AllThingsD » Netherlands

Twitter Expands European Business

Peter Kafka — Tue, 03 Apr 2012 15:29:04 +0000

Twitter is signaling its intentions to ramp up its European business by posting 17 new job openings for its new office in Dublin, Ireland. Most of the positions are sales-related, and include jobs that cover Spain and the Netherlands, two new territories for the company’s ad products. Twitter has around 900 employees worldwide.

Apple's Bid for Galaxy Tab Ban Samsunged in the Netherlands

John Paczkowski — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 16:00:25 +0000

Apple has been dealt another setback in its ongoing patent battle with Samsung.

This morning, a Dutch court dismissed Apple’s appeal of an earlier ruling which denied it an injunction against Samsung’s Galaxy Tab 10.1. Apple claims Samsung has copied the look and feel of the iPad, and that the Galaxy Tab 10.1 infringes its patented designs.

Issued by a higher court in The Hague, the ruling allows Samsung to continue selling the Galaxy Tab 10.1 in the Netherlands. More importantly, it allows the company to continue distributing them to other European Union markets via the port of Rotterdam, through which it moves a lot of its EU merchandise.

Samsung was overjoyed by the decision.

“Samsung welcomes today’s ruling by the court in the Hague, which affirms the August 2011 ruling that the design of the Galaxy Tab 10.1 is distinctive and does not infringe Apple’s intellectual property rights,” the company said in a statement. “This ruling again demonstrates that Apple’s products simply do not warrant the intellectual property protections that it believes.”

eBay Acquires Invoicing Company in Germany

Tricia Duryee — Thu, 22 Dec 2011 16:34:35 +0000

EBay has acquired BillSAFE, which serves 15 million accounts in Germany, after buying a minority stake in the company last year. Terms were not disclosed. With BillSAFE, PayPal customers will now be able to receive an invoice for an order, after items have been shipped and received. Because of its security benefits, purchasing by invoice is used heavily in Germany, Austria, Switzerland and the Netherlands, eBay says.

LivingSocial Expands Internationally With Acquisitions in Asia, Middle East

Tricia Duryee — Mon, 27 Jun 2011 15:44:39 +0000

LivingSocial, the second-largest deals provider after Groupon, is now in 21 countries after making three acquisitions. Terms of the deals were not disclosed. LivingSocial acquired Ensogo, which operates sites in Thailand and the Philippines; DealKeren, an Ensogo company based in Indonesia; and GoNabit, which operates in the United Arab Emirates. LivingSocial also has introduced deals in the Netherlands. Groupon operates in at least 43 countries.

Kobo Opens New Chapter in Europe

Tricia Duryee — Mon, 11 Apr 2011 07:01:30 +0000

Toronto-based Kobo, the e-reading service going up against Amazon, Apple and others, is expanding into Europe. It plans to launch local content versions starting in Germany and Spain in May, and then expand to France, Italy and the Netherlands. Kobo, which isn’t focused on selling hardware, turned one in December and has sold millions of e-books in at least 100 countries.

iPhone 4 Hits 17 More Countries Friday

John Paczkowski — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 12:05:11 +0000

The iPhone 4’s international roll-out begins in earnest this week. Come Friday, July 30, the device will go on sale in 17 more countries–Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, Hong Kong, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, New Zealand, Singapore, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland. Left off the roll-out roll call, much to the dismay of its citizens, is South Korea, where regulatory issues are reportedly slowing things down. By September, the iPhone 4 should be in stores in 87 countries, making its global roll-out Apple’s fastest ever.

Hello World: Apple iPad Goes International on May 28

John Paczkowski — Fri, 07 May 2010 13:08:14 +0000

The international launch of the Apple iPad, which was delayed due to strong demand in the the U.S., will finally begin later this month.

Apple (AAPL) will start accepting pre-orders for both the 3G and Wi-Fi models on Monday, May 10. And on May 28, Apple will begin shipping units in Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Spain, Switzerland and the U.K.

The launch will continue in July when the iPad arrives in nine additional countries: Austria, Belgium, Hong Kong, Ireland, Luxembourg, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand and Singapore.

Apple has already sold more than one million iPads in the U.S. since the launch of the Wi-Fi-only model on April 3 and the 3G version on April 30. Given these sales figures and Apple’s supply issues to date, it will be interesting to see how the international rollout goes.

