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from the L.A. Times

IBM's Watson on 'Jeopardy': Computer takes big lead over humans in Round 2

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On Tuesday night's "Jeopardy" episode, Watson, the IBM supercomputer, steamrollered to a commanding lead over his human competitors.

Watson missed just one question before the first commercial break, getting 14 of the 15 questions correct. The lone question Watson missed was answered correctly by former "Jeopardy" champion Ken Jennings.

Jennings and Brad Rutter, also a former champ on the game show, eked out just five correct responses during the second round of the challenge, which began Monday and ends Wednesday night.

By the end of the episode, Watson amassed $35,734 in winnings, with Rutter ascending to second place at $10,400 and Jennings (who is a record holder with 74 straight matches of "Jeopardy" previously won) having earned just $4,800.

Watson and Rutter ended Monday night's episode in a tie with $5,000 in winnings each and Jennings at $2,000. With Jennings behind after the first round, he chose the first category Tuesday night to start off the show.

But Watson was too quick for Jennings and Rutter in the first question and for a large part of the night.

Just as on Monday, Watson was competitive yet showed that there was plenty of room for improvement. A skill that Watson lacks is making decent bets.

When the IBM computer landed a Daily Double question in the Cambridge category, it bet $6,435.

Host Alex Trebek shook his head saying, "I won't ask," gaining a laugh from the audience.

Watson got the right answer -- "Who is Sir Christopher Wren?" -- and boosted its earnings to $21,035.

One moment of man over machine came in the Final Jeopardy question, which both Jennings and Rutter got right and Watson got wrong.

To "Its largest airport is named for a World War II hero; its second largest, for a World War II battle" the humans correctly submitted the question "What is Chicago?"

Watson, who bet only $947 in the final question, submitted "What is Toronto?????" with the five question marks implying that the computer was unsure of its answer.

On Wednesday night the three will face off in the final round of the match, dubbed the IBM Challenge, with the winner taking home $1 million. If Jennings or Rutter win, half the money will go to charity, and if Watson is victorious, all of the cash will be donated.

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-- Nathan Olivarez-Giles

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Photo: Ken Jennings, left, and Brad Rutter, right, compete against a computer named Watson on the game show "Jeopardy" in Yorktown Heights, N.Y. Credit: Carl Kaelson /Associated Press/Jeopardy Productions


Google CEO Eric Schmidt says company is 'very proud' of Egypt's Wael Ghonim

Eric Schmidt at Mobile World Congress

Google Chief Executive Eric Schmidt said Tuesday that Google is "very, very proud" of Wael Ghonim, the company executive who helped organize the 18 days of protests in Egypt that resulted in the ouster of President Hosni Mubarak.

Wael Ghonim Ghonim, who is on a leave of absence from Google, was also imprisoned for 12 days, during which Mubarak's government kept him blindfolded and questioned him about the protests and how they got started.

Schmidt, who made the remarks at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain, was the first at Google to give an outright opinion on Ghonim's actions, according to an Associated Press report.

Before that, Google's only comment had been in a statement issued after Ghonim's release: "Huge relief -- Wael Ghonim has been released. Our love to him and his family."

Mubarak held the presidency for more than 30 years and many compared his rule to that of a dictator.

Ghonim has risen to heroic status in Egypt and is seen as an example of the young, tech savvy Egyptians at the core of the nation's revolution toward democracy.

Schmidt, who is set to step down as chief executive in April to make way for Google co-founder Larry Page, said in Barcelona that collaborative technologies such as Facebook "change the power dynamics between governments and citizens." Schmidt will remain at Google as company chairman.

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Top photo: Google Chief Executive Eric Schmidt speaks at the 2011 Mobile World Congress, held in Barcelona, Spain, on Feb. 15. Credit: Toni Albir / EPA

Bottom Photo: Egyptian cyberactivist and Google executive Wael Ghonim speaks with the media at Cairo's Tahrir square on Feb. 8, the day after his release from 12 days in custody by the Egyptian security service. Credit: Khaled Desouki / AFP/Getty Images


Apple sent COO Tim Cook to China after Foxconn suicides last year

Foxconn employees

Apple sent Chief Operating Officer Tim Cook to China in June to review the facilities at Foxconn, one of the company's main manufacturing partners, after nearly a dozen employee suicides there.

"Like many of our customers and others around the world, we were disturbed and deeply saddened to learn that factory workers were taking their own lives at the Shenzhen facility of Foxconn," Apple said in its annual Supplier Responsibility report.

