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31May By AnkitaNo Comments

News

NewsBytes Launches its News Bot on Facebook Messenger

Started by IIT, IIM and Ivy League alumni; Gurgaon-based news technology start-up NewsBytes launched its automated bot on Facebook Messenger. The beta version of their cross-platform bot is a part of Facebook's Messenger program revealed at F8 conference. It is known to be India's first news bot. In its one year of existence, NewsBytes, by Elysium Labs Private Limited, with around 40k downloads on Play Store, has seen a spectacular growth so far. It is one of the highest-rated news apps in India. Its primary focus is to reduce information overload in your everyday news consumption. Its engine along with human curators picks up the most significant news events of the day, summarizes them and creates the contextual timeline around them. Available globally, in English, the bot lets user...

Trai Issues Pre-Consultation Paper on Net Neutrality

31May By Press Trust of IndiaNo Comments

INDIA

Trai Issues Pre-Consultation Paper on Net Neutrality

Telecom regulator Trai today issued pre-consultation paper on net neutrality, a topic that had kicked up dust earlier this year over platforms like Facebooks Free Basics and Airtel Zero as well as attempts to charge certain Internet services, including calls. Seeking to put in place an overall framework for Internet usage in the country, Telecom Regulatory Authority of India said: "This pre-consultation paper is an attempt to identify the relevant issues in these areas, which will help Trai in formulating its views on the way forward for policy or regulatory intervention." There has been a conflict between telecom operators, Internet companies and consumers interest on the issue of net neutrality. While all the three major stakeholders - telecom operators, Internet compani...

Facebook Report or Agenda? $1 trillion Extra GDP By 2020 if All Indians Get Online

30May By NitishNo Comments

News

Facebook Report or Agenda? $1 trillion Extra GDP By 2020 if All Indians Get Online

IANS- Four of five Indians could afford the internet if data costs fell by 66 percent, according to a Facebook-commissioned report on Internet access. But Indian telecom operators already run data services at a 11 percent loss, making cost-cutting difficult. The statistics mean that a data plan currently priced at Rs.100 should not cost more than Rs.34 if India has to make the internet affordable for 80 percent of its population. But the adverse economics imply this cannot happen without intervention from the government - whose Rs.20,000 crore ($2.9 billion) plan to connect each of India's 250,000 panchayats with broadband by 2018 is three years behind schedule. The internet reached 29 per cent of Indians - 354 million users - in September 2015, IndiaSpend reported. It could rise ...

Zuckerberg to Use Facebook Live to Chat With ISS Astronauts

28May By PriyankaNo Comments

News

Zuckerberg to Use Facebook Live to Chat With ISS Astronauts

Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg will chat live with three astronauts currently living on the International Space Station and ask them questions posted by viewers on NASAs facebook page. In a 20-minute Facebook Live video call with two NASA astronauts - Tim Kopra and Jeff Williams - and a European Space Agency astronaut Tim Peake, Zuckerberg will ask questions and use the service to enable viewers to livestream themselves. Zuckerberg will speak with astronauts living and working aboard the International Space Station (ISS) at 12:55 PM (local time) on Wednesday, June 1, NASA said in a statement. The interesting questions from the facebook viewers include - What is the outcome of Newtons bucket experiment on ISS?, Who provides the food eaten on the space station? The ISS serv...

Microsoft, Facebook to Jointly Lay Giant Cable Across Atlantic

27May By Press Trust of IndiaNo Comments

News

Microsoft, Facebook to Jointly Lay Giant Cable Across Atlantic

Microsoft and Facebook have joined hands to lay a giant state-of-the-art subsea cable across the Atlantic Ocean connecting the US with Europe and beyond so as to facilitate faster speed and access to the Internet. The new "MAREA" cable will help meet the growing customer demand for high-speed, reliable connections for cloud and online services for Microsoft, Facebook, and their customers, a media release said. Construction of the cable will commence in August 2016 with completion expected in October 2017, it said. Microsoft and Facebook are collaborating on this system to accelerate the development of the next-generation of Internet infrastructure and support the explosion of data consumption and rapid growth of their respective cloud and online services, the release said. MARE...

5 Indian Social Commerce Websites That Let You Confess and Share

27May By NitishNo Comments

Story

5 Indian Social Commerce Websites That Let You Confess and Share

Social commerce is no more a space occupied by the likes of Instagram, Snapchat and a few other influential brands like Twitter and Linkedln. In fact, the networking giants like Instagram and Snapchat have now shown way to newer social commerce startups how to attach with the audience. These below mentioned social commerce platforms let you create meaningful conversations, along with building social networks. They not just enable you to share experiences but also let you earn reward points. Sagoon - Sagoon is an online social commerce platform that facilitates an amalgamation between concepts of social network/collaboration and E-commerce. Initially incepted in 2009, it was further developed over the years, finally being officially launched in its latest avatar on November, 2015. ...

