Facebook now officially owns WhatsApp

By Ellis Hamburger on October 6, 2014 10:20 am

Eight months after announcing its intent to acquire messaging giant WhatsApp, the deal has finally gone through. Facebook announced the closing of the deal with the SEC in the United States, and with the European Commission in Europe. Since the deal was announced for $19 billion, its price tag has actually increased to a whopping $21.8 billion. This is in part due to Facebook's rising stock price over the last several months, Recode points out.

As WhatsApp officially joins the Facebook fold, WhatsApp founder Jan Koum has joined Facebook's board. He will also be paid just $1 per year like Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, according to filings, but has been given a very hefty purse of Facebook shares to hold on to. Facebook now has the right to do whatever it wants with WhatsApp, though the company likely won't make any dramatic changes to the service for a long while. Facebook has pledged to operate its latest acquisitions, from Instagram to Oculus, largely independently — seeing as these companies were already doing so well on their own. For example, don't expect WhatsApp to abandon its $1 / year business model or add advertisements any time soon.

"There would have been no partnership between our two companies if we had to compromise on the core principles that will always define our company, our vision and our product," Koum said when the deal news broke months ago. Facebook does, however, plan to its new businesses to achieving larger scale, according to Facebook. Like Mark Zuckeberg said on a recent earnings call, it's all about ramping up Instagram, Oculus, and now WhatsApp to reaching one billion users. So why mess with something that isn't broke?

asal disini

reverse takeover of google by Alphabet.

 
Google Inc is changing its operating structure by setting up a new company called Alphabet Inc, which will include the search business and a number of other units. Photograph: PAWEL KOPCZYNSKI/REUTERS


Google is now Alphabet. Temporary Holding Company Number Two is now Google. And “don’t be evil” is now one step closer to being a thing of the past.

Following the corporate reshuffle at Google, the world’s largest search firm is now owned by a holding company called “Alphabet” – which, confusingly, was temporarily a subsidiary of Google but then executed a “reverse takeover” of its parent company to become the new boss, at which point Google spun off a number of its own subsidiaries such as its life sciences subsidiary Calico and “moonshot” division X to sit under Alphabet.

The end result is that the Google we all know and love still exists, but sits under an entirely new company, with a new name, new brand, new website – and new ethics policy.

When Alphabet was revealed, it was made clear that Google’s pre-existing ethics policy would only apply to the search firm itself, rather than its parent company. But now that Alphabet has revealed its own Code of Conduct, and the words “don’t be evil” are nowhere in sight.

Instead, the holding company has a rather less pithy set of requirements for its employees, including “avoid conflicts of interest”, “ensure financial integrity and responsibility” and “obey the law”.

That means that Google’s own companies, including YouTube and Android, are still run with a code of conduct that includes the command “don’t be evil” (as well as the less well-known statement that “we like cats, but we’re a dog company”), while the companies that sit directly under Alphabet aren’t.

Alphabet’s other subsidiaries such as X, the division in charge of the company’s balloon-powered internet drone delivery projects, will still have the ability to set their own codes of conduct, just as Google itself has. But the company itself leads on the highly catchy requirement that “Employees of Alphabet and its subsidiaries … should do the right thing – follow the law, act honorably, and treat each other with respect.”

It isn’t the first time Google has downgraded “don’t be evil” in its internal communications. In 2009, the company quietly dropped the line from “motto” to “mantra”, as part of a rebranding of its corporate PR – a far cry from the early noughties, where the phrase had even been included in the company’s 2004 intial public offering.

original here >>> 

original title : Where Google said 'don't be evil', Alphabet just wants employees to 'obey the law'

WhatsApp Web - wanna use it?

Part 1 - Using Google Chrome & Android

This WhatsApp Web review (as we go on) is from an end-user perspective. I am a late WhatsApp user - just had a samsung smartphone with android version 4.2.2. I had opted to use WhatsApp Web, due to my physical shortcomings. You may like WhatsApp Web, if you like to try - here’s how, Kindly note that WhatsApp Web is browser based.

1] Checking your Browser.

Firstly, you have to check that your browser is ‘compatible’ with WhatsApp Web. As for me, I have been religiously using Google Chrome, for Chrome the version needed is minimum ver36 or above. To check your browser’s version – just key in whatversion.net in the navigation bar and once that page is fully loaded just press on the browser you are using, in my case the Chrome (for now I cannot advice you on the versions of other browsers need to operate WhatsApp Web) I am using is:-

2] to use WhatsApp Web - Follow this simple steps here:-

Open this site on your browser (by keying in the navigation bar)  

: - Web.whatsapp.com         

Open WhatsApp on you android (I am using Samsung)

In Chat tab, Go to WhatsApp Web menu and pressed it[the green buttons tell you where & how to get the relevant menu]

3] "Camera mode" will be activated automatically, scan the QR code on the screen with the phone, in the required location [square boundary on your phone], let the phone read the code, a scanning cursor is there as a guide. An Example of the QR code is given below. Please remember to “tick” where the green notification is, to avoid having to activate WhatsApp Web frequently.

Your phone need to be "on" and stay connected all the time, to the internet to use WhatsApp Web on PC.

<end of part 1>