Google calls the effort Project Loon and acknowledges it is “highly experimental” at this stage.

“This is the first time we’ve launched this many balloons (30 this week, in fact) and tried to connect to this many receivers on the ground, and we’re going to learn a lot that will help us improve our technology and balloon design,” Mike Cassidy, head of Project Loon, wrote in a blog post.

This week Google started this pilot program in the Canterbury area of New Zealand with 50 testers trying to connect their balloons.

It works by ground stations connecting to the local Internet infrastructure and beaming signals to the balloons, which are self-powered by solar panels.

“We imagine someday you’ll be able to use your cell phone with your existing service provider to connect to the balloons and get connectivity where there is none today”,Cassidy said.

Office Mobile for iPhone is available in the Apple App Store, and it’s free for Office 365 subscribers.It’s optimized for the iPhone, not Apple’s larger iPads.

“We don’t view this as a standalone app,” said Chris Schneider, a marketing manager in Microsoft’s Office division.

The iPhone app will come with Word, Excel and PowerPoint and will sync with Microsoft’s SkyDrive online storage service.

Files can be saved in the cloud on Microsoft’s SkyDrive or SkyDrive Pro. From the app you can send files off as attachments. Office content can be cached locally on the phone.

The service, dubbed #FollowMe, can “instantly set your Twitter timeline in motion,” according to Vizify.

You can create your own on Vizify’s website. Just link up your Twitter account to Vizify and the company will email you the final result.

You can share your “videos” on Twitter with one click once finished.

“#FollowMe looks and behaves like a video, but is actually built using HTML5 & animations; it plays on pretty much any modern Web or mobile device,” Vizify said.

#FollowMe is powered by automatic infographic-maker Vizify.

During his first blog post for LinkedIn, Bill Gates speaks about three skills he has learned from friend and fellow billionaire Warren Buffet.

Bill Gates writes on his LinkedIn blog:

“No matter how much money you have, you can’t buy more time. There are only 24 hours in everyone’s day. Warren has a keen sense of this. He doesn’t let his calendar get filled up with useless meetings. On the other hand, he’s very generous with his time for the people he trusts. He gives his close advisers at Berkshire his phone number, and they can just call him up and he’ll answer the phone”.

Gates also told that Buffet helped him with big decisions regarding both Microsoft and the Gates Foundation.

“The dialogue has been invaluable to me, and not only at Microsoft. When Melinda and I started our foundation, I turned to him for advice. We talked a lot about the idea that philanthropy could be just as impactful in its own way as software had been,” says Gates.

According to news.com.au, Cinton’s profile is a bit light on endorsements and summaries of his skills.

“For almost three weeks, we have detected and disrupted multiple email-based phishing campaigns”,Eric Grosse, the vice president for security engineering, wrote in a post.

“The timing and targeting of the campaigns suggest that the attacks are politically motivated,” he said.

Mr Grosse said victims targeted in the attacks had received an email containing a link to a web page purporting to perform account maintenance.

If they clicked the link, they were taken to a fake Google sign-in page, which would steal their username and password.

Google said it used its Chrome browser to detect phishing efforts from what appears to be the same Iranian group in 2011.

“Indian customers are passionate about books and reading, and we’re very excited to make the best-selling e-readers in the world—Kindle and Kindle Paperwhite—available to our Amazon.in customers,” said Amit Agarwal, vice president and country manager, Amazon India.

The prices of the devices are as follows:

Kindle Fire HD 7-inch – Rs. 15,999 (16GB), Rs. 18,999 (32GB)
Kindle Fire HD 8.9-inch – Rs. 21,999 (16GB), Rs. 25,999 (32GB).
Kindle Paperwhite Wi-Fi only – Rs. 10,999
Kindle Paperwhite 3G model – Rs. 13,999
Kindle (5th generation model) – Rs. 5,999

The Kindle Fire HD comes with a 7-inch screen with a resolution of 1280*800 display, powered by 1.2GHz dual-core processor and Imagination SGX540 GPU. A 4, 400mAh battery makes it lasts for 11 hours.

Kindle Fire HD 8.9 on the other hand, comes with a bigger 8.9 inch 1920×1200 pixels display. It is powered by a dual core 1.5GHz OMAP4470 processor and features 1GB RAM, front HD camera, 16/32GB internal storage and a 6,000 mAh battery.

Kindle Paperwhite models have a 6-inch front-lit display (212 ppi) and they display 16 level grey scale.