Irex's E-Reader Poses No Threat to the Kindle

Walter S. Mossberg — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 02:03:37 +0000

The tech industry and media are focused on Apple’s (AAPL) forthcoming iPad tablet computer, a multifunction device that includes an e-book reader. Meanwhile, with much less fanfare, other companies are pressing ahead with conventional, dedicated e-readers aimed at the leader in the category: Amazon’s Kindle.

[ See post to watch video ]

These more focused, monochrome devices aren’t as flashy or as versatile as the iPad, which handles everything from email to games. But they cost less and are aimed wholly at people who seek to read books and periodicals in digital form.

I’ve been testing one such new e-reader from a company that has been in the business for years, but is mainly known in Europe. It is called the Irex DR800SG and costs $400 at bestbuy.com (BBY)—about $140 more than the Kindle. While the DR800SG uses the same electronic ink screen technology as the Kindle, it has some major differences: in screen size, in user interface, and in the way it wirelessly downloads books and newspapers.

The Irex is shorter but wider than the Kindle, and has an 8.1-inch screen, versus the Kindle’s 6-inch screen. It’s slightly thicker than the Kindle, but about 25% heavier. It has a single, thin page-turning and menu button on the left side, while the Kindle has larger, multiple buttons on both sides. Both devices claim to hold about 1,500 books.

Irex, a Los Angeles-based company whose products are engineered in the Netherlands, produced its first e-reader in 2004, but this new model is its first aimed specifically at the American market and its first to use the cellular 3G network for downloading content.

The Irex DR800SG

The new Irex has some advantages over the Kindle. Its larger screen makes for a better reading experience, allowing many more words to show on the page, at similar font sizes. The screen also seems slightly sharper.

The Irex looks sleeker than the Kindle, because it has a much thinner bezel around the screen, due mainly to the lack of a physical keyboard. It also does a better job of organizing your reading material, grouping items into separate folders for books, newspapers, and personal documents.

And, instead of being linked to a single online store, like Amazon (AMZN), it uses a “mall” concept, designed to allow users to choose from many different online stores, though only two are available now. The principal merchant in the mall so far is the Barnes & Noble e-book store—the same one used on the Barnes & Noble (BKS) Nook e-reader—which claims about a million titles. The other store is called NewspaperDirect, which claims over 1,000 newspapers.

However, in my tests, I found the Irex much clumsier to use than the Kindle and, because of that, I still prefer the Amazon device. For instance, the Irex requires a stylus—an ancient and fading navigation device—for some operations. Yet it lacks a holder for this pointer except in the leather cover, so the stylus is easy to lose. The Irex also lacks a Home button, a note-taking function, any way to highlight text and a built-in dictionary.

More important, I found the mall concept for downloading books to be frustrating. Because the Irex isn’t seamlessly linked to its own online store, I had to establish, or sign into, four different accounts to test the device fully. Even after that, each Barnes & Noble download required multiple steps. On the Kindle, ordering books is a breeze, and they appear almost instantly after you click a single “Buy” button.

This last issue is a trade-off between greater choice and simpler, quicker functionality. Some readers will be willing to make that trade-off, especially if Irex is able to add specialized stores in the future that offer, say, a large selection of non-English-language books. But, for most Americans with typical book needs, I find the current trade-off unacceptable.

For example, books I bought from Barnes & Noble appeared slowly on the Irex. The device seemed to have to turn on its radio and establish a new connection each time. Also, until I opened each book, they appeared on the screen identified only by a geeky file name. And, after I opened each, there was a long delay while the device did something called “counting pages.”

The company says that some of these shortcomings will be fixed in a software update due as soon as next month. It promises there will be a note-taking function, speedier wireless connections and the elimination of the counting-pages delay. It also says it is working on a universal log-in system for its mall of stores. But highlighting and a dictionary are only being “considered” for a future revision.

On the bright side, I was able to easily plug the Irex into a PC and Mac, and manually drag onto it personal PDF files, pictures and even a free book I bought at a Web site.

Irex says it is working on a color model for next year. I hope it works more smoothly than the DR800SG.

