Latest news

According to new data from netmarketshare.com, Internet Explorer has fallen under 50 percent in total market share, mainly thanks to Safari's 62.17 percent share in mobile traffic.

Safari, the default browser for iOS devices like the iPhone, has helped IE fall to 49.6 percent share.

For the month ended October 31st, Firefox remained in second at 21.20 percent of traffic with Chrome in 3rd at 16.60 percent.

Safari came in fourth at 8.72 percent and along with Chrome, saw significant increases at the expense of the leaders.

Some more figures:

It has been rumored and implied for over a year now, but it seems that PayPal payments may finally be headed to the Android Market.

Google announced it was working with PayPal to bring the ability to pay with Paypal instead of needing to use Google Checkout or carrier billing when buying apps and games.

The updated Market (version 3.3.11) which was leaked this week makes references to Paypal in its coding (pic via Aguys).

You can try the new Market by downloading the APK directly from here: Android Police

According to AOL's latest quarterly earnings, the company still has 3.5 million dial-up subscribers accessing the internet with 8Kbps download speeds.

Additionally, the company only lost 630,000 subscribers in the quarter, its smallest loss ever. AOL has had a price promotion available to new users for months now and it appears the promotion worked as 200,000 people actually added the service.

As broadband became mainstream in the early-mid 2000s AOL was losing up to 5 million subscribers per year.

Surprisingly, the monthly bill for AOL dialup is still $17.50, down just $0.50 from 2001.

Full chart (via BI):

Motorola has officially launched the Xoom 2 and Xoom 2 Media Edition tablets today.

Under the hood the devices are practically the same. Each runs on a 1.2GHz dual-core processor, Android 3.2, 1GB RAM, dual cameras 5/1.3MP and the full line of Google apps.

While the Xoom 2 keeps the common 10.1-inch HD display, the Media Edition will only have an 8.2-inch screen. The Xoom 2 has a larger battery, as well, and will run for 10 hours compared to 6 for the smaller device. Each has Gorilla Glass, as well.

The Media Edition also includes the MotoCAST remote media streaming service.

Notably, the tablets don't appear to be headed to the U.S., at least not this month. Motorola is releasing the tablets in the U.K and Ireland in "mid-November." Pricing is unknown but the smaller device, at least, is expected to retail for 399 pounds.

Last month, LG announced that its flagship Android device, the Optimus 2X, would unfortunately not be receiving an update to Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich.

Users were not all too shocked as they are still on the outdated Android 2.2, but the device launched in February so many were upset at being locked into contract with a phone that will not be updated.

Today, LG has made amends, updating the device to 2.3 and announcing that the device will get ICS in the future.

Via their Facebook page, the company says:

LG firmly denies the rumours that claim LG will not be providing the Ice Cream Sandwich (ICS) OS update for the LG Optimus 2X. These rumours are NOT true. LG is currently in the process of planning the ICSOS update for the LG Optimus 2X as well as other LG high-end smartphones. Detailed information on the ICS OS update schedule for specific models will be announced, once the ICS OS is publicly released by Google. Please stay tuned for more updates from LG.

Antitrust lawsuits opposing the buyout of T-Mobile USA by AT&T will be allowed to continue thanks to a ruling by a federal judge.

Sprint and C-Spire (formerly Cellular South) are seeking to block the purchase on the grounds it will give AT&T the ability to get exclusive handset deals.

Although several portions of both companies' complaints were thrown out by the judge, The Washington Post reports both carriers will be allowed to continue pursuing their lawsuits on some of their claims.

The suits are in addition to the antitrust action being pursued by the Justice Department.

AT&T is currently the second largest of four US mobile carriers who provide nationwide coverage. Sprint is the third largest, followed by T-Mobile.

C-Spire Wireless is a regional carrier located in the southeastern part of the country.

Apple has released a beta of iOS 5.0.1 to developers which to addresses the battery life problems experienced by some iPhone owners.

Yesterday the company announced they had found the culprit behind the issue, which results in the iPhone battery significantly faster than normal. The problem doesn't affect all phones.

This update also adds multitasking gestures to the original iPad, a feature which was added in a beta of iOS 4.3, disabled in the final release version, and then enabled again, only for iPad 2 owners, in iOS 5.

According to the release notes (via Mac Rumors):

iOS 5.0.1 beta contains improvements and other bug fixes including:
- Fixes bugs affecting battery life
- Adds Multitasking Gestures for original iPad
- Resolves bugs with Documents in the Cloud
- Improves voice recognition for Australian users using dictation
- Contains security improvements

iOS 5.0.1 beta introduces a new way for developers to specify files that should remain on device, even in low storage situations.

Amazon has added a new feature targetted specifically at Kindle owners to their Amazon Prime program.

Amazon Prime is a subscription service which already gave members access to streaming video in addition to free 2 day shipping. Now they are adding a lending library usable only on their Kindle eReaders.

Jeff Bezos, Amazon.com Founder and CEO said of the new service:

Owning a Kindle just got even better. Today, we're introducing a new Prime benefit built for Kindle: The Kindle Owners' Lending Library. Prime Members now have exclusive access to a huge library of books to read on any Kindle device at no additional cost and with no due dates.

Amazon Prime members will be able to "borrow" 1 book each month through the program. Currently it is limited to owners of Kindle hardware.

