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A wasted decade on Windows Mobile threatens Microsoft’s relevance in the future of computing.

Galen Gruman, Infoworld

It appears that Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer has finally woken up and realized that Microsoft’s laughable mobile position is more than a product failure but a potential loss of relevance in the computing world of the future, where desktop PCs are like TVs and the real action is in mobile devices of all stripes.

This week, the heads of Microsoft’s mobile and entertainment (Windows Mobile, Zune, and Xbox) division announced their pending departures. It’s not a moment too soon, given the widespread doubts that the long-sagging division’s mobile and music fortunes would revive under the status quo. (The Xbox is doing fine.) Unfortunately, Ballmer says the departures had nothing to do with Microsoft’s slide into mobile irrelevance and that business will continue as usual. That’s suicidal.

[ Stay up on tech news and reviews from your smartphone at infoworldmobile.com. | Get the best iPhone and iPad apps for pros with our business iPhone apps finder. | Keep up on key mobile developments and insights with the Mobile Edge blog and Mobilize newsletter. ]

With Apple’s huge lead in mobile with the iPhone, iPod Touch, and iPad; Google’s Android surge in smartphones and perhaps soon in slate-style tablets; and Research in Motion’s seeming lock on messaging devices, people might wonder why Microsoft doesn’t cut its losses and shift more emphasis to the company’s cloud strategy, which Microsoft’s execs hope will be its next-generation platform dominator à la Windows.

Ballmer should know why: Because mobile devices are where the client figure is, and a Microsoft without a strong mobile position means Microsoft loses any hope of owning the emerging technology ecosystem. At worst, Google would own it; at best, it would be a combination of Google, Apple, and Microsoft.

Microsoft has wasted a decade — it’s been that long since Windows Mobile (née CE) did anything that mattered to customers — with meaningless updates on an operating system that showed signs of innovation in 2000 but quickly became a confused mess of desktop wannabe functions by 2004. Complacency clearly set in as Palm frittered its future on endless reorganizations and RIM stayed happily in the mud of messaging. Then the iPhone showed up in 2007 and changed the mobile world. Google saw it and after a rough start started to deliver serious alternative. Both now outsell the establishment mobile OS that Windows Mobile had meant to be.

Steve, what did your company do? It wasted several years on the hapless Windows 6.5 and the moronic Kin — talk about throwing good money after bad. Now you have to turn around the mobile gap, and fast. Here’s what you need to do — and you have only the rest of this year to do it.

1. Kill the Crap (And do the Rest Right, or Not at All)

Leaked: Dell’s Upcoming ‘Lightning’ Windows Phone 7 Handset Microsoft produces a lot of mediocre software that it slowly fixes over a half-dozen or more iterations — adding more crap along the way. I’ve never understood this business strategy, but it worked for Windows, so it’s now accepted at Redmond. Practically every product from Office to Dynamics is developed this way.

For Windows Mobile, the crap caught up to it, smothering the operating system in a pile of excrement that as of Windows Mobile 6.5 could not longer be disguised for what it was. The new Kin mobile platform is also full of crap, lacing some interesting ideas around social networking on a badly designed user interface running on crappy hardware. It’s Windows Mobile all over again.

The successor to Windows Mobile — Windows Phone 7 — can’t contain crap. It needs to be a good OS, with a UI that works at all levels. The operating system needs to be elegant, simple, intentional, and consistent — something Microsoft has never been good at.

Instead, Steve, your company’s engineers confuse elegance with decoration, simplicity with obscurity, intentionality with brutishness, and consistency with — well, they don’t know that word. If you provide three ways to do the same thing, clutter up the screen with menus and dialog boxes and radio buttons, badger users with “helpful” alerts and confirmations, rely on multifinger keyboard shortcuts, and change navigation techniques across apps, you’re dead.

Everyone cites Apple as the master of this game, but I don’t believe for a minute that only Apple’s designers can produce such quality. Apple is a standout, but it doesn’t have a lock on good design. Amazon.com, Acer, Renault, and Nike are some top-of-mind examples.

Ironically, Microsoft has occasionally shown itself capable of design excellence: The original Excel was the first application to show that a graphical UI wasn’t just for pretty pictures, and its success is what I believe made Windows possible. Before that, the original Word was a very well-designed application in a sea of ungainly competitors back in the DOS era.

