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The Radicati Group just released its annual Email Statistics Report, 2012-2016 while the report is not just about email it provides an interesting perspective on the growth of email and other collaboration technologies such as instant messaging and social networking. Some key excerpts from the report include:
- The total number of worldwide email accounts is expected to increase from 3.3 billion accounts in 2012 to over 4.3 billion accounts by year-end 2016. This represents an average annual growth rate of 6% over the next four years.
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Microsoft to buy Yammer in $1.2 billion deal
Not surprising this is the latest in a string of acquisitions aimed at "modernizing" Microsoft's position in the post-Internet era. Microsoft has been shyly trying to gain attention in social networking with it's SharePoint product, but SharePoint is often misunderstood and unloved and while most business customers use it in some form or other today, few use or appreciate it for its social networking capabilities.
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Symantec announced on January 16th that it acquired LiveOffice, a cloud-based archiving service provider, for $115 million. It has been long rumored that these two companies would eventually come together due to their close technology partnership over the last couple of years and the common bond two LiveOffice executives share having previously worked for Symantec. Consolidation has been a reoccurring theme in the archiving and eDiscovery markets recently.
MoreMobile Access for Microsoft Lync
Microsoft Lync native mobile applications were finally released this week. All versions, however, have not been approved yet for placement in their respective application stores. Unsurprisingly, Microsoft was the first to approve the Lync app for placement in the Windows Phone Marketplace. Apple and Nokia have not yet approved the app for placement in their respective app stores at the time of this writing. The Android app has now been available in the Android Marketplace, which does not have an approval process, for a couple of days, and has had more than 10,000 downloads so far.
MoreNokia’s Smartphone entry in the US market
Nokia is set to release its first smartphone in the US that runs on Microsoft Windows Phone software. Nokia was once the king of the mobile industry, but it got too complacent with its lead that it neglected to properly nourish its Symbian OS to compete with Google Android and Apple iOS. Nokia’s solution was to ditch its Symbian OS in smartphones to utilize software from Microsoft. Its aspirations, however, to be a leading maker of smartphones with Windows Phone technology is questionable.
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Earlier this week RIM announced its BlackBerry Mobile Fusion offering, which is a mobile device management (MDM) solution that administers policies to BlackBerry, Android, and iOS devices. RIM has been known as one of the best providers of enterprise-grade security for mobile phones, and this new offering that brings security and other features to multiple mobile platforms may be the answer the company has been looking for to save the sinking ship that is RIM.
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Google just introduced a few new features to its social networking site, Google+. The new features, individually known as Creative Kit, What’s Hot, and Ripples, add more tools to help entice consumers to join the 40 million people already on the network. While the new features may look attractive to some, they are hardly a game changer for the social media space.
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Google released its newest Android update this week with its Ice Cream Sandwich iteration. The biggest innovation as part of the release is its compatibility with both tablets and smartphones. This new feature will spell further complications for other smartphone and tablet OS makers in the market.
MoreAnother Boo-Boo for BlackBerry
This past week Research in Motion had the biggest outage in the history of its BlackBerry network. The service was said to be restored on Thursday, October 13, but there were still complaints about shutdowns a day later. RIM is hemorrhaging customers to both iOS and Android. This outage will only further encourage wireless users to switch.
MoreOracle Now Has Its Own Social Network
This week at the OpenWorld conference in San Francisco, Oracle announced its new social network, not-so-creatively-named “Oracle Social Network”. Oracle’s CEO Larry Ellison introduced it during his keynote presentation by stating that, “The biggest change over the past few years is social networking…”. How original!
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The new Facebook Timeline profile set to be released in the next couple of weeks is another privacy blunder waiting to happen. The updated look portrays profiles in a way that puts each user’s past activity in a nice, neat chronological order starting from the moment he or she joined Facebook. This new look gives viewers instant and easy access to every bit of information from the past. While this may sound like a great idea to some, the average user may feel the new layout is just a bit too much.
MoreThe Search for the Perfect Search Engine
Google’s present success is largely thanks to its development of a search algorithm that users thought gave the best results. To the untrained eye the results are as great as ever; the savvy searcher, on the other hand, may have noticed a decline in quality.
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Carol Bartz has been fired as the CEO of Yahoo! and has also left the board of directors within the past week. Bartz left under less than amicable circumstances as she gave some scathing parting shots towards the Yahoo! board despite receiving $10 million in severance pay.
MoreFacebook to launch music service
Facebook has rounded up partners Spotify, MOG, and Rdio to help provide music services through Facebook. The music platform will not directly host or stream any music, instead it will rely on third-party partners to provide music for Facebook users. It coincides with Facebook’s model for its applications and games, as it aims to be a platform for music services instead of a provider.
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HP announced its intent to acquire Autonomy, an enterprise software magnate, for up to $10 billion. Autonomy’s archiving portfolio includes technology and assets from CA and Iron Mountain.
MoreGoogle buys Motorola – Smart move or desperation?
Google has announced its intention to buy Motorola Mobility Holdings Inc. for $12.5 billion dollars, while setting a $2.5 billion dollar breakup fee if the acquisition does not pass antitrust scrutiny.
MoreFacebook Releases New Messenger App
Facebook released its new Facebook Messenger App for smartphones. The app competes directly with established mobile messenger BlackBerry Messenger (BBM), and offers much of the same functionality found in BBM, which makes it a fairly redundant app (should we say useless?).
MoreLinkedIn posts impressive revenues
LinkedIn has reported Q2 2011 revenues of $121 million, which is a 120% increase from revenues posted last year, while claiming that membership has climbed from 61 million to 116 million in the span of one year.
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Sadly, Research in Motion just announced that it will lay off 2,000 employees, or roughly 10% of its work force. These layoffs don't come as a surprise. RIM has been struggling against eroding market share from increasingly popular Android And Apple handsets. With "BYOD" becoming a major trend in business communications, and with better security in Android and Apple handsets, BlackBerry handsets are no longer the only viable game in town when it comes to business-class smartphone devices.
MoreSocial Networking and Unified Communications
Analysts and experts in the Unified Communications field believe that there is a natural convergence between unified communications and social networking. However, we feel it is a misconception that customers are demanding integration of social networking into their unified communications solutions.
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