It will not be offered through Kindle software running on other devices, such as desktop and laptop computers, iPads or Android tablets other than the new Kindle Fire.

The exact number of books available through the program was not announced, except to say it is in the thousands.

A new whitepaper from wireless services firm WDS points out some potential problems for carriers who sell Android smartphones.

The paper, based on analysis of 600,000 support calls to mobile carriers, details some mistakes they have made in selecting, marketing, and updating Android phones.

It concentrates primarily on the effects of hardware and software fragmentation caused by Google's relative lack of control over phone manufacturing standards and OS update rollouts.

They found 12.6% of Android support calls ended up with a hardware fault being diagnosed, costing carriers approximately $2 billion a year. In large part they chalk this up to failure by carriers to adequately test phones before choosing to offer them to customers.

More than 25% of smartphones, they say, are manufactured by relatively unknown manufacturers, and most of them run Android.

By comparison, support calls for BlackBerry phones had a 5.5% rate of hardware faults, iPhones 8%, and Windows Phone 7 came in at 11%. They suggest the difference between Android and Windows Phone likely stems from the tighter hardware control exercised by Microsoft.

The report also warns operators about the issues which can be caused by OS updates, or the lack of them. Citing an October 2011 study, they say, "of 18 Android devices from the US, 10 were at least two major versions behind within their two-year contract period."

Apple is rumored to be planning an overhaul of their entire product line next year.

Citing an unnamed source in Apple's supply chain, Digitimes reported the company has already ordered parts for 2 new iPad prototypes, and will have enough components ready to build 2 million units by year's end.

This seems to match another recent rumor that Apple would be releasing a smaller tablet to compete with Amazon's Kindle Fire.

The source indicated the new iPhone would ship some time in the second half of next year. That is to be expected considering the current model has been available for less than a month and has yet to launch in most countries.

It makes sense that Apple would redesign both products right now, given the increasing competition in the tablet industry and the fact the iPhone 4S is essentially just an upgraded iPhone 4.

There are also rumors that Steve Jobs put significant effort into an iPhone redesign as one of his last projects before his death in October.

The Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) is a US law intended to prevent the collection and use of personal information from children under the age of 13.

A new report from the University of Illinois At Chicago finds that the measures taken by services like Facebook to comply with the law have resulted in it being largely ineffective.

The report, based on a survey of US parents with children between the ages of 10 and 14, looks specifically at how parents view Facebook's minimum age requirement. Like many websites, Facebook requires users to be at least 13 years old to join in order to avoid any COPPA compliance issues.

It should come as no surprise to anyone that large numbers of children younger than 13 sign up for Facebook accounts. The report found their parents are almost always aware of the child's Facebook activity.

In fact, the majority actually helped their child create the account, almost always with the knowledge that it was against Facebook's terms of service. What almost none of them were aware of was the reason for Facebook's policy.

After announcing last week that they had changed their minds about selling their PC division, it now seems HP is also sticking around in the tablet market for the time being.

No, they aren't bringing back the TouchPad. Their latest tablet, announced today, is the Windows 7 powered Slate 2.

The 1.5 pound Slate 2 is an update to the Slate 500, released in March of 2010. However, at $699, it will be a full $100 cheaper.

Like the original, it has a 8.9" display and is powered by an Intel Atom processor. The 32GB SSD is half the size of the original's 64GB hard drive.

The HP Slate 2 will go on sale later this month.

EA's new hit shooter "Battlefield 3" for PC has been plagued by criticism due to the publisher's forceful inclusion of the "Origin" account, a DRM required to play the game online.

Origin, which is still in beta, has been in the news as it gives EA the rights to access your personal info and practically spy on you. That's without mentioning that Origin is prone to crashing and customer service issues.

Gamers who decided to purchase the retail edition of the game have been having issues, as well, with Origin.

Warez group Razor 1911, patching games since the 1990s, has come to the rescue with a patched .exe.

Says the group:

Razor1911 doesn't accept and support the online DRM "Origin" from EA.

This release is dedicated to our fans worldwide who bought this game on
legal way and don't want to install the trojan from Electronic Arts to play
online.

Install Notes
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
1. Unpack
2. Copy bf3.exe to your install folder
3. Have fun!

The fixed .exe is verified working, but it is likely EA is working on an update.

Apple has confirmed today that some iPhone 4S (and other iPhone) owners are experiencing bad battery life.

The company is working on a fix for iOS 5 and will release it within weeks.

Says the company (via ATD):

A small number of customers have reported lower than expected battery life on iOS 5 devices. We have found a few bugs that are affecting battery life and we will release a software update to address those in a few weeks.

Users have been complaining since last month when Apple released iOS 5, the latest software update for their iOS devices.

As Yahoo continues to search for a plan to return to their former glory, one former company executive explained why that's not going to happen.

The company, he says, was never really that great. According to him, they were always destined to fail because they didn't plan for the future.

The executive, whom they identify only as "a former executive from Yahoo's last great era," told Business Insider the company's decline in recent years is the result of a lack of vision at the top.

He characterized Yahoo's success as a direct result of bad judgement by decision makers at other companies, saying:

The internet blew up and people were paying ridiculous sums of money to advertise on Yahoo. I remember doing this deal with Barnes and Noble, we did this 30 million dollar deal over 3 years, and they just thought they had to be there. The reality is everybody was paying too much money to be a part of Yahoo back in the go-go days. We were generating revenues that were built on false premises.