"Recognizing that we would need additional expertise to help prevent further tragedies, we launched an international search for the most knowledgeable suicide prevention specialists -- particularly those with experience in China -- and asked them to advise Apple and Foxconn."

Lf8csunc The suicides shocked Apple, Foxconn and the tech world, with many calling into question the working conditions at the Chinese firm, which also makes components for Dell, Hewlett-Packard and Nokia.

Psychologists and Buddhist monks were brought in to console workers, music was piped in to soothe employees and a stress-release center was set up with punching bags adorned with pictures of supervisors.

The Cupertino, Calif., tech giant sent two suicide experts with Cook -- who is among Apple's most important execs and currently handiling the majority of CEO Steve Jobs' daily responsibilities as Jobs is on a medical leave of absence.

Cook, and the suicide experts, were also accompanied by other Apple executives (who were not named in the report) to visit to Foxconn's Shenzhen factory and evaluate the working conditions there, Apple said in the report.

The group met with Foxconn CEO Terry Gou and  other executives and staff "to better understand the conditions at the site and to assess the emergency measures Foxconn was putting in place to prevent more suicides," the report said.

Apple also commissioned an independent review by a larger team of suicide prevention experts, the company said.

"This team was asked to conduct a deeper investigation into the suicides, evaluate Foxconn's response, and recommend strategies for supporting workers' mental health in the future," Apple said in the report.

In July, the independent investigators "surveyed more than 1,000 workers about their quality of life, sources of stress, psychological health, and other work-related factors," the report said. "The team designed the questionnaire, delivered and collected it, and tabulated the results without Foxconn's involvement."

The second team also interviewed workers face to face, met separately with managers, evaluated working and living conditions, reviewed "the facts of each suicide and the known circumstances behind them" and evaluated Foxconn's management of the crisis and counseling services, Apple said.

In August, the independent team presented its findings and recommendations to executives at both Foxconn and Apple.

"The team commended Foxconn for taking quick action on several fronts simultaneously, including hiring a large number of psychological counselors, establishing a 24-hour care center, and even attaching large nets to the factory buildings to prevent impulsive suicides," Apple said.

The independent team found that Foxconn had "worked openly with many outside experts and government officials" after the suicides and that the company's response probably prevented further suicides, the report said.

Several areas for improvement were suggested as well, such as better training for Foxconn's hotline staff and care center counselors, in addition to better monitoring of such resources, Apple said. Foxconn implemented the independent investigators' suggestions, the report said.

Foxconn has also begun the process of expanding into other parts of China, which could allow more of its employees to work closer to their hometowns, Apple said.

Foxconn applicants

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Top photo: Staff members work on the production line at the Foxconn complex in the southern Chinese city of Shenzhen on May 26, 2010. Credit: Kin Cheung / Associated Press

Middle photo: Tim Cook, Apple's chief operating officer, speaks at a Jan. 11 event in New York to announce that Verizon Wireless will start selling a version of the iPhone. Credit: Ramin Talaie / Bloomberg

Bottom photo: A recruiter from Foxconn talks to job applicants outside the factory in Shenzhen in southern China's Guangdong province Feb. 24, 2010. Credit: Associated Press


Tesla's fourth-quarter loss doubles, even as revenue surges

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Tesla Motors Inc. saw its loss increase 177% last year, the electric vehicle company said Tuesday.

The only public automaker in California, Palo Alto-based Tesla said its loss ballooned to $154.3 million in 2010 from $55.7 million in 2009.

The company's loss for the fourth quarter ending Dec. 31 was $51.4 million, or 54 cents a share. That's more than double the $24.2 million, or $3.43 a share, for the same period in 2009, which had fewer outstanding shares.

Even after its initial public offering in June, Tesla has long struggled to convince investors that there’s substance behind the razzle-dazzle.

Just last week, the automaker opened stores in Italy and Washington, D.C. to great fanfare. The opening of the Milan showroom featured an extravagant gala with more than 400 guests. The company’s electric Roadster counts celebrities such as Matt Damon and Leonardo DiCaprio among its fans.

But while Tesla sells the Roadster for more than $100,000, it only makes several hundred of the vehicles each year and has delivered just 1,500 total. Instead, chief executive Elon Musk is pinning his hopes for a profit on the upcoming Model S sedan.

