Xpertfeed

Amazon, Microsoft, IBM and the cloud gang Summary: Comparing the largest cloud players on the block gets a bit convoluted the way tech vendors are compiling their financials. Here's a crack at playing the cloud revenue face-off game. Amazon's disclosure of its Amazon Web Services financials fills in a big piece of the cloud financial picture that revolves around a bevy of tech giants all claiming to be the biggest as-a-service kid on the block. Unfortunately, it's difficult to declare a winner since every cloud player has its own math. So much for standards kids. But given I can't really resist an apples and oranges cloud face-off I'm going to give this a shot. For our purposes, we'll look at the four biggest hyperscale cloud providers. Amazon, Google, Microsoft and IBM. We'll toss in some over-the-top cloud players such as Salesforce, which is a bit hard to ignore, with Oracle, which also breaks out its various as-a-service cloud efforts nicely

Google Fiber is forcing its rivals into offering cheaper, faster service Summary: When Google comes to town, it's bad news for its rivals but good news for consumers. Good news for Charlotte, NC! Google, the search engine you often go to during the day, has sufficiently scared your existing internet service enough into giving your faster speeds at no extra cost. It's the latest trend-setting move by the search giant, which aims to upend the rural internet-providing monopolies that are often the sole providers in one area. And not by offering a better overall service. Just announcing its way into the market is enough. Time Warner Cable announced last week it would launch  its next-generation "Maxx" television and broadband service  in the North Carolina city, hot on the heels of rivals Google Fiber and AT&T's Gigapower service arriving in town. That means hundreds of thousands of homes and businesses will now have internet speeds up to &q

Might Microsoft buy HERE maps (this time) if Nokia sells it? Summary: Nokia may be shopping its HERE mapping division around, according to a Bloomberg report. If the price is right, might Microsoft be among the potential buyers? Bloomberg is reporting this week that   Nokia Oyj is looking to sell its HERE mapping uni t. The report claims that the Finnish equipment maker wants to sell HERE to focus on its wireless-networking business and improve its debt rating. Among those to whom Nokia is said by Bloomberg to have reached out are Uber, a "group of German carmakers," and private-equity firms. Not on Bloomberg's short list: Microsoft. (Or Apple or Google, for that matter.) Of those three, Microsoft might seem like the obvious potential buyer, given Microsoft already bought a big chunk of Nokia's business (the handset division, plus various services and patents) last year. Microsoft also ended up laying off about half of the Nokia employees that it acqu

TrueCrypt audit shows no evidence of NSA backdoors Summary: But there's no lifeline in sight for the now defunct open-source encryption project, which barred developers from taking the remains and forging something from its ashes. Good news and bad news for TrueCrypt fans. After a thorough public audit, the open-source full disk encryption software found no backdoors or unfixable vulnerabilities that could kill the project flat. The bad news is that it's still likely not coming back any time soon. TrueCrypt called it quits last year unexpectedly, saying that it "may contain unfixed security issues" and that the software "is not secure." Its developers directed users to more readily available alternatives like Microsoft's BitLocker (which was later  found to have been cracked by the CIA ). The software had glowing recommendations from security experts, as well as whistleblower Edward Snowden. But the mystery surrounding the project&