The bottom line: If you can’t do something at a level of excellence, pull it. Add it later, when it’s truly ready, as a free update. Get out of the crapware and shovelware business — you won’t believe the kind of loyalty you’ll get if you deliver quality products without compromises. (Just ask Apple.) I’m not suggesting everything be perfect — often, there’s no such thing — but customers can spot half-assed and rushed a mile away, and you already are too well known for those.

Your new mobile OS needs to run on hardware that oozes quality, fit and finish, and confident capability. You don’t need to clone the iPhone to get that; the HTC Droid Incredible is another example, as are the top-end PCs and laptops from Acer, Hewlett-Packard, and Dell. Don’t add a ton of perpherals and ports; instead, provide just one or two MicroUSB ports, the fewest buttons needed (without making any one button do unrelated things), a really good camera for still photography and videoconferencing (and remember it’s not the megapixels that matter but the CCD quality, despite what the Gizmoids say), an amazing screen with excellent multitouch sensing, a memory card slot, flexible radios (CDMA and GSM 3G, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth not limited to headsets and keyboards, and maybe WiMax), and great audio in/out. A distinctive look that isn’t distracing would be icing on that cake.

Furthermore, you should allow only two models: one with a physical keyboard, and one without. Memory and maybe a couple other noncritical features can vary within each model line, but don’t create confusion. You don’t need 15 different Windows Phone 7 devices of varying quality. You’ve already been burned going down that road. If you can’t bring yourself to having just two models (and thus picking only HTC or Samsung as your hardware partner), enforce very tough requirements on the permissible variability. And don’t let HTC add its own UI overlay; like Windows Mobile before it, Android needed the Sense UI to be usable, which, in essence, means they screwed up the OS. If you don’t need it, you’ve just permitted an inconsistency in your platform’s core.

Along these lines, don’t confuse listening to the customer with delivering what you heard the customers say. Apple succeeds because Steve Jobs and the company’s other key leaders have a strong vision, and they deliver it time and time again. Despite their outward arrogance, they do listen to customers, but make their own decisions. That results in cohesive products that more often than not move the ball forward. After all, it is a truism in market research that customers don’t know what new features they want, just the ones they know they don’t have. You have to invent the future the customers didn’t know they wanted until you showed it to them.

Microsoft makes a lot of noise about listening to its customers, but that often leads to muddled products like Vista, whose aspirations of “everything but the kitchen sink OS” couldn’t be put together despite the years of efforts and $6 billion or so of investment. Instead, try out novel concepts with users and see how they react; that’s more likely to result in positive innovation and identify areas of confusion than trying to please or accommodate everything you hear.

2. Get the Basics Right

The underlying capabilities in your new mobile platform must be what’s needed. Don’t do the usual Microsoft thing and skimp. Apple got away with inferior business capabilities around security and manageability in its early iPhones and only in the last year has made serious headway to correct that. You don’t have that luxury. Though I believe it harbors a deep desire for the iPhone to be the corporate standard, Apple doesn’t pretend to be a business-oriented company; thus, it could ignore that audience and play to its entertainment strengths honed with the iPod and its creative strengths honed with the Mac. Microsoft has no such waves of passion to carry it past key omissions or compromises.

Don’t think Windows Mobile’s business strengths — the security and management capabilities where it did lead — will cut you any slack for the corporate audience. More than half of people who use smartphones in business buy their own, so those IT fond memories don’t carry the weight they used to. In business, you’re competing with both the iPhone and the BlackBerry. For individuals, you’re competing with the iPhone and Android. You can’t underperform in any core capabilities.

We all know what those core expectations are today, so if Windows Phone 7’s multithreading doesn’t deliver the experience users typically associate with multitasking, don’t pretend it does and ship it anyhow. If Zune is locked into Windows PCs, don’t include it; media management needs to be universal. The UI paradigm can’t change because the app does its own thing; the gesture language needs to be universal, and human interface guidelines need to be rigorously enforced. You get the idea.

For more IT analysis and commentary on emerging technologies, visit InfoWorld.com. Story copyright © 2010 InfoWorld Media Group. All rights reserved.

Read More At The Original Source: http://www.pcworld.com/article/197418-2/5_ways_steve_ballmer_can_save_microsofts_mobile_bacon.html

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Newly-released stats reveal how social network dwarfs other top sites

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By Marco Tabini, Macworld

As launches go, the introduction of the iPad at Toronto’s Yorkdale Mall, home of Apple’s flagship store in Ontario, was a typically Canadian affair: a small, orderly, and enthusiastic crowd greeted the 8 a.m. opening with cheers and happy chatter. Notably absent were fans dressed as their favorite Apple device, people wearing homemade iPod jewelry, or the bleary eyes that identify those who had camped out all night, but at least there was plenty of Tim Horton’s coffee–without which Canada probably would stop functioning–on hand.