Tesla plans to make 20,000 Model S units a year and will start selling the vehicles in the second half of 2012 for about $50,000 after government incentives. So far, the company has received more than 3,700 reservations for the vehicle and, in “the highlight of the quarter,” said it has finished making a drivable version for testing.

In 2010, Tesla’s revenue jumped to $116.7 million, up $4.8 million from the year before. In the fourth quarter, revenue was $36.3 million, a 95% improvement on the same quarter in 2009.

The company credited its lucrative partnership with Daimler, which ordered 1,800 sets of battery packs and chargers for the Smart Fortwo electric vehicle.

Tesla also hooked up with Toyota this quarter to make an electric version of the RAV 4 compact SUV, with sales pegged to start next year. The deal is expected to generate up to $69 million in development services revenue for Tesla over the next year or so.

Last month, the company also said that it planned to make a small sport utility vehicle called the Model X, set to arrive in 2014.

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Photo: Bob Chamberlin / Los Angeles Times


Apple launches subscriptions in App Store for magazines, newspapers, videos and music

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Apple announced a subscription service through its App Store for publishers of magazines, newspapers, videos, music and other content on Tuesday.

Apple's offer to content publishers is the same one it dealt to News Corp., which recently launched The Daily -- a daily digital news magazine app only available on the iPad.

The deal gives Apple a 30% cut of all subscription revenue for purchases made through the Apple App Store or within an iPad, iPhone or iPod app.

Publishers can set their own prices and the length of the subscription term, while the Cupertino-based tech giant processes the payments.

Previous to Apple's subscription service, publishers (excluding News Corp. and The Daily) had to sell their content one issue, video, song or album at a time.

"Our philosophy is simple," Apple CEO Steve Jobs said in a statement. "When Apple brings a new subscriber to the app, Apple earns a 30% share; when the publisher brings an existing or new subscriber to the app, the publisher keeps 100% and Apple earns nothing.

"All we require is that, if a publisher is making a subscription offer outside of the app, the same [or better] offer be made inside the app, so that customers can easily subscribe with one click right in the app."

Apple is giving iOS app users the option of sharing their personal information with publishers or not -- including name, e-mail address and ZIP Code -- which could cut down on how much subscriber information publishers get through Apple.

"Protecting customer privacy is a key feature of all App Store transactions," Apple said in a statement. "Publishers may seek additional information from App Store customers provided those customers are given a clear choice, and are informed that any additional information will be handled under the publisher's privacy policy rather than Apple's."

Publishers have to provide their own authentication process within their iOS apps for users who have signed up for subscriptions outside the App Store, Apple said.

Apple's App Store has more than 350,000 apps available to customers in 90 countries. About 60,000 of those apps are designed for the iPad. The company said it has sold more than 160 million iOS devices worldwide.

The market for Apple App Store users is something publishers have been looking to tap into for some time, with many looking at Apple's business and that of other mobile ecosystems such as Google's Android Marketplace and the Android operating system, to help boost sagging sales in traditional media industries such as print, video and music.

So far, sales of magazines on Apple's iPad have started off strong, but usually fall after a few months for many publications.

Apple's App Store could also face increased competition from Google's Android, which is said to be working on creating a digital newsstand of its own.

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Photo: The Daily app for Apple's iPad is displayed in New York on Feb. 2 as News Corp. unveils the new publication. Photographer: Jonathan Fickies / Bloomberg


HTC ChaCha and Salsa 'social phones' feature Facebook buttons

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HTC showed off its ChaCha and Salsa "social phones," equipped with Facebook buttons, at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain, on Tuesday.

ChaCha The Facebook buttons lead users directly to the popular social networking website or post content to it automatically, depending on what is being done on the phone at the time.

The new handsets are among the first of what is expected to be dozens of such Faceook-integrated phones to come out this year.

The ChaCha and Salsa arrive after weeks of rumors that Facebook would release it's own smart phones.

Facebook co-founder Mark Zuckerberg again denied the rumors of a Facebook-branded phone, but he said greater integration and more Facebook buttons were on the way.

Both the ChaCha and Salsa run on Google's Android operating system. The ChaCha features a 2.6-inch display and a full physical keyboard, while the Salsa has a 3.4-inch touch screen display.

HTC said the ChaCha and Salsa were developed with Facebook in an effort by the handset maker to turn more of Facebook's 500 million active users worldwide into HTC customers.

Salsa The Facebook button on the ChaCha and Salsa is "context-aware, gently pulsing with light whenever there is an opportunity to share content or updates through Facebook," HTC said in a statement.

