SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Automattic, the company that operates blogging service WordPress.com, announced a $50 million (33 million pounds) investment from hedge fund Tiger Global on Friday.
The investment comes on the heels of Yahoo’s $1.1 billion acquisition of blogging company Tumblr, showing the high prices fast-growing services that targeting Internet users can command. Read more…
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(Reuters) – Google Inc intends to finance, build and help operate wireless networks from sub-Saharan Africa to Southeast Asia, hoping to connect a billion or so people in emerging countries to the Internet, the Wall Street Journal reported on Friday.
The Internet search giant – which has for years espoused universal Web access – is employing a patchwork quilt of technologies and holding discussions with regulators from South Africa to Kenya, the WSJ cited people familiar with the strategy as saying.
Access to the vast trove of information on the Internet, and the tools to make use of it, is considered key to lifting economies up the value chain. But countries are often hampered by the vast sums needed to build infrastructure, thorny regulations or geographical terrain. Read more…
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Aberdeen – News report reaching us has it that the SCOTTISH council which is currently consulting on a series of controversial school closures sparked outrage by announcing proposals to spend an estimated £860,000 to ensure every pupil has access to a smartphone in the classroom.
Education chiefs at Aberdeen City Council are drawing up radical plans to buy mobile phones for pupils whose parents cannot afford to purchase a device.
The aim is to allow both primary and secondary pupils to use their handsets in class, utilising new wi-fi systems which will enable schoolchildren to connect their phones to the internet for classroom research.
A mobile device management system will filter which sites pupils can use and they will not be allowed to use their handsets to make any phone calls. Read more…
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CANNES (Reuters) – A man pretending to be South Korean rapper Psy talked his way into glitzy parties at the Cannes film festival and posed with fans until he was spotted drinking champagne by the real Psy’s manager.
Psy, in Singapore on Thursday night to perform at the inaugural Social Star awards, said that Scooter Braun spotted the imposter, took a photo and sent it to the musician.
“He sent it to me, and I tweeted that, like, five, six hours ago, so everybody in France, they know,” Psy told Reuters television at the Singapore ceremony. “Real Psy is here.” Read more…
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CANNES, France (AFP) – Iranian director Mohammad Rasoulof, jailed in 2010 for anti-regime propaganda, told the Cannes Film Festival on Friday he knew his latest picture would also come under fire in his own country.
Rasoulof reportedly filmed his censorship drama “Manuscripts Don’t Burn” secretly in Iran following a ban, and the circumstances of his visit to Cannes and where he now lives remain strictly confidential.
Rasoulof’s wife in 2011 accepted his best director award in the new talent section, Un Certain Regard, for his film “Goodbye” about a young Tehran lawyer trying to get a visa to leave Iran. Read more…
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