Facebook and eBay have joined forces to integrate social networking features into online shopping applications, as both companies attempt to breathe life into the flagging field of social commerce.
While several companies have experimented with setting up storefronts on Facebook to sell directly to consumers while they network with friends, actual purchase rates indicate that people are not interested in buying when they’re socializing online. Read more
Why Google needs to become a platform company
Internal rants can sometimes shed interesting light on the stresses inside big companies. One such leaked out on Wednesday from Google engineer Steve Yegge after he bungled his privacy settings on Google+ (oops).
With due allowance for the tone of a missive not intended for public consumption, the basic question he raises is an important one: has Google put its future at risk by failing to become a true platform company, rather than just the provider of a series of widely used products? Read more
For people unable to communicate easily via BlackBerry, BlackBerry users are making a lot of noise. Faced with a third day of disruption to BlackBerry services around the world, they’re venting their outage outrage on Twitter and in the blogosphere. Many are reaching the same conclusion: this is a communications crisis for Research in Motion.
Well, no. As one of BP’s advisers commented last year when the oil company was being lambasted for its response to the Deepwater Horizon explosion: “It’s not a PR crisis; it’s a crisis.”
Tech news from around the web:
Sony has revealed that a third party had this month tried to sign into 93,000 accounts on its PlayStation and other networks, Reuters reports. The company said it had frozen the accounts and informed the affected customers, adding that it believed only a few of the accounts were actually accessed.
Traffic to Google+, the online search company’s social network, has fallen since the massive peak in interest seen when it was opened to everyone late last month, according to Mashable. Quoting research from analysts Chitika, Mashable says traffic to the site has fallen 60% since its public launch. Read more
| About this blog | Blog guide |
Richard Waters has headed the FT's San Francisco bureau since 2002 and covers Google and Microsoft, among other things. A former New York bureau chief for the FT, he is intrigued by Silicon Valley's unique financial and business culture, and is looking forward to covering his second Tech Bust.
Chris Nuttall has been online and messing around with computers for more than 20 years and since 2004 has reported from the FT's San Francisco bureau on semiconductors, video games, consumer electronics and all things interwebby.
Maija Palmer has been writing about technology for the FT since 1999 and is fascinated by cybercrime, privacy and all the other issues of the information society. Based in London, she covers European tech companies and hopes that they won't all get acquired by American rivals.
Robin Kwong is the FT's technology, media and telecoms page editor in London. Formerly he was the Taipei correspondent and wrote about the companies that manufacture the vast majority of the world's computers and gadgets. He is interested in the intricacies of the technology supply chain and how China is increasingly changing the tech landscape.
Tim Bradshaw is the FT's digital media correspondent, and has just moved from London to join our team in San Francisco. He has covered start-ups such as Twitter and Spotify, as well as the online ambitions of more established media companies, such as the BBC iPlayer. He also covers the advertising, marketing and video-game industries. Tim has been writing about technology, business and finance since 2003.