"With a single press of the button, you can update your status, upload a photo, share a website, post what song you are listening to, 'check in' to a location and more."

When a user snaps a photo, one press of the button uploads it to his or her Facebook page. If a user is listening to a song and presses the Facebook button, the song is automatically identified by the phone and shared on Facebook.

Facebook messages and conversations also appear in the ChaCha's and Salsa's text message and e-mail in boxes.

"We have worked closely with HTC for several years on bringing Facebook to their devices and HTC ChaCha and HTC Salsa are the next stage," said Henri Moissinac, head of mobile business for Facebook. "HTC has brought Facebook to these two new devices in an innovative way enabling people to connect and share easily whenever they want, wherever they are."

Both phones are slated to release in the second quarter of the year. HTC did not offer specifics on price.

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Photos from top: John Wang, chief marketing officer of HTC, holds up the HTC ChaCha and Salsa phones during a news conference at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain; detailed views of the ChaCha and Salsa. Credits, from top: Denis Doyle / Bloomberg News; HTC


HTC unveils Flyer tablet with digital pen, 4G compatibility

HTC Flyer tablet and HTC Scribe pen

HTC unveiled the Flyer, its first tablet, on Tuesday in Barcelona, Spain, during the Mobile World Congress event.

With the Flyer, HTC seems to be aiming for a higher-end feel with an aluminum body, a 7-inch touchscreen and a quick 1.5 gigahertz Snapdragon processor from Qualcomm.

The device, which is set to hit retail stores in the second quarter of the year, will come with 32 gigabytes of storage and connect to the Internet via Wi-Fi, as well as 3G and 4G HSPA+ networks.

Android Honeycomb will not be pre-installed on the Flyer, but users will be able to upgrade to the tablet-optimized version of Android from Android Gingerbread, a build of Google's operating system designed for smart phones.

HTCFlyer HTC's Sense interface for Android makes its way from the company's phones over to the Flyer with the recognizable time and weather widget on the home screen.

Apps can also be run in a split-screen view, allowing a user to use two apps at the same time -- say the Website for a record store where a user can get an address, split with Google maps to locate it and find directions.

A digital pen will be packed with the Flyer for drawing and writing in certain apps on the tablet in what the company is calling HTC Scribe technology.

A 5-megapixel camera is on the back of the tablets, while a 1.3-megapixel camera can be found on the front for use with video chat software such as Skype.

The tablet will also be the first device offered with the company's HTC Watch video download service.

HTC described the service as "low-cost, on-demand progressive downloading of hundreds of High-Definition movies from major studios."

Another interesting addition is video games through OnLive, the cloud-based gaming service for laptops and TVs. HTC said users will be able to connect the Flyer to television sets to play games via OnLive, or games can be played directly on the tablet.

HTC didn't mention how games that have previously required the use of a video game controller on the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 would be played on the tablet, but promised titles such as Assassin's Creed Brotherhood, NBA 2K11 and Lego Harry Potter.

Below is a marketing video HTC posted on YouTube for the Flyer.

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Top photo: An HTC employee demos the new Flyer tablet computer at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain, on Tuesday. Credit: Denis Doyle/Bloomberg

Bottom: HTC Flyer. Credit: HTC


Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg says no Facebook-branded phone, but dozens with Facebook integration

Facebook's chief executive Mark Zuckerberg on Tuesday again torpedoed rumors that Facebook planned to launch its own phone, saying the world's most popular social networking site would instead help roll out dozens of phones with "much deeper social integration than we have so far."

Lgbjbsnc Speaking at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain, Zuckerberg said: "A lot has been made about a single Facebook phone. But this year, you can expect to see dozens of phones."

As we told you in September, Facebook is giving mobile phone manufacturers the software to build social networking into their operating systems. Facebook wants smart phones to more seamlessly deliver the experience users have on its online service. There had been speculation that Facebook would work with one manufacturer as Google did on its Nexus phone.

Facebook chief technology officer Bret Taylor said at a conference last month that Facebook planned to focus on mobile in 2011 as vital to its future. Nearly 31% of users accessed social networking from smart phones in January, according to research firm ComScore.

On Monday, Facebook introduced a new SIM card made with Gemalto which makes it easy for people with a feature phone (versus the smart phone) to access Facebook.

Taiwanese phone maker HTC on Tuesday released two new smart phones targeting Facebook users, the ChaCha and the Salsa. Each has a dedicated Facebook button that makes it easy to access the site.

