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Spotify seems to be completely missing the point when it comes to concerns with their new signup system which requires a Facebook account.

Spotify CEO Daniel Ek announced changes to the Spotify client, tweeting, "We're rolling out a new client as we speak where you can temporarily hide your guilty pleasures. It works like a browsers private mode."

In fact, this is just an addition to the option which was already in the Spotify client which already allowed users to turn off sharing via Facebook entirely.

Just 3 days earlier Ek tweeted that the company listens to criticism and makes changes accordingly. But today's announcement is still dismissive of the people who simply don't want a Facebook account.

For some the reason is a general distrust of Facebook, while others simply don't see any benefit to it. But just as importantly, many people don't want to be given an ultimatum telling them to sign up for a third party service whether they want it or not.

Ironically, Spotify's success has been predicated on choice. It allows you to choose not to pay for your music without breaking the law.

Samsung appears to be offering Apple a preliminary settlement in their Australian patent infringement lawsuit over the Galaxy Tab 10.1.

In the Australian suit, Apple is claiming Samsung's tablet infringes on a patent for touchscreen technology. The dispute over two other patents for "selective rejection," which helps the device ignore accidental contact with the touchscreen, have already been settled with Samsung agreeing to drop the feature.

Based on an account of the proceedings from The Wall Street Journal, Samsung's proposed settlement would allow them to release the tablets before a final hearing on the matter.

This should make it possible for them to begin selling the tablet in Australia well before Christmas, perhaps as early as next week.

Details of Samsung's offer, which was presented privately to Apple representatives, weren't discussed in court, it seems likely they are proposing a preliminary licensing agreement.

Samsung has made it clear they have no objection to licensing patents for their devices. They consider it a standard cost of doing business.

A coalition of US privacy and civil rights groups wants the Federal Trade Commission to investigate Facebook over alleged deceptive trade practices.

The letter was sent by the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) on behalf of themselves and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), American Library Association (ALA), Bill of Rights Defense Committee (BORDC), Center for Digital Democracy (CDD), Center for Media and Democracy (CMD), Consumer Action, Consumer Watchdog, PrivacyActivism, Privacy Times & Stanford Law School lecturer Chip Pitts.

They are asking the FTC to examine the harm to consumer privacy caused by a combination of Facebook's new frictionless sharing features and tracking cookies used without the user's knowledge or consent.

The letter contends:

In light of recent changes announced by Facebook that impact the privacy interests of almost two hundred million Facebook users in the United States, we would like to bring your attention to new privacy and security risks to American consumers, the secret use of persistent identifiers ("cookies") to track the Internet activity of users even after they have logged off of Facebook, and the company's failure to uphold representations it has made regarding its commitments to protect the privacy of its users.

Facebook's tracking of post-log-out Internet activity violates both the reasonable expectations of consumers and the company's own privacy statements. Although Facebook has partially fixed the problem caused by its tracking cookies, the company still places persistent identifiers on users' browsers that collect post-log-out data and could be used to identify users.

"Frictionless sharing" plays a leading role in the changes Facebook announced at the recent f8 development conference, and works through the interaction of Facebook's Ticker, Timeline, and Open Graph. These changes in business practices give the company far greater ability to disclose the personal information of its users to its business partners than in the past. Options for users to preserve the privacy standards they have established have become confusing, impractical, and unfair.

As many of our regular visitors have probably noticed, we had outgrown our four-year-old server setup quite a while ago. We have worked on a new infrastructure for quite a while now, and finally switched to a new location earlier this week.

We have now ironed out much of the (inevitable) bugs that appeared in the transition. However since this was quite a major upgrade, there's bound to be some more problems lurking around in the shadows. Therefore please do let us know if you encounter something that is not working as expected.

In addition to moving to completely new server hardware, we also switched from very old and unsupported BlueDragon FREE Coldfusion server to an open source version of the same software - Open BlueDragon (or OpenBD for short).

Probably the most significant change was moving the hosting location from Dallas, Texas to Amsterdam in the Netherlands. The change in location allowed us to get much more beef behind the scenes (full server specifications after the break).

Patent troll UltimatePointer, maker of the Upoint laser-pointer presentation remote, has sued Nintendo, GameStop, Best Buy and Sears over alleged patent infringement.