The lines at the store were not quite as long as the ones that formed in occasion of the device’s U.S. launch on April 3, or, indeed, of those that various report indicate have formed at other locations throughout the world, likely due to the fact that many Torontonians live close enough to the American border (or travel to the States often enough) that they have picked up their very own iPad ahead of its launch, or pre-ordered one for delivery.

Casey Smith of Etobicoke (a Toronto suburb) belonged to both groups: “I bought a Wi-Fi model in Buffalo in April, and I hope to get my hands on a 3G model today, which should make taking the iPad on the road easier,” he said while taking his place in line.

A smaller crowd meant a much more relaxed atmosphere, with Apple Store employees chatting with customers awaiting their turn into the store. Meanwhile, those who had just received their iPads stood outside, unpacking their new gadgets and comparing their app purchases.

As was the case with the U.S. launch, two lines formed outside the store–one for customers who had pre-ordered their iPad, and the others for those who were hoping to secure one without a reservation. The store was also offering instant activation for those who couldn’t wait to unpack their tablets and connect them to iTunes on their own computers; judging from the crowds at the activation stations, that option was quite popular.

The launch of the iPad has been greatly anticipated by Canadians throughout the nation, particularly given the proximity to the U.S., where the device has been available for over two months. Earlier in May, Apple quietly “flipped the switch” on the Canadian iPad app store, enabling those without an American iTunes account to start making purchases for their devices. Canadian cellular providers Rogers Communications and Bell Canada both announced support for the iPad and introduced plans that, while not comparable to the unlimited access that AT&T offers in the U.S., are generous by national standards, with 250MB of data available for $15, and 5GB for $35.

Both companies are making their data plans available without a term contract, which is virtually unheard of in Canada, where a few carriers need to compete for a relatively small customer base spread over a very large territory. Apple’s Website initially indicated that Rogers was also going to allow existing customers with a smartphone to share their data plan on the iPad for a $20 monthly fee, but the cellular provider later backtracked and stated that the data-sharing option would not be available after all.

The difference between the U.S. and Canadian pricing of the iPad–$50 for the 16GB Wi-Fi model–didn’t seem to be a problem for anyone in line. “That’s a fair exchange rate, given where the U.S. dollar is at,” said Jerry MacDonald, who was in line with his daughter. “It doesn’t bother me at all.”

Inside the store, in the meantime, customers wrangled with the agony of choice between the various models, accessories and cases. While store employees wouldn’t release any numbers, sales seemed brisk and there was plenty of stock on hand.

“I came here worried by all the reports of shortages in the States,” said Maria Papadopulos, who was in the stand-by line. “Luckily, it looks like I won’t have a problem buying one today.” Perhaps now Americans will visit the Great North in search for the elusive iPad, instead of the other way around.

Read More At The Original Source: http://www.pcworld.com/businesscenter/article/197447/small_but_enthusiastic_crowd_greets_ipad_in_toronto.html

For more Macintosh computing news, visit Macworld. Story copyright © 2010 Mac Publishing LLC. All rights reserved.

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Carrie-ann Skinner

Security vendor Sophos has slammed a technology experiment in which a British scientist infected himself with a computer virus.

Dr Mark Gasson from the University of Reading infected a computer chip implanted in his hand with the virus and then transmitted it to a PC to prove that malware can move between human and computer.

Gasson uses the chip as a security pass to gain secure access to the university building, and to activate his mobile phone.

He said the implications for computer viruses in implants are far-reaching, and could potentially affect those with pacemakers and other medical devices.

Someone with an infected chip implant could potentially infect someone else, while a person with two devices under the skin could run the risk of viruses passing between the two chips, he said.

However, Sophos says that while it is possible to put any software code onto an RFID chip, the code would not be read until an RFID reader came into contact with the affected chip.

Furthermore, the software connected with the RFID reader itself would need to have a security vulnerability in order to allow the malicious code to be run.

“Scientists should be responsible in how they present their research, rather than hyping up threats in order to get headlines,” said Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant at Sophos.