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Photo: In this Wednesday, Oct. 17, 2007 file photo, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg smiles during a talk at Web 2.0 conference in San Francisco. Credit:Paul Sakuma/file/AP Photo


IBM's Watson on Jeopardy: Round 1 ends in a tie

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IBM's Watson landed a tie in the first round of Jeopardy's man-vs.-machine challenge Monday night.

Watson, IBM's supercomputer, and Brad Rutter each ended Day 1 with $5,000 in winnings, while Ken Jennings, the other human competitor, came out with $2,000.

Jennings -- who had previously won 74 consecutive Jeopardy matches -- defeated Watson in the practice match between the three players leading up to the three-round faceoff.

Round 2 is Tuesday night, and the final round airs Wednesday.

While Watson proved competitive, there were some missteps.

At one point during on Monday's episode, Watson gave a wrong answer, saying "What is 1920s,” after Jennings had just given the same incorrect response.

Host Alex Trebek responded with "No, Ken already said that."

Watson, named after IBM founder Thomas J. Watson, started off Monday's episode in dominating fashion with $5,200 on the board by the first commercial break, while Rutter accumulated $1,000 and Jennings rung up $200.

The first night was a huge learning experience for the engineers who've spent years working on building Watson for this very match, said Steve Canepa, IBM's general manager of global Media and the entertainment industry.

"I've seen a lot of the the videos we've put together about the making of Watson and things like that, but I hadn't actually seen it in action until tonight," Canepa said Monday after the first night of competition.

"When Watson repeated that answer, to the general public it was probably pretty funny. But Watson only takes his input from the question board so the fact that somebody else gave the same answer already doesn't factor to into Watson says. He can't hear what the other players are saying, but maybe that's a feature we can add in the future."

Offering the same response as Jennings also shows just how smart Watson is, he said.

"There is obviously some form of logic that was very similar to that of the human player tackling that problem, and that is fascinating to me," Canepa said. "The ability to sort through what is a couple hundred million pages of information in a very short amount of time, all the data that we create in blogs and tweets and articles and all of that unstructured text on the Internet -- to be able to find the relationship between words so quickly is what the point of all this is."

All the data stored in Watson is acquired from the Internet, as well as books and journals, though for competition, Watson is disconnected from the Web, he said.

IBM is looking to change the way computers, and people, search and learn using computers, Canepa said, and Watson is searching information as humans create it, not just by data put into rows and columns as has been done before.

"We'll see what happens over the next two nights, but I'm not overly focused on the win or loss myself," he said. "In Chess, as finite as it is, there's a finite number of moves. But in this there are an infinite number of questions that can be asked and with all the puns and ways there are to ask a question.

"I'm really focused on the many real-life situations for this ability to be able to dive into unstructured data and make sense of it. The kind of search we do on a search engine today is much more keyword oriented and this is way beyond that ... If we can search with intelligence, it could open up all sorts of new fields and possibilities."

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Photo: Alex Trebek, Ken Jennings, IBM's Watson, and Brad Rutter. Credit: Associated Press.


Wael Ghonim, Google exec, says Egypt's revolution is 'like Wikipedia'

Ghonim

Wael Ghonim has been touted as one of the leaders in Egypt's revolution and has already coined the phrase Revolution 2.0 — which he also plans to take as the name of a book he's writing.

On Sunday, in an interview with CBS' "60 Minutes," Ghonim spoke further on the peaceful protests in Egypt that lead to the overthrow of President Hosni Mubarak, who led Egypt for three decades.

"I call this Revolution 2.0," Ghonim said in the interview. "Revolution 2.0 is, is — I say that our revolution is like Wikipedia, OK? Everyone is contributing content. You don't know the names of the people contributing the content ... This is exactly what happened. Revolution 2.0 in Egypt was exactly the same."

"Everyone was contributing small pieces, bits and pieces. We drew this whole picture. We drew this whole picture of a revolution. And that picture — no one is the hero in that picture."

Lgd070nc The 18-day period of protests in Egypt were organized by Ghonim and many others using social media sites and other tools.

Ghonim, Google's head of marketing in the Middle East and North Africa, was one of the moderators of a Facebook page called "We Are All Khaled Said" dedicated to memory of an Egyptian man who witnesses say was beaten to death in Alexandria by police officers who have not been held to account.

"The moment we announced on the page, the locations, they shut down Facebook," Ghonim said.

