Apple chief executive Tim Cook has opted not to take $75 million in dividend payout on restricted shares of stock he owns in the maker of iPhones, iPads, iPods and Macintosh computers.

Documents on file with the US Securities and Exchange Commission on Friday said that while other Apple employees will be awarded quarterly “dividend equivalents” of $2.65 on restricted shares, Cook asked not to be included.

Restricted shares typically don’t qualify for dividends, so the decision by Apple’s board amounts to bonuses for employees of the Cupertino, California-based company.

Cook has 1.125 million shares of restricted stock in the process of vesting, making him eligible for about $75 million in dividend value, according to the SEC filing.

Cook, who took the helm of the iPhone and iPad maker in August last year, two months before the death of founder Steve Jobs, clocked in total annual compensation of $378 million.

Cook earned $900,000 for his annual salary and $900,000 for his annual incentives.

But he scooped up a cool $376 million in restricted stock grants, based on Apple’s stock price at the time.

Apple’s coffers continued to swell in the first three months of the year due to record sales of iPhones and iPad tablet computers, particularly in China and other parts of Asia.

Apple reported that it made a profit of $11.6 billion on revenue of $39.2 billion in the quarter ended March 31. The amount of cash Apple had on hand grew $12 billion to $110.2 billion.

Its long streak of blockbuster earnings prompted Apple in March to announce it will begin paying quarterly dividends and buying back stock.

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Sent from my iPad 2 – Ť€©ћ№©¶@τ

After copious amounts of work and many sleepless nights Absinthe 2.0 is finally here to jailbreak your device. This release has been a large collaborative effort between Chronic-Dev Team and iPhone Dev Teams (Jailbreak Dream Team)

This jailbreak supports firmware 5.1.1 ONLY and is again one of the most easiest jailbreaks to use (so easy your grandma could do it ;D)

Press release: http://conference.hitb.org/hitbsecconf2012ams/ios-jailbreak-dream-team-releases-absinthe-2-0-ios-5-1-1-jailbreak/

Absinthe 2.0 supports the following devices:

iPad1,1 – 2,1 – 2,2 – 2,3 – 3,1 – 3,2 – 3,3

iPhone2,1 – 3,1 – 3,3 – 4,1

iPod3,1 – 4,1

(Support for iPad2,4 will be added at a later date)

How To Use Absinthe 2.0 (if you’re unjailbroken):

1. Make a backup of your device in iTunes by right clicking on your device name under the ‘Devices’ menu and click ‘Back Up’.

2. Once your backup is complete return to your device and go to Settings – General – Reset – Erase all Content and Settings. This will make the jailbreak process much faster.

3. Open Absinthe and be sure you are still connected via USB cable to your computer.

4. Click ‘Jailbreak’ and wait…. just be patient and do not disconnect your device.

5. Once jailbroken return to iTunes and restore your backup from earlier. Right click on your device name under the ‘Devices’ menu in the left panel of iTunes and click ‘Restore from Back Up…’ then select the latest backup you created before. (restoring this backup will return all the content previously on your device ie, apps, photos, etc.)

6. Thanks for using Absinthe, enjoy your jailbroken iDevice!

How To Untether 5.1.1 (if you’re already jailbroken):

Just search for and install “Rocky Racoon 5.1.1 Untether” from Cydia.

Download Links

Absinthe2.0 MacOSX (10.5, 10.6, 10.7)

Absinthe2.0 Windows (XP/Vista/Win7)

Absinthe2.0 Linux (x86/x86_64)

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Researchers at Cern, the Swiss nuclear physics lab which is home to the world’s largest particle accelerator, the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) aren’t just searching for the origins of the universe – they’re also working on the future of big data.

The LHC experiments alone will generate some 22PB of data this year, and that’s after throwing away 99 per cent of what is recorded by the LHC detectors.

Because the LHC experiments generate vast amounts of information and the physicists access that data from more than 150 datacentres across the globe, Cern doesn’t rely on a relational database to store raw experimental data.

The raw data from CERN’s experiments is instead stored in ROOT structured files, which are better suited to physics analysis. Transactional relational databases, Oracle 11gR2 with Real Application Clusters and Active Data Guard, store metadata information that is used to manage that raw data.

Raw data is analysed using batch processing, but batch processing is slow and the lab plans to investigate ways to allow researchers to tap into larger pools of data and query that data more rapidly. In doing so the lab will be a testbed for future big data technologies for its private partners HP, Huawei, Intel, Oracle, and Siemens, all of whom work with Cern on the openlab research project.

“As the amount of data continues to grow we have to keep trying to optimise the rate at which we can process the data,” said Bob Jones, Cern’s head of openlab.

“If Cern shows what works, and we publish that information with HP, Oracle, Intel, Siemens or Huawei, then that’s beneficial to their other customers and to other business sectors as well.”

The lab plans to study ways that it could place more data from its experiments in both relational databases and data stores based on NoSQL technologies, such as Hadoop and Dynamo in Amazon’s S3’s cloud storage service.

