Linked List: October 16, 2012

Tuesday, 16 October 2012

Tech Talk: iPhone 5 

Saturday Night Live nails it.

Amazon in Talks to Buy Texas Instruments’ Mobile Chip Division 

Reuters:

Amazon.com Inc, the world’s largest Internet retailer, is in advanced talks to buy the mobile chip business of Texas Instruments, Israeli financial newspaper Calcalist reported on Monday.

If negotiations lead to an agreement, Amazon, which makes tablets and is expected to enter the smartphone industry, would become a direct rival to Apple and Samsung Electronics, which also designs their own chips. The value of any deal will probably be billions of dollars, Calcalist said.

Makes sense if Amazon is committed to being a device maker. You want control over your core dependencies, and these chips are without question a core dependency in the mobile game. (Now imagine if Microsoft bought a chip maker.)

Do-Not-Track Movement Is Drawing Advertisers’ Fire 

Natasha Singer, reporting for the NYT:

“If we do away with this relevant advertising, we are going to make the Internet less diverse, less economically successful, and frankly, less interesting,” says Mike Zaneis, the general counsel for the Interactive Advertising Bureau, an industry group.

Utter and complete bullshit. TV doesn’t track you, and with a few exceptions like HBO, it’s completely advertising driven. Print media doesn’t track you, and it’s been primarily advertising-driven for centuries.

Update: Lessien disputes my argument that “TV doesn’t track you”:

Not true. Cable boxes are data treasure troves.

Good point. But even so, I don’t see how anyone could argue that such tracking is necessary for advertising. And it certainly wasn’t the case for most of the TV industry’s history, which predates digital cable boxes.

Bullish Cross: ‘Apple $1000: Why It’s Time to Buy’ 

I don’t offer investment advice, but Andy Zaky does — and those who listen to him have done pretty well:

History has repeatedly taught us that the best time to buy Apple is when the bearish sentiment in the stock has reached the pinnacle of extreme pessimism. When every guest on CNBC is calling for the imminent demise of Apple, when every headline is making a case for why Apple has peaked, and when the stock continues to slide by over a 2% a day right in the face of a market rally, that’s when you know it’s time to buy.

The last two times we publicly advised investors to buy Apple was on Thursday, May 17, 2012 when Apple was at $530 a share and on Friday, June 17, 2011 when Apple was at $320 a share. In both cases, Apple bottomed out on the following trading session and then went on a 30%+ rally. We have only ever published five public buy recommendations on Apple and each one was published within a few days of Apple’s final bottom. We have never missed a long-term price-target on Apple.

Get the Details on Mitt Romney’s $5 Trillion Tax Plan 

Just a click away.

Pricing and Pre-Orders for Surface With Windows RT 

Roughly in line with iPad (3) pricing: $499 for 32 GB, $599 for 32 GB and a Touch Cover, $699 for 64 GB including a Touch Cover. Maybe the only surprise is that the cover isn’t standard — I thought that was the Surface’s hook, its primary differentiator.

Foxconn Admits Employing 14-Year-Old Interns 

Kathrin Hille and Sarah Mishkin, reporting for The Financial Times:

“Our investigation has shown that the interns in question, who ranged in age from 14 to 16, had worked in that campus for approximately three weeks,” the company said. “This is not only a violation of China’s labour law, it is also a violation of Foxconn policy, and immediate steps have been taken to return the interns in question to their educational institutions.”

Foxconn pledged to conduct a full investigation and fire any employee found to have been responsible for the violations. The company also said the Yantai facility “has no association with any work we carry out on behalf of Apple”.

Foxconn needs to get its act together.