Find all of Walt Mossberg’s columns and videos online, free of charge, at the All Things Digital Web site, walt.allthingsd.com. Email him at mossberg@wsj.com.

Almost Famous: Keith Lee of Booyah Games

Drake Martinet — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 09:07:30 +0000

A feature wherein All Things Digital looks at up-and-coming and innovative start-ups you should know about.

This week: We walked down University Avenue to the Silicon Valley headquarters of Booyah Games to talk with co-founder and CEO Keith Lee. Booyah is the maker of MyTown, an Apple (AAPL) iPhone app that combines Foursquare and Monopoly into a novel kind of augmented-reality game. The start-up has added about 100,000 news users a week over the last two months.

Who: Keith Lee

What: CEO and co-founder

Why: Keith was a lead producer on Diablo III at Activision Blizzard (ATVI), but left with some colleagues to start Booyah and dip his feet into the social-gaming space. He wanted to explore ways to connect the real world to the game world. After some trial and error, he decided to build an experience around the iPhone GPS platform.

Where: Booyah.com (Web site); Search “MyTown” (iTunes); Palo Alto, Calif. (analog place)

Who else: Booyah’s MyTown competes directly with Foursquare and Gowalla as a location-based game for the iPhone.

Five Stats You Won’t Find in His Facebook Profile

Game of the Moment: I’ve just started playing Demon Soul, and it’s probably the hardest game I’ve played in the last five years. It’s very stats-based, so stuff like the weight of your sword or knowing how a halberd (a type of battle ax) works matters. It’s full of some real innovations for player interactions as well.

Has a Geek Crush On: Rob Pardo. He’s the creator of Starcraft, Warcraft and World of Warcraft. His philosophies have really influenced how I build games.

Gadget of the Moment: I was really disappointed in the Kindle. I got one for Christmas. I had to subscribe and pay to read TechCrunch or Kotaku. It didn’t make sense.

Best Gamer High: It is about doing the hardest thing in the game, reaching the extra goals and doing it faster than everyone. So, when people are talking about that goal or feature I can be like, “Yeah, I already got that.” I played Mass Effect twice, just to get the highest score in our group. It’s all about the bragging rights.

Fails At: I’m a total fail at a lot of things–basically everything that involves real life. I have, like, zero common sense. A perfect example is this one time I was supposed to take care of my girlfriend’s little dog. Without thinking, I set the dog down on the top of this high speaker, and I went off to do something else. Well, the dog decided to jump down and she broke her leg. When I called my girlfriend, she knew what I’d done. She just picked up the phone and said, “What did you do to the dog?” It’s all the normal-living stuff I can’t do.

Bio in 140 Characters

Globetrotted growing up. Educated at Exeter and Stanford. He went into finance at parent’s request, but his internal gamer won out.

The Five Questions

You seem like a pretty hardcore gamer. Where does that come from?

We moved around a lot when I was growing up. I was born in Hong Kong, then we moved to the Netherlands, lots of other places. My parents were very strict. I was forced to play piano and violin two hours a day. We never had any videogames; I could only play them over at friend’s houses. I wasn’t allowed to read sci-fi or fantasy books either. I was only allowed to read biographies and classics….I think because I was never allowed to read that stuff, that’s all I ended up reading when I went to Exeter and college, and why I needed to be a part of making games.

So, what makes MyTown worth playing?

From the very beginning, we wanted to get into this to forge a new category of social games. We don’t really see ourselves as being in competition with Farmville or any of the others because the games are so different, but maybe just in terms of mindshare. We want to be the leader in location-based gaming, or real-world gaming. With MyTown, we’ve created a way, by partnering with Citysearch, to let people have virtual ownership of real places. Our strategy moving forward is about widening the gap between us and our competitors in certain metrics and trying to be very agile. It’s sort of like in World of Warcraft. You can work methodically on something until someone comes and scouts you and sees what you are doing. Then, you have to build like mad so you can rush them.

What are you making that hasn’t been scouted yet?

As for future stuff, I’m pretty sure we’re going to be doing something music-related. We have a few products that are already in the works for Facebook that are a totally new type of social game. They have real-world tie-ins like MyTown. We could leverage GPS from a smartphone, but also focus on tie-ins with music, celebrities and businesses.