The company says it owns the patent for "Easily Deployable Interactive Direct-Pointing System and Presentation Control System and Calibration Method."

Nintendo "directly infringed the patent with the unauthorized selling of its Wii remote hardware," says the company.

The retailers, by association of selling the Wii remote, infringed as well, explains UltimatePointer.

While looking for monetary damages, the company also wants Nintendo to pay its court costs.

It is important to note that UltimatePointer's Upoint is currently vaporware, and is not even up for sale.

(Pic via Rant)

According to the Justice Department, U.S. carriers like AT&T and Verizon retain customer data, including texts, call records, billing records and cell towers used for at least one year.

As usual, AT&T is the biggest offender, keeping your data for up to 7 years.

Greg Nojeim, senior counsel at the Center for Democracy and Technology in Washington, panned the carriers:

This disclosure reflects the importance of data minimization. Some companies do a much better job of disposing of sensitive, personally identifiable information. Once such information is no longer needed for business-reasons, it shouldn?t be held onto because of the risks that it could be obtained by a hacker.

Law enforcement agencies can obtain the documents via legal process but there is certainly no reason to keep records for 7 years.

Government sources have noted today that a highly anticipated $12 billion plan for Foxconn to produce iPads in Brazil is now seriously "in doubt" thanks to stagnant negotiations over tax breaks.

Additionally, Brazil apparently lacks skilled labor, say the sources.

Factories being hit with high taxes, an overvalued currency and lack of skilled factory workers has put the deal in complete jeopardy, however, and the proposed start date of November 5th is likely to be delayed indefinitely.

Says one Brazilian official:

The talks have been very difficult, and the project for a Brazilian iPad is in doubt. (Foxconn) is making crazy demands [for tax breaks and other special treatment].

After expecting 7.5 percent economic growth this year, that expectation has been dropped to 3.5 percent, placing the country firmly last in the BRICS group and towards the bottom of all South American nations.

Microsoft will bring in an estimated $444 million this year from extorting Android manufacturers, says Goldman Sachs, bringing in $3-6 per mobile device sold.

Android has a 40 percent global market share, while Microsoft's own Windows Phone 7 is only expected to take 4 percent.

For now, manufacturers pay $11 to license Windows Phone 7 so Microsoft will make significantly less money from their own platform than they will from Android, which they had no part in creating.

Continues the Goldman analyst:

Despite the royalties Microsoft is demanding for alleged patent infringement, we see its legal battles as playing a lesser role in its overall mobile strategy as compared to its desire to strengthen the ecosystem for Windows Phone going forward.

HTC pays Microsoft $5 per device, and Velocity Micro, General Dynamics Itronix, Wistron, Acer, ViewSonic and Samsung have all signed similar licensing deals.

According to Bloomberg, Microsoft will begin offering online pay TV service from both Comcast and Verizon via its Xbox Live platform.

The software giant is currently in talks with two dozen providers in the U.S. and Europe and could announce some deals as early as next week.

Outside of Verizon and Comcast; HBO, Crackle, Bravo, Syfy and Lovefilm are all expected to sign deals with Microsoft, as well.

It is unclear how the other services will work, but Comcast?s Xfinity TV and Verizon?s FiOS would require users to prove they already are pay-TV customers in regions where the services operate, likely with a simple account number-based authentication.

Almost since the moment it launched, Apple's iPad has been the best selling tablet in the world. But in Australia and New Zealand, Android tablets are taking a bigger share of tablet sales than you might expect.

Tablet shipments in the two countries doubled in Q2 compared to the previous quarter, reaching 420,000 units. However, sales of Android tablets actually increased threefold according to numbers from IDC.

As a result, Android tablets accounted for 25 percent of the total market. By comparison, iPad sales accounted for 80 percent of the market in North America over the same period.

IDC Market Analyst Yee-Kuan Lau explained the trend, saying:

The market expansion was a combined effort of early adopters refreshing devices purchased last year and new users who were interested in a media tablet as a complementary device, with some waiting for more non-Apple variety. That said, there is still strong demand for Apple's iPad 2 since its launch at the end of March.

It's possible this is simply a mirror image of the scenario which played out earlier in the North American market. In that region, iPad sales only accounted for 74 percent of the market in Q1 before rebounding in Q2.

A new report from Knowledge Networks suggests Dish Network's strategy of combining pay TV and unlimited streaming could cost Netflix customers.