“Any virus code on the RFID chip would be utterly incapable of running unless a serious security hole existed in the external device reading it. RFID chips normally just have data read from them, rather than ‘executed’, so the chances of a virus infection spreading in this fashion is extremely remote. ”

Cluely added he had “more chance of being flattened by a falling grand piano than I have of getting my dog infected by a PC virus next time I take him to the vets”.

“The main progress that appears to have been made from such research is not a contribution to computer security, but a full-proof method of ensuring that university staff don’t forget their office door pass in the morning,” said Cluely.

“Predictions of pacemakers and cochlear implants being hit by virus infections is the very worst kind of scaremongering.”

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Emma Woollacott

The Times Square car bomber was aided in his attempt by the fact that he was wearing shoes, leading to a call from two US senators to make people register before buying footwear.

Oh, sorry, we meant prepaid mobile phones.

Under a bill proposed by Chuck Schumer and  John Cornyn, buyers would have to show ID and vendors would be required to keep the information to allow law enforcement bodies to trace the phones.

“While most Americans use pre-paid mobile devices lawfully, the anonymous nature of these devices gives too much cover to individuals looking to use them for deviant, dangerous means,” says Cornyn.

“It would be foolish to stand idly by while the risk remains that another terrorist or criminal could purchase a pre-paid phone leaving no paper trail.”

Apparently, the fact that “terrorists, drug kingpins and gang members” use prepaid mobile phones makes them inherently dangerous. They’re used by other dodgy people too, says Cornyn – including hedge fund managers and Wall Street executives implicated in the largest insider trading bust in US history.

Quite a few countries already require registration, including such bastions of individual freedom as Indonesia and Singapore. There have been calls to do the same in several states. But Schumer and Cornyn believe there should be a nationwide requirement.

“We caught a break in catching the Times Square terrorist, but usually a prepaid cell phone

is a dead end for law enforcement,” said Schumer.  “There’s no reason why it should still be this easy for terror plotters to cover their tracks.”

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Matthew Lasar

One out of every six mobile phone users have experienced “bill shock”—an unexpected jump in their monthly service fee that was not prompted by a change in their calling or texting plan. That’s 30 million Americans all told, according to a new survey released by the Federal Communications Commission.

These nasty surprises aren’t the kind of multi-thousand dollar hikes that have been making headlines in Europe and sometimes here in the United States. “Nevertheless, we know from our consumer call center that for many, many people in this country, a jump of $20 or $30 or $50 on your cell phone bill is a very significant jump,” Joel Gurnin, Chair of the FCC’s Consumer Task Force told reporters at a Wednesday press conference. “We did find many people who were experiencing bill shock in the range of $50 or $100 or more.”

15 percent of these “shocks” cost consumers from $25 to $49 more on their bill, the report says. 14 percent cost from $50 to $99. Another 23 percent cost over $100.

The survey also indicates that half of cell phone users and almost two thirds of home broadband subscribers are lost in the woods when it comes to Early Termination Fees—the price tag for dropping their plan. Bottom line: they often don’t know how much their ETF is. In many instances, they don’t even know that they have one.

“I think the most striking finding is that so few people know what they are,” Gurnin noted.

Did not know

The FCC commissioned Abt/SRBI and Princeton Survey Research Associates to interview 3,005 American adults about these matters from April 19 to May 2, 2010. Among the report’s major findings:

• 17 percent of respondents (one out of every six) said that their cell phone bill suddenly increased, even though they hadn’t switched plans.
• 84 percent of those in the “bill shock” category reported that their mobile service did not contact them, even as they verged on exceeding their call minute, text, or data plan.
• 88 percent said they received no message from their carrier after the sudden increase.
• 54 percent of personal cell phone consumers knew that would have to pay an ETF if they quit, but 18 percent disclosed that they did not know about the fee.
• 21 percent of home broadband customers were aware of an ETF condition attached to their plan, but 38 percent were not.

“Among personal cell phone users who said they were subject to an ETF, 47% did not know what the amount of the fee would be,” the study added. “For home broadband users who said they would have to pay an ETF, 64% did not know the amount of the fee.”

Major reasons

The survey also suggests that ETFs “may also play a role in consumer behavior” when a subscriber is trying to decide whether to switch plans. 43 percent of respondents who did know about them confided that their ETF represented a “major reason” they stayed with their current carrier. 18 percent said that paying an early fee was a “minor reason” they didn’t switch services. Another 34% said the ETF played no role in their decision.

This is all in line with a recent Government Accountability Office report that concluded that 42% of cell phone users don’t switch, thanks to fees.

