Ad Blocking Raises Alarm Among Firms Like Google

PARIS — Xavier Niel, the French technology entrepreneur, has made a career of disrupting the status quo. Now, he has dared to take on Google and other online advertisers in a battle that puts the Web companies under pressure to use the wealth generated by the ads to help pay for the network pipelines that deliver the content. Mr. Niel’s telecommunications company, Free, which has...

Read More..

“Ubuntu for Phones” Turns Smartphones into Desktop PCs

Millions of people have tried out Ubuntu, a free operating system for desktop and notebook PCs. Like Android, Ubuntu is open-source and based on Linux, and while it’s mostly seen as an OS for hobbyists here in the U.S., hardware manufacturers like Dell and HP make Ubuntu PCs for markets like mainland China.Now Canonical, the startup which drives Ubuntu’s partly community-based development, has announced...

Read More..

RG3 hurt, Seattle tops Redskins 24-14 in playoffs

LANDOVER, Md. (AP) — Russell Wilson raced ahead to throw the final block on Marshawn Lynch's fourth-quarter, go-ahead touchdown run, doing just enough to get in the way of the Washington Redskins safety near the goal line.Less than a minute later, Robert Griffin III's knee buckled as he tried to field a bad shotgun snap, the pain so bad that he didn't even try to recover the ball.The last rookie quarterback...

Read More..

Alarm in Albuquerque Over Plan to End Methadone for Inmates

Mark Holm for The New York TimesOfficials at New Mexico’s largest jail want to end its methadone program. Addicts like Penny Strayer hope otherwise. ALBUQUERQUE — It has been almost four decades since Betty Jo Lopez started using heroin. Her face gray and wizened well beyond her 59 years, Ms. Lopez would almost certainly still be addicted, if not for the fact that she is locked away in jail,...

Read More..

At Disney Parks, a Bracelet Meant to Build Loyalty (and Sales)

ORLANDO, Fla. — Imagine Walt Disney World with no entry turnstiles. Cash? Passé: Visitors would wear rubber bracelets encoded with credit card information, snapping up corn dogs and Mickey Mouse ears with a tap of the wrist. Smartphone alerts would signal when it is time to ride Space Mountain without standing in line. Fantasyland? Hardly. It happens starting this spring. Disney in...

Read More..

As Putin’s Grip Gets Tighter, a Time of Protest Fades in Russia

MOSCOW — As the final days of 2012 slipped away, no one at Denis Terekhov’s company was talking about the next antigovernment protest. Compared with the same time last year — when Mr. Terekhov delivered an impromptu lecture on avoiding police detention — Moscow feels like Moscow again. Profits at this marketing firm have tripled, the corporate holiday party featured cocktails in an unnatural...

Read More..

Cricket-Herath alive and bowling despite death rumours

SYDNEY, Jan 5 (Reuters) – As Mark Twain might have said, rumours of the death of Sri Lankan spinner Rangana Herath which spread like wildfire across social media late on Friday proved to be greatly exaggerated.Far from lying in a Sydney morgue alongside former test bowler Chaminda Vaas after perishing in a car crash as the reports had suggested, Herath was very much alive when he pitched up for work...

Read More..

Packers show off depth in 24-10 win over Vikes

GREEN BAY, Wis. (AP) — Deep on offense and scary-good on defense, the Green Bay Packers were way too much for the Minnesota Vikings.Maybe everyone else in the NFC, too.Aaron Rodgers, Charles Woodson and the Packers reminded everyone of how dangerous they can be when they're at full strength Saturday night, overwhelming the Vikings 24-10 in an NFC wild-card game that was never really close."Our defense...

Read More..

Despite New Health Law, Some See Sharp Rise in Premiums

Health insurance companies across the country are seeking and winning double-digit increases in premiums for some customers, even though one of the biggest objectives of the Obama administration’s health care law was to stem the rapid rise in insurance costs for consumers. Bob Chamberlin/Los Angeles TimesDave Jones, the California insurance commissioner, said some insurance companies...

Read More..

Michael Cronan, Who Gave TiVo and Kindle Their Names, Dies at 61

Michael Cronan, a San Francisco-based graphic designer and marketing executive who placed his stamp on popular culture when he created the brand names TiVo and Kindle, died on Tuesday in Berkeley, Calif. He was 61. The cause was colon cancer, said his wife, Karin Hibma, with whom he founded the marketing firm Cronan in the early 1980s. Mr. Cronan, who studied art in college, had many...

Read More..