nets

Netflix powers up PAC to boost Washington profile

Netflix has formed a political action committee called Flixpac, records show.

Under federal election rules, PACs are allowed to make donations directly to federal candidates of up to $5,000 per election.

The formation of Flixpac is just the latest sign that the technology sector is raising its profile on Capitol Hill. The news about Flixpac was first reported by Politico.

Politico wrote that Netflix's lobbying costs have gone from $20,000 in 2009 to $500,000 last year. The documents that Netflix filed with the government for its PAC were signed by Christopher Libertelli, hired in December as … Read more

Comcast has some Xplaining to do

What do you get when you cross Xbox with Xfinity? A double-X rating for obscene power grabs in the video market? Or at least a double-extra-large helping of questions about the potential impact on consumers?

Whatever the answer, it's easy to see why Comcast's recent data-cap announcement set off a flurry of Internet chatter. A week ago Monday, the company said that it would not count Xfinity content viewed on Xbox 360s against customers' monthly data caps. Comcast justified its decision by suggesting at first that the Xfinity content was a streaming-video option exempt from Open Internet considerations. … Read more

No, Comcast is not breaking the Internet...again

Comcast annoyed media activists last week by announcing it wouldn't count television programming retrieved through a customer's Xbox console against a monthly "excessive use" threshold for Internet access.

As with any change to existing Internet services -- even one that sounds like a good thing -- the response in Washington was to sound the doomsday alarm. "The reports that Comcast is offering a video product through the Xbox 360 without the data counting toward the customer's data cap," Public Knowledge said last week, "raises questions not only of the justification for the … Read more

Windows XP won't give up top spot without a fight

Windows XP has gradually been losing market share over the past few years, yet it continues to hang on as the most popular OS, according to the latest stats from Net Applications.

XP grabbed a 46.86 percent share of the OS market last month, up from 45.39 percent in February. At the same time, Windows 7 lost a bit of ground, capturing 37.53 percent in March, down from 38.12 percent in the prior month.

Neither stat represents a major shift. Over the longer haul, Windows 7 is still gaining in popularity, while XP has been shedding … Read more

Bonus for Apple shareholders

Links from Monday's episode of Loaded:

NetZero teams up with Clear to offer free mobile broadband, kind of

The company that's been famous for offering free dial-up Internet access has just taken a big leap by offering up to one year of free mobile Internet and a free data plan.

NetZero announced today two mobile wireless data solutions including a mobile hot-spot router and a USB modem, called NetZero 4G Hotspot and NetZero 4G Stick, respectively. Both of these devices are 4G-only and will access the Internet via Clear's 4G wireless coverage. The NetZero 4G Hotspot is actually a rebranded version of the Clear Spot Apollo 4G and offers exactly the same feature set. … Read more

XP loses ground to Windows 7 but still top OS

Windows XP lost more users to Windows 7 last month, but the decade-old platform continues to hold on as the most popular operating system

Looking at OS stats for February, NetApplications found that XP's share of the market dipped to 45 percent from 47 percent in January. At the same time, Windows 7 grabbed 38 percent of all users, up from 36 percent the prior month.

The latest numbers show a trend in which XP has gradually lost share over time, while Windows 7 has picked up more customers. In February 2011, XP owned more than half of the … Read more

IE holds rival browsers at bay

For Microsoft's Internet Explorer team, stasis is bliss.

In February's worldwide usage statistics, IE largely held at bay its top challengers, Mozilla's Firefox and Google's Chrome, according to Net Applications' latest measurements. IE has done so for a few months now, a big improvement for Microsoft compared to years of losing share.

IE dipped from 53.0 percent of global usage in January to 52.8 percent in February among desktop browsers; Firefox and Chrome stayed level at 20.9 percent and 18.9 percent, respectively. Safari popped up a notch from 4.9 percent to … Read more

Would an AT&T 'toll-free' data service stifle app innovation?

BARCELONA, Spain--App developers and consumer advocates are unhappy with news this week that AT&T may be considering a plan that would allow data-heavy service providers to pay upfront for the bandwidth their customers may use.

Earlier this week, AT&T's CTO John Donovan told The Wall Street Journal at the Mobile World Congress here that the carrier is considering a kind of toll-free calling for mobile data. The idea is that mobile-app providers whose services consume a lot of data, such as video streaming, could buy 1-800-like service from AT&T so that their users … Read more

Microsoft SkyDrive aiming to outcloud iCloud

Microsoft is targeting a host of improvements for SkyDrive, potentially giving iCloud and similar services some healthy competition.

The next version, dubbed SkyDrive Wave 5, could lead the way, with several features revealed by blogging site LiveSide.net.

Tipped off about "new features that are said to be coming to SkyDrive soon," the site detailed such items as support for the OpenDocument format and the ability to store and manage BitLocker recovery keys on SkyDrive.

A new URL-shortening service will provide links to your shared files, while you'll be able to share those files directly with your … Read more