“I think the major take home message from all of this is that people don’t know what they should know in order to be able to manage these kind of fees in the best possible way,” Gurnin told reporters. “We do know that there are some carriers out there who are beginning to alert their customers when they’re heading into bill shock territory. But it is certainly not yet a common practice. We would like to see some of these best practices become universal practices.”

Reporters asked the FCC whether all this data would translate into regulations or just attempts to encourage the wireless industry to move into the “best practice” camp.

“We really can’t say at this point whether this all will result in a rulemaking or voluntary standards,” Gurnin explained. “We have begun some conversations with industry. I think that the importance of this survey is that it gives us a common ground of understanding.” And: “We’re really confident that we can work in a way that the industry will support that gets out information in a way that is ultimately good for everybody.”

Very troubled

Good luck with that, given the wireless industry’s response to the report.

“I am very troubled with the current direction the FCC is taking with respect to the wireless industry,” Steve Largent of CTIA – The Wireless Association, told us. “It seems the Commission is going to attempt to micromanage what is an incredible array of choices for consumers.  From prepaid to postpaid, subsidized handsets to unsubsidized, contracts with ETFs to those without, large, medium or small buckets of minutes and ‘all-you-can-use’ plans, consumers have an unbelievable range of choices.”

“Unfortunately, the Commission’s release missed an opportunity to educate consumers,” Largent added. “Nowhere mentioned in the documents is there any information for consumers about how they can better manage their wireless usage – information that is readily available from every carrier and that has been submitted to the Commission by CTIA and carriers.”

The FCC’s materials did come with a tip sheet on dealing with ETFs, but to be fair to CTIA, the trade association may be dealing with “report shock,” following the release of the agency’s 14th wireless industry competition survey last week. The study very conspicuously noted that over the last five years, concentration in the industry has gone up. The two dominant providers, AT&T and Verizon, now enjoy a 60 percent chunk of revenue and subscribers, “and continue to gain share,” the compendium noted. This might result in the FCC pressing some “policy levers” on the wireless industry, the document hinted.

Largent’s commentary lamented “the message sent last week in the Mobile Competition Report to today’s survey release.”

Reporters also asked the FCC whether the agency was going to make any effort to tabulate the size of ETFs and their impact, given AT&T’s announcement last Friday that the telco is attaching $325 in early fees to its iPhone.

No go on that, it seems.

“Increases in general . . . I wouldn’t want to single out any one company,” Gurnin explained. “Different companies adjust their ETFs up or down. It’s really an overall issue that we’re looking at. Our issue is clarity and disclosure to consumers.”

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Microsoft Corp. (MSFT) plans to launch a new software for mobile phones by the end of 2010, Chief Executive Steve Ballmer said Thursday, while commenting on its entertainment division.

The entertainment division makes Xbox video game consoles, Zune music players and mobile phone software.

“Fantastic things (are) coming with the Xbox to change the landscape between TV and entertainment,” Ballmer told reporters.

The company recently announced plans to reorganize its entertainment division with the division’s president, Robbie Bach, retiring this fall.

Microsoft had announced its overhauled operating system for smartphones, Windows Phone 7, in February.

New devices with the software are expected out this holiday season.

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Megan Ko

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Desire Athow

The countdown to the year’s biggest Apple launch so far has begun and in less than 24 hours, thousands of Britons will have received their first UK iPad devices or buy them from the device from either Apple stores.

Currys and PCWorld (but not Dixons) have iPad static pages ready to go live (but still without any info) but these should be updated within the next few hours. We expect that only some stores will have available stocks and these are likely to be less than a few dozens each, if not much less.

Electro Candy’s Adam Roche said that he contacted TNT UK and was told that a first batch of 13,700 iPad tablet PC has already arrived in the UK and that delivery has already started. It is very likely that all the iPads of the first batch have already gone.

Not surprisingly, #ipad and #ipads have been trending today on Twitter and according to the Daily Telegraph, dozens of Apple fans have received their iPad 24 hours before the product is due in the stores.

We will be covering the launch of the iPad live from their Regent Street Store from 7am and you’re invited to join us. You can already bookmark our video landing page here where you will find the livestream.

ITProPortal also launched a contest inviting prospective and current iPad owners to get up to £500 worth of iPad accessories (including iPad Apps and Apple iTunes Credit) simply by submitting the list of accessories they’d like to have. Simples!!

