Schiaparelli lander to attempt a dangerous landing on Mars

Image: ISRO

  19 Oct 2016 , 09:35

The search for life on Mars may take a giant leap on Wednesday when a space lander is due to touch down on the red planet in Europe’s first attempt to land a craft there since the Beagle 2’s “heroic failure” more than a decade ago. The disc-shaped 577-kg (1,272 lb) Schiaparelli lander, which will test technologies for a rover due to follow in 2020, is expected to enter Mars’s atmosphere at a speed of nearly 21,000 km (13,049 miles) per hour at 1442 GMT.

It will use a parachute and thrusters to slow down before touching down on the planet’s surface only six minutes later. The lander is named for Giovanni Schiaparelli, the Italian astronomer who in 1877 began mapping the topography of Mars, extending study of what are now known as the planet’s canals, a mistranslation of the Italian word canali, or channels.

Schiaparelli is part of the European-Russian ExoMars program, which will search for signs of past and present life on Mars and represents only the second European attempt to land a craft on the red planet, after Britain’s Beagle 2 was ejected from the Mars Express spacecraft in 2003 but never made contact after failing to deploy its solar panels upon landing.

At the time it was dubbed “a heroic failure”. Landing on Mars, Earth’s neighbor some 35 million miles (56 million km) away, is

Intel beats Wall Street earnings expectation but current quarter forecast disappointing

  19 Oct 2016 , 10:06

Intel Corp reported better-than-expected quarterly earnings and revenue, boosted by improving PC demand and growth in its data centre and cloud businesses, but its revenue forecast for the current quarter disappointed Wall Street. The world’s largest chipmaker’s shares were down 5.3 percent at $35.75 in after-hours trading on Tuesday.

Intel said it expects fourth-quarter revenue of $15.7 billion, plus or minus $500 million. Analysts on average were expecting $15.86 billion, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S. “This is below the average seasonal increase for the fourth quarter as we expect the worldwide PC supply chain to reduce their inventory,” Executive Vice President Stacy Smith said on a conference call with analysts.

Last month, Intel raised its third-quarter revenue forecast for the first time in more than two years, citing improving PC demand. The company’s decision to raise third-quarter forecast moved investors’ expectations to

Xiaomi reportedly building a smartphone with flexible display

  19 Oct 2016 , 15:16

Joining the race to build a bendable smartphone, Chinese smartphone maker Xiaomi is reportedly working on its own version of such a device.

According to Inquirer, Xiaomi’s device made its public debut over the internet through a 30-second video posted last week.

The video, courtesy of Gizmodo China, did not show the phone being bent but rather a bent screen that is very responsive to touch.

Flexible displays or foldable, bendable smartphones are the future and earlier this year, another Chinese major Lenovo became the first company to display two futuristic concepts: a foldable smartphone that can be turned into a wearable device and a bendable tablet that becomes a phablet.

Apart from Lenovo, Korean smartphone-maker Samsung has been working on foldable displays for years and is reported to be ready to launch its first foldable smartphone in 2017.

Apple has also gone for patents that suggest it is set to develop iPhones with curved screens.

IANS

You can now ask Google Now to book an Ola or Uber

By tech2 News Staff /  19 Oct 2016 , 16:11

Google has teamed up with Ola and Uber to make cab booking even more hassle-free. So, you can now look for directions and then choose the taxi service directly within the Search app or mobile search browser.

The feature was made available on the latest version of Google Maps earlier this year, offering a tab with information for cab services in addition to the existing driving, public transport, or walking options. With the further integration, users can ask Google for directions and book the ride directly from Search.

Google explains that on request for specific information such as “Taxi to Bangalore airport” or more specifically “Uber to Bangalore airport” or “Ola to Bangalore airport”, the app/ browser directs the user to select a service and

Google updates AdWords to let businesses chat with customers through advertisements

By tech2 News Staff /  19 Oct 2016 , 13:33

Messaging is a convenient platform for both businesses and customers to interact.Facebook, Google and Microsoft have all promoted the untapped potential of conversations during developer conferences held over the course of this year.

For businesses, it gives a direct line of communication with the customer. The customer can participate whenever they can afford the time and attention, and continue the conversation later.

Google has announced a new feature for advertisements shown in search results, that allows businesses to chat with their customers. For those businesses that use the feature, there will be a messaging option shown below the calling option attached to the advertisements. On tapping the chat bubble icon, a pre-generated text message selected by the business opens the conversation.