"But I had a backup plan. I used Google Groups to send a mass mail campaign to all these people in order to tell them here are the locations and please spread it among your friends And everyone knew eventually."

"So, definitely technology played a great role here. You know, it helped keeping people informed, it helped making all of us collaborate."

During the protests, Ghonim was detained by the Egyptian government for 12 days — and kept blindfolded the entire time, he said.

Once Mubarak stepped down on Friday, and the government was dissolved, the Egyptian military took over. Egypt's army said it will govern for the next six months or until an election is held for a new parliament and presidency.

Ghonim and the tens of thousands who took part in the historic uprising, hope that new system of government will be a democratic one and work is already being done to figure out how to get the ball rolling.

"We just created a page using Google moderator asking people what are you dreaming about — that was a couple hours ago," Ghonim said Sunday. "So far, before the interview when I checked we had 4,000 suggestions and we had over 100,000 votes. Everyone is now dreaming. Everyone wants to do something. A lot of these ideas are amazing."

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Top photo: Google marketing executive Wael Ghonim, weakened after nearly two weeks in custody, is helped off the stage after greeting thousands of anti-government protesters in Tahrir Square on Feb. 8 in Cairo. Credit: John Moore/Getty Images

Bottom photo: An Egyptian anti-government protester holds a photograph of Wael Ghonim, in Tahrir square, Cairo, on Feb. 9. Credit: Andre Pain/EPA


AOL CEO Tim Armstrong buys $10 million in company stock

AOL Inc. Chief Executive Tim Armstrong is putting his money where his mouth is.

He has invested more than $10 million in 477,000 shares of his company's stock, according to a Monday filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. He bought the shares at an average price of $20.97 each on Friday. He nearly doubled his stake in the company to 4% after the stock dropped on news of AOL’s $315-million acquisition of online news and opinion site Huffington Post.

ArmstrongIt was the largest acquisition for AOL since the former Google Inc. executive joined AOL in April 2009. Armstrong is betting that his turnaround strategy for AOL will eventually pay off. He is hoping that the additional traffic from Huffington Post will make AOL more appealing to advertisers. AOL has struggled since spinning off from Time Warner Inc. in December 2009, ending a troubled decade-long marriage.

Armstrong's enthusiasm for AOL's future as an online media powerhouse is not echoed by Wall Street analysts. AOL shares, which have dropped nearly 20% since November, on Monday closed up 2.9% at $21.83.

Armstrong told me in an interview in October: "AOL is playing offense. We believe we have the right strategy and we are executing against it heavily."

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Photo: AOL CEO Tim Armstrong with Arianna Huffington of the Huffington Post. Credit: Jin Lee / Bloomberg 


Twitter Translation Center uses crowd-sourced translations for new languages

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Twitter launched its Twitter Translation Center on Monday in an effort to turn its users into translating volunteers who will help convert the social media company's products into new languages.

The Translation Center opens up Twitter.com; Twitter's mobile, business and help websites; and Twitter's mobile apps for Apple's iOS and Google's Android operating systems to translation that is crowd sourced by those who use the popular platform to send out messages in 140 characters or less.

Twitter is looking to add Indonesian, Portuguese, Russian and Turkish to the list of languages in which it is currently offered. The service is already available in English, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean and Spanish and those languages will also be available to volunteers in the Translation Center in an attempt to improve already translated sites and apps.

Translators who take part in the Translation Center will be translating Twitter's products, not the messages sent out on Twitter.

StabilityIssues The translations take place on the Translation Center's website and the San Francisco-based company has also set up a Twitter account, @translator, to help recruit translators and answer questions about the process.

For a few hours on Monday, the Translation Center's Website was sporadically unavailable to users looking to translate.

Twitter employees at the @translator account told users the company was "working on some stability issues."

A company spokeswoman was unavailable to comment on what stability issues the Twitter Translation Center site was dealing with on Monday.

Twitter said in a company blog post that it has been using crowd sourcing to launch in new languages since October 2009 but had never before done so in a centralized effort open to all of its users.

The launch of the Translation Center comes as many Middle Eastern countries are protesting for democratic reforms in their nations and using social media such as Twitter to help organize demonstrations.

The service was also a valuable organizing tool for protesters in recent uprisings in Egypt and Tunisia.

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-- Nathan Olivarez-Giles

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Top image: The Twitter Translation Center website. Credit: Twitter

Bottom image: Twitter's @translator account addressing stability issues with the Translation Center's site on Monday. Credit: Twitter




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