to a central set-top box can then be streamed over the home network to a variety of compatible devices, reducing the clutter of multiple set-top boxes in the home.... ...Full Story
MIPI Alliance offers new specs for RF control
Janine Love
EETimes.com – January 23, 2012: Today, the MIPI Alliance announced new DigRF and RFFE specifications, and yesterday, I had the opportunity to speak with Jim Ross, of Skyworks, and Dr. Dietmar Wenzel, of Intel about the changes. Both men are part of the MIPI Alliance.
The DigRF v4 v1.10 specification released today still defines the interface between the baseband and the RFIC, but it addresses the increased bandwidth handled by HSPA+ and LTE architectures in one common high-speed interface.... ...Full Story
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