NoSQL technologies are well-suited to scaling out data – to distributing it across many different server clusters – without the problems of increased data management complexity that affects relational databases. Cern also favours off-the-shelf computers in its IT estate, and NoSQL tech works well with clusters of cheap commodity servers.

“The sort of things we’re looking at are – can we use the links between the data in an Oracle database to extract it and put it in to some other environment, do some Hadoop-style processing and use some business logic on that data and then shift the results back into Oracle,” he said.

As Cern tries to find more efficient ways of handling big data it will factor in the continuing evolution in computer hardware, particularly the prediction that data centres that can carry out more than one billion, billion calculations per second will exist within five years and the advent of cheap cloud storage services such as Amazon S3.

“One of the question we are looking at is ‘Imagine you had an infinite amount of compute capacity’. What would you change in your programming model? Would you continue to throw away quite so much data?,” Jones said.

“If we can explore that with our partners they can see what are the potential avenues that ought to be explored, and what are the potential barriers they are going to have to overcome,” he said, adding that he anticipates the main difficulties in running exascale data centre will be providing enough power and moving data in and out of servers rapidly enough to avoid creating a bottleneck.

Cern recently struck a deal to expand its 65,000 processor core and 30 PB core computer centre by building an additional data centre in Hungary that will add 20,000 cores and 5.5PB of storage.

Much of the analysis of the data generated by Cern’s experiments is carried out by a network of more than 150 computing centres in the Worldwide LHC Computing Grid (WLCG). The WCLG puts some 150,000 processors at Cern’s disposal but the research institute is examining whether it could double that number by turning to cloud computing.

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Telecom operators must collaborate with each other and work more closely with regulators and governments in order to survive, according to Hakam Kanafani, CEO, Turk Telekom Group.

Speaking at the Arab Advisors Group’s Convergence Summit in Jordan, Kanafani said that telecom operators are facing “survival questions” and must reassess the way they operate and invest in infrastructure.

“We are facing survival questions. When your data grows that much and the revenue is stagnant, then you have to be in survival mode. Something is wrong with the way we are doing things,” he said.

He added that telcos should consider new models for deploying infrastructure, including a far more collaborative approach to LTE networks. He warned that if telcos continue to lower prices and tread the same path with LTE that they did with 3G, they will be “finished”.

“We must put a plan out to the regulator and explain how we are going to invest in LTE,” he said. “We cannot invest three or four networks in each country. It is a waste of money, effort and is making other people richer.

“We must think of a way where we can have one LTE network which we can all utilise. There has to be a change, internally, we need to limit the way we subsidise handsets. We have to think of other ways, other than lowering prices, we have to.”

A significant part of the problem facing operators stems from over-the-top players according to Kanafani.

“Today telecom companies are subsidising Apple products, worth $50 billion a year. We are creating their network of distribution, their infrastructure. No one denies customers love them, but we have to change our business models. Today we are going through tremendous price wars amongst ourselves. The regulator is only regulating the telco industry,” he said.

“Do you know how many employees work in YouTube? Only 650. Google generates a lot of money, but doesn’t necessarily pay as much taxes as we do.”

He added that telcos pay some of the highest taxes in the region, and yet face greater regulation than the OTT players. “We have to look at our self interest.”

The CEO warned that if telcos continue to operate in the same way as they do at present, they could lose 50-60% of their value. “We have to unite and face regulators, subscribers and our governments,” he said.

Kanafani also stressed that cutting prices was not a sustainable strategy for operators and questioned the reasoning of analysts that criticised operators that dared to raise prices. “Last year we raised our prices at Turk Telekom twice. When I face analysts they say to me that I’ve raised prices, it’s as if it’s an allegation.

“The coffee you are drinking, the tie on my neck, the watch you are wearing have one thing in common: they will be more expensive next year, whereas telco prices will be lower next year. We have to make some radical changes to save our industry.”

US computer maker Dell on Tuesday reported a 33 percent drop in profits in a disappointing quarterly report for former market leader.

The company, which has slipped to third place in the global PC market, said its profit in the first fiscal quarter fell to $635 million.

Revenue in the quarter was $14.4 billion, a four percent decrease from the same period the previous year.

Dell said however the firm was moving away from its traditional PC base to services.

“We continued to shift the mix of our business during a challenging environment,” said Brian Gladden, Dell’s chief financial officer.

“Our enterprise solutions and services businesses now account for 50 percent of our gross margin, and we’ll continue to make the necessary investments to maintain our progress.”

Texas-based Dell, once the biggest PC maker, has fallen to third place behind market leader Hewlett-Packard and Lenovo, and is just barely ahead of fourth place Acer Group.

Dell last month said it was buying Wyse Technology to expand its business offerings in the Internet “cloud” in the face of softening demand for traditional computing hardware.

Last year, Dell said it would halt sales of its Android tablet computer in the US market, failing to gain traction against rivals such as Amazon’s Kindle Fire and Apple’s iPad.

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Facebook shares sank further Tuesday even as US markets pushed higher, as analysts blasted underwriters and the company for getting greedy in the most-awaited IPO in years.

