E-Commerce Minute

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E-Commerce Minute: Wednesday -- June 1, 2016

The E-Commerce Times -- E-Business Means Business
http://www.ecommercetimes.com
Part of the ECT News Network

Headline Scan
Report: Smartphone Ad Blockers Picking Up Steam
Federal IT Living in the Floppy Age, Reports GAO
Salesforce Picks AWS as Preferred Public Cloud Provider
Coalition Wants FCC to Look Into Data Cap Exemptions
Microsoft's Intolerable Windows 10 Aggression
Facebook Tweaks Trending Topics Out of Abundance of Caution
Microsoft Drastically Scales Down Smartphone Biz

Today's Story Highlights

Report: Smartphone Ad Blockers Picking Up Steam
At least 419 million people around the world are blocking advertising on
their smartphones, according to a report PageFair released Tuesday. Most
of those people -- 408 million of them -- are using ad-blocking
browsers, notes the report. The use of ad blockers doubled in 2015, and
the use of mobile ad-blocking browsers increased 90 percent during the
same year.
http://www.ecommercetimes.com/story/83563.html

Federal IT Living in the Floppy Age, Reports GAO
Antiquated IT systems are soaking up federal technology dollars and
creating risks for both bureaucrats and citizens, the Government
Accountability Office reported last week. More than 75 percent of the
federal IT budget in 2015 went toward the operation and maintenance of
nearly obsolete legacy systems that use outdated software languages and
unsupported hardware parts.
http://www.ecommercetimes.com/story/83557.html

Salesforce Picks AWS as Preferred Public Cloud Provider
Salesforce last week announced its selection of Amazon Web Services as
its preferred public cloud infrastructure provider. The deal is worth
$400 million. "For the first time, we'll be able to deliver our core
services -- including Sales Cloud, Service Cloud, App Cloud, Community
Cloud, Analytics Cloud and more -- for our international infrastructure
expansion," said Salesforce cofounder Parker Harris.
http://www.ecommercetimes.com/story/83561.html

Coalition Wants FCC to Look Into Data Cap Exemptions
A coalition of technology companies and advocacy groups earlier this
week wrote to the Federal Communications Commission, urging it to open a
public investigation into zero-rating practices, in which mobile
providers allow some video or music providers to be excluded from data
caps. The group called on the FCC to examine the zero-rating practices
to determine whether they harm competition.
http://www.ecommercetimes.com/story/83554.html

Microsoft's Intolerable Windows 10 Aggression
Microsoft seems to have gone off the deep end with its tricks to get
unwilling customers to upgrade from Windows 7 and Windows 8 to Windows
Doesn't the company realize this will hurt it? Does Microsoft think
it can be abusive and win? Users are complaining loudly. Why doesn't
Microsoft care about the disruption it is causing? A slice of the
Microsoft marketplace wants to move to Windows 10. Fine. Many of them
absolutely love it. That is not the problem.
http://www.ecommercetimes.com/story/83553.html

Facebook Tweaks Trending Topics Out of Abundance of Caution
Facebook this week said it would make several procedural changes to its
Trending Topics feature to quell concerns that the results could be
steered in a particular political direction, even though it has found no
evidence of bias. The company will retrain workers in the Trending
Topics department and institute additional oversight and control to make
sure trending stories are selected fairly.
http://www.ecommercetimes.com/story/83551.html

Microsoft Drastically Scales Down Smartphone Biz
Microsoft on Wednesday announced plans to streamline its smartphone
business by cutting 1,850 jobs. It will record an impairment charge of
$950 million, with severance payments accounting for $200 million of the
charge. The restructuring will entail up to 1,350 job losses at
Microsoft Mobile Oy in Finland, and 500 more cuts around the world.
http://www.ecommercetimes.com/story/83549.html

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