Currently, according to the report, more than a third of US consumers say they watch a movie or TV show from Netflix at least once per month. That includes both their streaming and disc rental business.

Some of that viewing is coming at the expense of VOD offerings from pay TV services.

However, 20 percent of respondents to their survey who indicated they are watching less VOD in favor of Netflix also said if their pay TV provider offered a similar streaming service, they would be "very likely" to switch.

That could be good news for Dish Network and Blockbuster, who unveiled just such a plan last week called Blockbuster Movie Pass.

Dish bought Blockbuster earlier this year largely to get their streaming service. They are also considered a leading contender to buy Hulu.

Google+ may not be ready to take on Facebook yet, but traffic to the would be contender for the social networking crown spiked immediately after opening to the public.

According to data collected by Experian Hitwise, Google+ traffic grew more than 1000 percent from the week ending September 17th to the week of September 24th.

Interestingly, their data seems to suggest the reason Google chose to end the invitation-only beta and open Google+ to everyone may be that user interest had already started to wane.

The traffic surge immediately made them nearly as popular as MySpace.

Keeping things in perspective, this doesn't mean Google+ is a top tier social networking site. With just under 15 million visits last week, their traffic still amounted to less than 1 percent of Facebook's total.

Nor does it come anywhere near YouTube, the number 2 site on the Experian Hitwise index. YouTube had 530 million visitors for the week.

According to a Samsung representative, Samsung's decision to enter into a patent licensing deal with Microsoft was intended to protect them from Apple.

The deal, announced yesterday, gives Microsoft and Samsung each access to the other's patents. It was accompanied by a commitment from Samsung to continue producing Windows Phone handsets.

An unnamed source within Samsung explained the company's concerns to the Korea Times, saying, "Samsung knows it can't rely on Google. We've decided to address Android IP issues on our own."

Google has made a push recently to increase their patent pool in an effort to defend Android from patent claims, including a recent agreement to purchase Motorola's phone division for $12.5 billion. But that hasn't stemmed the tide of patent infringement lawsuits, particularly from Apple.

Samsung's deal with Microsoft, as well as a new initiative to develop a separate Linux-based mobile OS with Intel, seem to indicate how fragile the relationship between Google and handset makers might be.

Visa Europe has launched a new Android app which will allow transfers directly from one card holder to another.

The app was announced by Visa Europe Chief Executive Peter Ayliffe in his keynote speech at the EFMA conference in Paris. Right now the app is available only in English and allows transfers in a single currency for Visa and V PAY cardholders within Europe.

Visa promises support for additional operating systems and multiple currencies, as well as payments to and from countries outside Europe in the future.

In order to transfer money, the sender will need to use a Visa card issued by a bank which supports the service and register with Visa. Money can then be sent, via the app, to a Visa pre-paid or debit card.

The recipient will not have to be registered with the service.

Another feature of the new app is access by a Visa card holder to notifications whenever their card is used.

In his keynote address, Ayliffe said:

The way we pay is changing, driven by the rapid uptake of new technologies and growing consumer demand for more flexible payments. Today's announcement is the first in a series of new products and services that Visa Europe will be launching in the coming months to reflect the fundamental shift in consumer behaviour. We are already seeing early adoption of mobile payments, and in the coming months we will see the arrival of mainstream NFC technologies, advanced loyalty and e-commerce services, and ultimately, the launch of a new digital wallet.

According to a new report, it appears that music piracy has consistently fallen since 2009, thanks to the popularity of Spotify, at least in Sweden.

Overall piracy has fallen 25 percent in two years, says the Swedish Music industry.

Spotify, which is free with some restrictions, has millions of tracks from all the major labels and independents. Premium versions give mobile access and unlimited streaming to users.

The recent Swedish study showed streaming as the preferred way to listen to music, with 40 percent of responders saying they now use a streaming service compared to just 10 percent who download music legally. 23 percent still regularly pirate, but that number has been dropping.

Says Music Sweden's CEO Elizabet Widlund (via Freak):

The long-term trend is a sharp increase in legal streaming while we see a reduction in illegal file sharing and downloading. When 800,000 Swedes are willing to pay for streaming music, there is clearly a market for more legal players in the digital music market. We encourage diversity of music services as it will provide better conditions for both those who create music and those who listen to it.