Domain Mondo's weekly review of technology news:
UPDATE:
AT&T announces
half-stock, half-cash deal to acquire
Time Warner, valuing the company at $85.4B
AT&T to Acquire Time Warner | att.com: Oct. 22, 2016
"AT&T Inc. (NYSE:T) and Time Warner Inc. (NYSE:TWX) today announced they have entered into a definitive agreement under which AT&T will acquire Time Warner in a stock-and-cash transaction valued at $107.50 per share. The agreement has been approved unanimously by the boards of directors of both companies. The deal combines Time Warner's vast library of content and ability to create new premium content that connects with audiences around the world, with AT&T's extensive customer relationships, world’s largest pay TV subscriber base and leading scale in TV, mobile and broadband distribution ..." See also: List of assets owned by Time Warner | Wikipedia.org and
Here’s why it doesn’t make sense for AT&T to own Time Warner | Recode.net.
Feature • FinTech Series: Crowdfunding & Peer-to-Peer Payments | Federal Trade Commission | ftc.gov: The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) will host a forum – the second in its
FinTech series – on
crowdfunding and
peer-to-peer payment systems 1:00 pm,
October 26, 2016, Constitution Center, 400 7th St SW, Washington, DC 20024.
Crowdfunding is the process by which companies and individuals raise money from the public to fund new products, projects or individual needs.
Peer-to-peer payment systems are online services – often in the form of mobile apps – that allow consumers to share money electronically. These systems make it easier for consumers who may not carry cash to send and receive money from other people quickly. The half-day forum will bring together industry participants, consumer groups, researchers, and government representatives. The forum will examine the various
models of crowdfunding and peer-to-peer payments used by companies, the potential
benefits to consumers, and possible
consumer protection concerns. In addition, the forum will look at how existing consumer protection laws might apply to companies participating in these areas. Panelists will include
Kickstarter.com general counsel Michal Rosenn and
FinancialInnovationNow.org executive director Brian Peters. More information, including full agenda,
here.
Feature • Robocall Strike Force:
Second Meeting of Industry-Led
Robocall Strike Force:
"The Federal Communications Commission will host another meeting of the Robocall Strike Force on Wednesday, October 26, 2016 from 1-2 p.m. in the Commission Meeting Room, located at 445 12th Street, SW, Washington, DC 20554. The event will be open to the public. We anticipate remarks from Chairman Wheeler, Commissioners Clyburn, Rosenworcel, Pai, and O’Rielly, and AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson, the Chair of the Robocall Strike Force. The Robocall Strike Force is an industry-led group which has been working for two months to develop comprehensive solutions to prevent, detect, and filter unwanted robocalls. Robocalls and telemarketing calls are the number one source of consumer complaints received by the FCC. However, giving consumers meaningful control over the calls and texts they receive requires collective action by the industry." For more information and to watch the
LIVE webcast:
Federal Communications Commission | fcc.gov.
Other Tech News:
•
Did ICANN Just Break the Internet? No, But It Could Have, and May Yet:
"If you live in the U.S., you may have noticed or been affected by the internet outage on Friday caused by a distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack ..."
•
iPhones also explode and burn:
" ... Recent reports show iPhones have similar problems [as Samsung Galaxy Note 7] with explosions and fires ..."--
SeekingAlpha.com
•
Mossberg: Why does Siri seem so dumb? | Recode.net:
"... in its current incarnation, Siri is too limited and unreliable to be an effective weapon for Apple in the coming AI wars ..."
•
Google Pixel review: Google's new smartphones are expensive, fast, powerful, have long battery life, and have a great camera though lacking optical image stabilization, but the software needs polish--
TheVerge.com.
•
US Government and
Cuba Telecom Development--
Bloomberg | BNA.com:
Cuba’s famously laggard internet market may be getting a major boost from the U.S. government.
• Facebook.com's
Sheryl Sandberg headed to D.C. or NOT? "She's a proxy for this growing problem that is the hegemony of five to 10 major Silicon Valley platforms,” David Segal, executive director of advocacy group Demand Progress, told
POLITICO.com, but Sandberg, who worked at Treasury during Bill Clinton’s administration, is being mentioned as a possible pick to run the Department of Commerce, as she
“would bring many advantages to Clinton’s administration: Clinton's advisers view her as both highly progressive and experienced in the corporate sector through her years at Facebook and Google. She would be a high-profile woman in a Cabinet that Clinton has said would be at least 50 percent female.”
•
T-Mobile will pay a $48 million fine for throttling 'unlimited data' plans--
TheVerge.com: "According to the FCC, the problem isn’t the throttling, but
the way T-Mobile marketed the plan. Marketing the system as an unlimited data plan was
deceptive to customers, and a violation of the
2010 Open Internet transparency rules. "Consumers should not have to guess whether so-called ‘unlimited’ data plans contain key restrictions, like speed constraints, data caps, and other material limitations," said FCC Enforcement Bureau Chief Travis LeBlanc in a statement."
•
Qualcomm & The Next Generation of mobile devices: by shaping the
5G wireless standard, Qualcomm.com (
NASDAQ:QCOM) is setting itself up as the leading provider of 5G chipsets.--
SeekingAlpha.com.
See also Qualcomm Said to Be Near Final NXP Deal, May Announce Next Week | Bloomberg.com.
•
Amazon Internet Service in Europe? According to
TheInformation.com,
Amazon.com is considering offering
internet service directly to consumers in
Europe that would allow Amazon to bundle internet access with its Prime streaming video offering, making it more competitive with cable operators which already offer a similar broadband-video package.
•
Microsoft reported Q1 FY2017 revenue of $20.5B, beating estimates, with Intelligent Cloud revenue up 8% to $6.4B, OEM revenue flat YoY as phone revenue dropped 72%--
TheVerge.com
•
NETFLIX exceeded expectations in its Q3 2016 earnings results
with $2 billion in quarterly revenue for the first time, a 36 percent jump
YOY. It reported 3.6 million subscribers, far in excess of its projection of 2.3 million. Hit original shows, like “Stranger Things” and “Narcos,” helped, but the main driver was Netflix's
international growth.
See Netflix $NFLX Q3 2016 Earnings Boosted by Surge in International Growth.
Q3 2016 financial results coverage this coming week on
Domain Mondo:
- Apple AAPL Oct 25 5:00pm EDT
- Neustar NSR Oct 27 4:30pm EDT
- Alphabet GOOG Oct 27 4:30pm EDT
- Verisign VRSN Oct 27 4:30pm EDT
- Twitter TWTR Oct 27 5:00pm EDT
- Amazon AMZN Oct 27 5:30pm EDT
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