gross

A trade association of 41 European telephone companies responded last week to mounting concerns over its controversial proposal to turn Internet traffic management over to the International Telecommunications Union, a regulatory body of the United Nations.

The European Telecommunications Network Operators Association, or ETNO, made its proposal in June, part of a year-long process to revise an ITU treaty known as the International Telecommunications Regulations. Changes to the treaty, which has not been revised since 1998, will be finalized later this year in Dubai at the World Conference on International Telecommunications.

Only national governments can vote on the new treaty. … Read more

Serial entrepreneur and investor Bill Gross is "completely smitten" with social media.

"The way it's connecting the planet, it's a new connective tissue for knowledge sharing," he told CNET during an interview last week. "It's really, really unbelievable."

As Gross sees it, the only hurdles today's social networks face are relevance and monetization. Not surprisingly, his latest social offering, dubbed Chime.in, is an effort to address both issues. Chime.in will formally launch today at 11:05 a.m. PST--timed to coincide with a live demo by Bill Gross … Read more

After a weekend in the dog house, UberMedia's Twitter apps UberSocial (formerly UberTwitter) and Twidroyd are back in the mobile-app stores.

UberMedia's Twitter apps ran afoul of Twitter on Friday, which banned the apps over certain policy violations, preventing new users from downloading them and current users from using them. The ban affected Android users of Twidroyd and BlackBerry and iPhone users of UberTwitter.

"These violations include, but aren't limited to, a privacy issue with private Direct Messages longer than 140 characters, trademark infringement, and changing the content of users' Tweets in order to make money,&… Read more

Sandy Gross was one of the founders of two major speaker companies, Polk Audio and Definitive Technology, and now with GoldenEar Technology he's going for one more. I recently spoke with him about his new venture, and he didn't seem the least bit concerned about entering a rather tough retail market. He is in fact off to a good start and already has 100 brick-and-mortar U.S. dealers, and he will have overseas distributors coming aboard in the near future.

As soon as I heard Gross' SuperCinema 3 I understood why he's so confident. It's a lifestyle-friendly satellite/subwoofer system that sounds remarkable.

It comes with four SuperSat 3 satellites ($249 each), one SuperSat 3C center channel speaker ($249), and a ForceField 3 subwoofer ($499). The gloss black speaker cabinets feel extremely well-built, which is because they're fabricated from injection-molded marble powder infused polymer, a big step up from the more typical plastic, medium-density fiberboard or metal cabinets. That said, the wedge-shape, textured black finished sub is made from MDF, but it also appears to be well-built. GoldenEar Technology speakers are only available in black.

At 12 inches by 4.75 inches, the SuperSat 3 isn't tiny, but it's a mere 2.7 inches deep. The gently curved cabinets are decked out with two 4.5-inch mid/bass drivers, and one high-velocity folded ribbon tweeter (similar in operating principle to a Heil tweeter). Ribbon tweeters are the hot ticket for lots of high-end speakers, including my two personal references, the Magnepan 3.6 and the Zu Essence, but ribbon tweeters are rarely seen on speakers in the SuperSat 3's price range. The tweeter really does play a big part in the speaker's extraordinary sound quality. The SuperSat 3C center speaker sports the same driver complement, but the 3C's drivers are oriented for horizontal speaker placement.

Both speaker models can be wall-mounted via keyhole slots on their backsides, or used with the included table stands. GoldenEar Technology will offer floor stands for the speakers sometime in 2011.

The ForceField 3 subwoofer features a proprietary 1,000-watt digital amp with digital frequency shaping electronics; a front-firing 8-inch active driver; and a special 9.6-by-11.4-inch quadratic planar infrasonic (passive) radiator on the bottom panel. Connectivity options include a direct RCA input as well as speaker-level inputs and outputs. GoldenEar Technology will have an optional wireless kit for the sub for $130 early next year. The sub measures a tidy 11.5 by 15.75 by 11 inches.… Read more

Apple added more than 12,000 employees to its ranks in the past year--a reflection of its sharp revenue growth and expanding retail presence.

As of late September, Apple had 46,600 full-time employees, as reported in a 10-K statement it filed yesterday with the Securities and Exchange Commission. That figure reflects a healthy surge from 34,300 workers in 2009 and 32,000 in 2008, according to Reuters.

Most of those gains came in Apple's retail stores, which now employ 26,500 people--10,000 more than last year. The company currently has 317 retail outlets--233 in the U.… Read more

Updated at 3:10 p.m. PDT: adding comments from CEO Paul Otellini and CFO Stacy Smith.

Intel's third-quarter revenue jumped $1.4 billion over the second quarter, though year-to-year revenue and profit comparisons were down.

The world's largest chipmaker is struggling to lead the PC industry out of a brutal downturn that saw demand collapse earlier in the year.

Revenue came in at $9.4 billion, beating Wall Street expectations, which hovered at just more than $9 billion. Revenue, however, was down from the $10.2 billion reported in the year-earlier period.

On a year over year … Read more

Updated at 2:30 p.m. PDT: adding statements from Dell.

Intel and Dell are indicating that PC demand may be increasing but it's not clear how sustained or strong this trend is.

The news Friday that Intel raised guidance is not a surprise, according to Ashok Kumar, an analyst at investment bank Collins Stewart. "It's in line with seasonal trends and reflects strong back-to-school build in the PC food chain," he said.

Kumar added, however, that the strength of actual sales to end users of PCs won't be known until later. "The ramifications … Read more

Among the Internet cognoscenti, Bill Gross is best known as the head of tech incubator Idealab. Now, as the CEO of solar start-up eSolar, he's working in renewable energy, but he's still putting his digital economy chops to work.

Two-year-old eSolar is having an opening ceremony for its pilot solar power plant in Lancaster, Calif., on Wednesday. There's a veritable glut of solar start-ups, but eSolar has already gotten further than most: it's actually producing electricity at below the price consumers pay in California.

The plant is also the first concentrating solar "power tower" … Read more

I know these are still in beta, and I'm all for silly fashion statements, but I have to take a second to expound on the ridiculousness of these "Lazy Sunday Pants."

To the layman, these pants by Spanish design studio Mitemite appear to be your normal pair of loungey sweatpants, perfect for wearing outside to wash the car or get a quick bite at a local McDonalds, right?

Nope. Take a look again, but this time use your lazy eye. The pants come with their own built-in remote control pocket, and that's not even the best … Read more