Snapchat Raises $1.81Bn For a Reported $20Bn Valuation

26May By reutersNo Comments

FUNDING

Snapchat Raises $1.81Bn For a Reported $20Bn Valuation

Messaging app Snapchat has raised $1.81 billion in an equity offering, indicating strong investor interest in the company despite concerns that it is struggling to attract advertisers. Snapchat did not disclose its valuation in the latest round of funding in its filing on Thursday but technology website TechCrunch reported on Monday, citing sources, that the company could be valued at about $20 billion. Snapchat, which makes a free mobile app that allows users to send videos, photos and messages that vanish in seconds, has faced concerns that the company's estimated valuation is not justified because of its uneven revenue stream. Investors in this round included General Atlantic, Sequoia Capital, T. Rowe Price, Lone Pine and Fidelity, among others, TechCrunch reported on Thursday,...

Saudi Arabia Blocked Social Networking Giant Facebook’s Messenger Service

16May By PriyankaNo Comments

MIDDLE EAST

Saudi Arabia Blocked Social Networking Giant Facebook’s Messenger Service

In a bid to protect the revenues of traditional telecom companies, Saudi Arabia has now blocked social networking giant Facebook's Messenger service. Internet calling over WhatsApp and Viber were already blocked in Saudi Arabia but similar apps including Tango and Line are still available in the country. Although the authorities claimed that the service has been blocked since it violated regulations, the independent reports. "The service had been banned because it failed to comply with regulations," an official told local news services. експресс займзайм с автоматическим одобрениемзайм онлайн только по паспорту

Decoding: Facebook’s Trending Topic Controversy

14May By NitishNo Comments

ANALYSIS

Decoding: Facebook’s Trending Topic Controversy

What's behind the accusations that Facebook is manipulating its "trending topics" feature to promote or suppress certain political perspectives? According to the technology blog Gizmodo, a former Facebook contractor with self-described conservative leanings said Facebook downplayed news that conservatives are interested in and artificially promoted liberal issues such as the "BlackLivesMatter" hashtag. Gizmodo did not name this person. Facebook denied the claims, but the GOP-led US Senate Commerce Committee has sent a letter to Facebook and CEO Mark Zuckerberg requesting answers about the matter. What are 'trending topics'? Facebook shows some of the most popular topics being discussed at any given moment. On browsers, the topics appear on the top right corner, separate f...

13May By NitishNo Comments

FUNDING

Hindi Social Networking Portal ShabdaNagari Raised Funding From ah! ventures

Hindi social networking portal ShabdaNagari has raised undisclosed amount of bridge funding from ah! ventures. The company had said that it plans to use the funds raised to expand its genres and improve its user interface, marketing and promotional activities. Artha Energy Project's Anirudh Damani & others also participated in this round. "ShabdaNagari team's thorough understanding of the Hindi speaking market and their innovative solutions to the various requirements make them stand apart. The positive results we have witnessed in the last one year makes us confident that ShabdaNagari is soon to be the biggest player in this niche category." said Harshad Lahoti, founder and CEO of ah! Ventures. ShabdaNagari had earlier raised Rs 1.2 crore from Kanpur Angels and a clutch of other...

After Google & Facebook, LinkedIn Planning Its Own Version of ‘Instant Articles’

8May By AdityaNo Comments

News

After Google & Facebook, LinkedIn Planning Its Own Version of ‘Instant Articles’

According to the report, LinkedIn is in the process of discussing a similar product with publishers that will enable the latter to publish their stories on LinkedIn. Facebook's Instant Articles, where publishers post content directly on to Facebook instead of putting links that direct users to their websites, has been a success with both publishers and users. You can then begin publishing them. Currently Facebook and Google has the feature of instant articles that allows users to publish instant articles which means users can publish articles directly on their platform. Google also has the Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) Project, an open source initiative that is created to load content instantaneously for publishers, consumer platforms, creators and users. For Facebook, it's all pa...

NASSCOM, Facebook ink Signed MoU to Engage With Indias Entrepreneurs

5May By AdityaNo Comments

News

NASSCOM, Facebook ink Signed MoU to Engage With Indias Entrepreneurs

The trade body of Indian IT firms NASSCOM has signed a MoU with Facebook to build a product design initiative to engage the country's young entrepreneurs into becoming problem solvers and solution builders. Signed in Silicon Valley this week, the NASSCOM-Facebook initiative is likely to propel innovative thinking and approaches to build solutions in key sectors where technology can play a transformational role, NASSCOM President R Chandrashekhar said. "This is a joint initiative to catalyse the innovation ecosystem and to help design thinking. Today, we are at an inflection point where the industry is at the next phase of revolution and moving towards the whole startup and innovation part, which is coming on the heels of the two-decades-old of the growth of the services company," Chand...