The tablets will be available online at Amazon.in and at over one hundred retail outlets across India including Croma, Reliance Digital, E-Zone and Vijay Sales stores starting June 27.

Last week amazon launches its website amazon.in for India.

Yahoo confirmed this acquisition via Twitter

Today we acquired @ghostbirdsoft for @flickr. Get ready to see your mobile photos in a whole new light! bit.ly/11zOvNY

— Yahoo! Inc.(@YahooInc) June 12, 2013

“We’ll integrate many of the mobile photography experiences from GhostBird into our Flickr apps,” a Yahoo spokesperson told to WebProNews.

People who have installed KitCam or PhotoForge2 apps on iPhones will still be able to use the mini-programmes, but Yahoo yanked them from Apple’s online App Store and planned no updates for the future.

GhostBird told about this acquisition in their site:

GhostBird Software is joining Yahoo!

Today we are thrilled to announce that Yahoo! has acquired GhostBird Software!

Over the last few years, mobile photography has really taken off, and we feel privileged to have been part of its growth. We are especially humbled to have introduced some of the most-loved photography apps to the App Store. We have been dedicated to bringing incredible photo-editing experiences to iOS since 2009; and the best part is that the journey has just begun.

As photography enthusiasts, we are long-time admirers of Flickr, and we’re thrilled to be able to bring our technology and passion for beautiful photos to the Flickr team. There has been so much exciting progress at Yahoo! as they re-imagine their most-loved products for mobile, including the awesome new Flickr apps for iOS and Android.

If you already have the KitCam or PhotoForge2 apps on your devices, you will be able to continue to use them in their current versions. However, we will not continue to update the apps as future versions of iOS are released. Anyone who previously purchased GhostBird Software’s apps, including KitCam and PhotoForge2, will be able to re-download those apps through iCloud. As of today, KitCam and PhotoForge2 are no longer available for download from the App Store.

Thank you for all of your support and feedback. We can’t wait to work with the Flickr team and help you capture even more beautiful moments for years to come.

Sincerely,
The GhostBird Software Team

Check out its front side, and you’ll see a device very similar to a Galaxy S4 Mini.On the back, it’s a full-fledged camera, with a 16-megapixel sensor and 10x optical zoom.

“The Samsung GALAXY S4 zoom represents yet another step forward in the way Samsung is working to enhance the lives of our customers around the world,” said JK Shin, President and CEO, Head of IT & Mobile Communications Division, Samsung Electronics. “As communication continues to become increasingly visual in nature, people wish to capture and share their moments in the highest quality possible, but often do not have the space or inclination to carry a dedicated camera for this purpose. The GALAXY S4 zoom changes this forever, combining the industry leading functionality and connectivity of the GALAXY S4 with the high quality photographic experience you’d expect from a compact camera. The result is truly the best of both worlds, without compromise.”

The device includes a feature known as Zoom Ring. If you’re on a call, for example, and spot something you want to share, twist the Zoom Ring to activate an in-call photo share feature. Then just snap a photo and send it via text to the person with whom you are talking.

The Zoom Ring also revolutionizes conventional camera zoom controls. Optical zoom control replaces traditional dials and buttons with smooth, easy-to-operate digital controls.

The French edition will automatically appear to those connecting to pinterest.com with a French IP address.

“We’re so excited to offer a tailored experience for our French community and we definitely couldn’t have done it without help from native French pinners”,the company said.

Terms of the deal for Waze weren’t disclosed in the Google blog post. But many people expect that it will be more than 1 billion.

Started in Israel, Waze later moved its headquarters and some operations to the U.S.

Read below the official blog post from Google.

We’ve all been there: stuck in traffic, frustrated that you chose the wrong route on the drive to work. But imagine if you could see real-time traffic updates from friends and fellow travelers ahead of you, calling out “fender bender…totally stuck in left lane!” and showing faster routes that others are taking.

To help you outsmart traffic, today we’re excited to announce we’ve closed the acquisition of Waze. This fast-growing community of traffic-obsessed drivers is working together to find the best routes from home to work, every day.

The Waze product development team will remain in Israel and operate separately for now. We’re excited about the prospect of enhancing Google Maps with some of the traffic update features provided by Waze and enhancing Waze with Google’s search capabilities.

We’ll also work closely with the vibrant Waze community, who are the DNA of this app, to ensure they have what’s needed to grow and prosper.

The Waze community and its dedicated team have created a great source of timely road corrections and updates. We welcome them to Google and look forward to working with them in our ongoing effort to make a comprehensive, accurate and useful map of the world.