We’re actually 70 percent done with that, and we are pretty close to announcing. Probably early Q2. I really feel like [in this arena] there are a lot of Atari-style games, in that everyone is just cloning each other. I think we have the opportunity to be a Nintendo and bring that killer Super Mario Brothers game that changes everything.

How heavily are the personalities of the developers here affecting the products?

Yeah, I mentioned the music thing before. I don’t know it you saw when you came in, but that was my DJ equipment in the corner. I’m really into the house and electronic music scene–I fly down to Los Angeles to DJ pretty frequently. That’s a pretty direct link.

There are a lot of interesting people here. We have a developer who used to be a Buddhist monk and then became a sort of Indiana Jones figure. He has this amazing skill to think not just deeply but laterally and connect things in games that wouldn’t normally be thought of as associated with each other. That alternative way of thinking lends itself to our strength.

What was your “Living in the Future” moment in gaming, when you knew the arena had come of age?

Its hard to say. I think it was probably the first time I played an MMO [massive multiplayer online] game. It wasn’t anything like crazy “Minority Report” technology stuff. It was when I played Dark Age of Camelot and everything afterward. I actually felt like I was completely in the a community environment, like a virtual world. Before, when I went in and came back out of the game, it went with me. But now, even if I’m not there, it keeps moving. Like it was something that would evolve without me. I felt like I had to get back in there, because I wouldn’t even know what it would be like 20 days later.

The In Living Color Interview

[ See post to watch video ]

The Median U.S. Broadband Speed? South Korea’s Divided by Four.

John Paczkowski — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 12:41:53 +0000

In South Korea, the average broadband download speed is 20.4 megabits per second. In Japan, it is 15.8 mbps. In Sweden, it’s 12.8 mbps. In The Netherlands, it’s 11 mbps.

And in the United States, the country that invented the Internet? It’s 5.1.

This according to a new study by the Communications Workers of America, which found that broadband speeds in the States are among the slowest of the 29 countries it surveyed. “Between 2007 and 2009, the average download speed in the United States has increased by only 1.6 megabits per second (mbps), from 3.5 mbps in 2007 to 5.1 mbps in 2009,” the CWA explains in its report. “At this rate, it will take the United States 15 years to catch up with current Internet speeds in South Korea, the country with the fastest average Internet connections.”

And no wonder: 18 percent of Internet connections in the States that the CWA surveyed revealed download speeds slower than 768 kilobits per second, which doesn’t even qualify as basic broadband according to the Federal Communications Commission’s definition.

That may soon change, now that the country has adopted the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, which includes a provision for a national broadband plan by spring of 2010 and grants of $7.2 billion to bring high-speed Internet to the hinterlands. But it will be slow going. It’s a long way from 5.1 mbps to 20.4.

Chinese Hackers Target NYPD Too, Says Police Commissioner

Sky Canaves — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 17:16:08 +0000

New York City’s police department joins the Dalai Lama, the Joint Strike Fighter and the U.S. electrical grid as the latest alleged target of Chinese hackers.

New York Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly said Wednesday that hackers make at least 70,000 attempts every day to access computer systems of the New York Police Department, the largest police force in the U.S. Kelly said most of the attacks originated from computers with IP addresses in China and the Netherlands, according to Newsday, but that all attempts have failed thanks to the department’s security system.

Read the rest of this post on the original site.

Kara Visits PICNIC in Amsterdam (and Hopes Head Does Not Explode)

Kara Swisher — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 03:08:43 +0000

BoomTown is now right next to a canal–no falling cows in sight!–in Amsterdam, here for an unusual digital conference called PICNIC, which starts Wednesday and runs through Friday.

With sessions like “We Think: The Power of Mass Creativity,” “The Emerging Real-Time Social Web” and “The Future of Business Creation,” it seems to be a place for big, messy Web ideas.

Speakers from the U.S. include former Microsoftie Linda Stone, Amazon CTO Werner Vogels and Internet thinker and author Clay Shirky.

For PICNIC’s conference onstage, I will be interviewing Liberty Global CEO Mike Fries on the future of television, and the CEO of Vodaphone Netherlands, Guy Laurence, on the future of mobile.

But I am a little worried, after seeing this promo video for the conference, that it is a little too brainy for me (Warning to those who don’t like seeing heads exploding in a bloody mess!):