Google consumer surveys conducted in US, Canada, Australia and UK show that sixty five percent of consumers are open to the idea of texting with a business to get information or schedule an appointment.

The new feature is called click-to-message ads. A select few partners are already using the service. Gavin Chan, Digital Marketing Manager of AnyVan says “Click-to-message is a useful tool that allows consumers to engage with our business in a way that’s comfortable and efficient for them. They could be on their commute or in a rush, so they can text us quickly through click-to-message. It’s also a good medium to get questions answered that aren’t addressed on our website, or to reach us during hours when our office is closed.”

Gavin Parker, Paid Search Manager, Auto & General says “The results from click-to-message have been phenomenal and we’ve seen a 80 percent higher conversion rate when compared to other similar channels. We can now tap into an important consumer base that prefers to use SMS to learn more about our insurance products.”

Businesses can integrate chat with their advertising by setting up message extensions. The feature is expected to roll out over the course of the next few weeks. The click-to-message feature will be available to advertisers at no extra cost.

The problem with the feature as of now is that it triggers an SMS interaction. A better implementation is to integrate with the more common instant messaging applications such as Telegram, WhatsApp and Messenger. The feature could potentially tie into existing chatbots by the businesses on these platforms. SMS is an outdated and expensive form of chatting, and is bound to be less engaging as an instant messaging application.

Startup Series: Do you need a fancy job title?

Image: Thinkstock

  19 Oct 2016 , 16:28

By Shefaly Yogendra

In one of my corporate venturing roles with a large Indian conglomerate, I served as the country manager of a European country. That was also the job title on my card and in my email signature file. The important sounding title was not just about sitting in a fancy office overlooking Zurich lake. I made a lot of calls and set up my meetings with prospective clients for business development purposes. I also went daily to the post office to collect our mail, printed and sent and filed my own faxes, made coffee and washed my own coffee cup, took out our recycling, and did a whole bunch of administrative work that people in large companies do not even think about or farm out to secretaries and assistants.

It was, after all, a new and small operation albeit with a BigCo parent company.

Startups are no different. In the early days of a startup, founders do everything from washing cups to taking and making calls to filing papers to paying bills. They do VAT returns, meet account filing deadlines, minute board meetings, keep an eye on the cash in the bank and so on. They pack products and take those packages to the post office for mailing. They also go out and represent the company to customers, partners, vendors, media and financiers. There is nobody else to talk about the brand, the company, the product but the founders who created the business. In other words, early days are when the startup founders are always selling, trying to sell or fulfilling orders.

Is there a need for startup founders have important sounding titles? Some even argue over them!

Titles serve a purpose.

Titles are useful in signalling to customers, partners, vendors and other third parties about the roles of the individuals they are dealing with. Giving such comfort and confidence is an outward facing utility of titles. Yo can go the ego-boosting heavy title route, or take a leaf from Craig Newmark‘s book. He is the founder of Craigslist and calls himself “customer service rep”.

Inside the startup, roles and titles can help start a useful and essential conversation about allocation of

Facebook bids for IPL digital rights; the social network is invading culture, media, news and governance

By Aditya Madanapalle /  18 Oct 2016 , 13:04

Facebook has purchased tender documents worth $10,000 (Rs 6.6 lakh) to join in the bidding for the digital rights of IPL, according to a report in Livemint. Amazon, Twitter and Reliance Jio are other contenders. BCCI sources confirmed to the Economic Times that Facebook had picked up the documents, but Facebook did not comment on the reports.

It makes sense for Facebook to bid for the digital rights considering the massive Facebook campaigns on IPL. The title sponsors have their own campaigns, and each team has their own strategies. The players themselves post multimedia content of training and celebrations during the tournament.

The campaigns are spread across Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Instagram. Facebook also owns Instagram, so two of its platforms see a surge of activity during the IPL. According to areport by Hiveminds (PDF), a digital marketing firm, Kolkata Knight Riders and Mumbai Indians are the most engaged with teams on Facebook. On Instagram, the top performing teams are Mumbai Indians and Royal Challengers Bangalore.

Facebook and IPL 2016

This social media share by Royal Challengers Bangalore creatively shows the cricketers as Sith lords from Star Wars.

On Facebook, the strategies by the teams included reposting selfies of fans, posting quotes from players on game strategies, posting selfies of the