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for its users during a press briefing on Wednesday at 10:30 a.m. Pacific time. The news comes just a few days after Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg promised to introduce “privacy controls that are much simpler to use ” for Facebook’s more than 400 million users. Following Wednesday’s announcement, Facebook will hold a briefing on Thursday in Washington, D.C, which will be open to Congress staff interested in learning more about Facebook’s privacy plans.

Facebook’s decision to revise its privacy controls is welcome news, but it’s not clear yet what privacy changes Facebook has in store for its users. It appears the company is not planning any changes to its actual privacy policies, but will instead give users easier choices about how their personal details are being used on Facebook.

Nevertheless, Facebook deserves credit for responding to criticisms and implementing changes that will, hopefully, give users a simpler way to understand what they’re sharing on Facebook. Here are five things I’m hoping to see from Facebook on Wednesday.

Opt-in, Not Opt-out

Facebook should make a public vow that whenever it introduces new features that can expose user data to third-parties the company will let users opt-in to the new feature and not opt-out.

On several occasions, Facebook has introduced new features that automatically exposed user data to third parties, such as Facebook Beacon and the new Instant Personalization program. An opt-out model forces Facebook users to turn these new features off instead of letting them decide whether or not they want to use the new feature in the first place.

Facebook quickly backtracked on Instant Personalization and made it opt-in, for which the company should be commended. Nevertheless, Facebook should vow never to mess with user settings again, and make every new feature it introduces opt-in and not opt-out.

Third-party Data Control

Whenever you sign up to use a third party application on Facebook all your publicly available information becomes accessible to that app. But does a company like Zynga, the makers of Farmville, really need access to a list of your favorite music and movies? Canada’s privacy commissioner didn’t think so during a review of Facebook’s privacy policies last year.

In fact, Canada’s privacy watchdog recommended that Facebook require third-party apps to explicitly tell users what personal information the app wants and then get permission from the user to access each piece of data. In practice, this would mean you’d be presented with a check list of information such as your Likes and Interests, location and public Wall posts. Then you’d get to decide which of your details the app could access.

Disconnect From Friends

In my view, one of the more troubling aspects of Facebook’s privacy controls is the fact that your Facebook friends can easily expose your personal information to third parties. For example, if Bob signs up to play Mafia Wars that application can then access Bob’s friend list and all of his friends’ publicly available information.

To Facebook’s credit, you can stop some of your data from being leaked by your friends by clicking on Account>Privacy Settings>Applications and Websites>What your friends can share about you. However, even if you make it through Facebook’s privacy maze to find this setting, you still won’t be able to stop third parties from seeing your Likes and Interests, the city you live in, and other data Facebook considers to be publicly available information.

To put it mildly, this is crazy. Facebook execs are famous for claiming that its users are in control of their Facebook data , and can decide how it is shared. But clearly that is not the case if my friends can share my data without my knowledge. Facebook needs to put a stop to this practice of indirectly sharing user data with third-parties. It’s a privacy loophole, and Facebook needs to close it.

Granular Versus Simple

Although Facebook’s current privacy set up is very confusing, it is also very granular and allows users to have a fair amount of control over their profile information. Instead of throwing out its complex controls, Facebook should give users a choice between using the simplified controls and the more complex ones. That way anyone who wants to exercise minute control over their sharing can still do so, while others can opt for privacy controls that are easier to understand.

Data Export

This isn’t really a privacy control, but it ties into Facebook’s theme of giving users control over their data. Facebook should give users a simple tool that can export all your personal information to your desktop including your Likes and Interests, photos, Friend list, Wall posts, and so on. That way users will feel more comfortable knowing they can pull all their information out of Facebook with just a few clicks. Admittedly, this is a scary prospect for Facebook, but the company might find that people are more willing to share their data if they know they can yank it off of Facebook any time they like.

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Jeff Bliss

The U.S. Justice Department is making preliminary inquiries into Apple Inc.’s business practices regarding its iTunes digital music service, two people familiar with the matter said.

The antitrust division’s questioning of music industry officials and Internet companies is in the early stages, and the department hasn’t found that Apple has done anything wrong, said the people, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

Apple offers more than 11 million songs through the iTunes store, which it opened in April 2003. ITunes now operates in 23 countries. The Cupertino, California-based company says it is the world’s largest music retailer, with 8.5 billion songs sold.

The inquiry initially was reported by the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times.

Apple spokesman Steve Dowling declined to comment. Gina Talamona, a Justice Department spokeswoman, couldn’t be reached immediately for comment.

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