On the second full day of trade after its much-anticipated Friday debut, the shares were at $32.25, down 5.1 percent from Monday’s close and 15.1 percent lower than the IPO price of $38.00.

In early trade the shares fell as low as $30.98 before regaining some of Tuesday’s lost ground.

The sell-off wiped off more than $15 billion from the $104 billion valuation the company earned in the initial public offering on Friday.

“They issued too many shares and the market wasn’t ready to absorb them, that’s all there is to it. The market isn’t ready to absorb it,” said Michael Pachter of Wedbush Securities.

The second-largest US initial public offering took off promisingly Friday as shares rose to $45 at one point.

But hours into trade the underwriters were forced to step in to prevent them from dropping below the IPO price. They ended with just a modest 23 cent gain for the day.

On Monday and Tuesday the backers could not hold off the flood of selling pressure, and the shares tumbled again.

The sell-off sparked more finger pointing and anger from those who had expected the price to zoom to massive gains like the immediate doubling of career-oriented social network LinkedIn’s IPO price last year.

“Investors are searching for someone to blame and there are plenty of suspects,” said Paul Ausick at 24/7Wall St.

Analysts blamed especially lead underwriter Morgan Stanley for allowing Facebook last week to increase the price and the offering size to 421 million shares, raising $16 billion.

“The underwriters placed the stocks with people who really were not that committed to owning it, and so a lot of them sold it,” said Pachter.

“They sent us false signals by adding 84 million shares to the offering on Wednesday, so right before they went public,” he said. “They were wrong, they completely blew it.”

But Lou Kerner, founder of the Social Internet Fund, blamed a “perfect storm” of several events: the announcement by General Motors days ahead of the IPO that it saw little use in advertising on Facebook; the Nasdaq market’s problems processing Facebook orders when trade opened Friday; and Morgan Stanley’s own cut of its forecasts for Facebook.

“So you had a lot of things coming at once and happening either on the day of the IPO or just prior to the IPO that I think had a real negative impact,” Kerner said.

But also underpinning the price fall has been the realization by many that there are real outstanding questions about Facebook’s revenue-generating potential, and that its advertising business remains a work in progress.

Facebook flop a “perfect storm”: analyst Duration: 00:49
AFPTV

“We do believe that the company still faces near-term challenges. Slowdown in revenue growth and declines in operating margins may further pressure the stock price,” said Rick Summer of Morningstar.

Facebook itself also came in for some hits for being greedy in the IPO, which came at a time in which markets were generally skittish over more turmoil in the eurozone and Greece’s possible withdrawal from the euro.

“The company on its roadshow did not do a very convincing job… of making investors believe that they were going to act in their best interest,” said Pachter.

Although conclusion was that the issue was overpriced was widespread, analysts were less willing to predict the direction of trade after Tuesday’s fall.

“The downward move in the stock price has been swift, but predicting short-term swings is truly a challenge,” said Summer.

“I think if you look forward six, 12 months, the trading of the shares today — the first few days after the IPO — it’s really just going to be noise,” said Kerner.

“The main thing that Facebook should do is focus on execution, which they’ve done a great job of during their entire lifetime.”

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Summary: For the first time, in more than a decade, Microsoft’s Internet Explorer has been kicked off its throne as the number one Web browser in the world.

Chrome is now the number one Web browser, followed by IE & Firefox.

The last time Internet Explorer (IE) wasn’t the top Web browser in the world, late 1998, Bill Clinton was president; France was the World Cup champion; Netscape was IE’s top rival; and, oh yes, Google was founded. One anti-monopoly lawsuit, which was largely based on Microsoft’s illegal tactics against Netscape, and not quite fourteen years later, IE has finally been knocked off as king of the browser mountain by Google’s Chrome Web browser.

According to StatCounter, Chrome passed Internet Explorer during the week of May 13th. StatCounter’s stats are based on a sample of 15 billion page views in the company’s network and they show that Chrome is continuing to gradually pull away from IE.

Today, Chrome has taken first place with 32.76 percent share, while IE dipped to 31.94 percent. Chrome has been slowly moving up on IE for years now. The first time Chrome moved past IE, for even a day, only came on March 18th.

Since then IE, as it has for well over a year now, kept declining. At the same time, Chrome has kept growing. Chrome overtook Firefox, by StatCounter’s figures, in December 2011.

Chrome has moved ahead of IE and it’s widening its lead.

The reason for Chrome’s rise is simple: Chrome is a great Web browser. IE’s decline is also easy to explain. Since the introduction of IE 9 last April hasn’t seen a single significant update. In addition IE 9 only runs on Windows 7. There is no version of IE 9 for XP. And, even if there were, overall IE 9 is slower than both Chrome and Firefox. It’s really no wonder that IE has declined even faster than I had expected it to.

By some other measurements, IE is still number one. But, no matter which Web browser counter you put your faith in, all of them show that Chrome is rising while IE is declining. The day of IE being the undisputed number one Web browser in the world is done.

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