Sharp Will Stop Selling TVs In The Americas, Licenses Name To Hisense

(Maurizio Pesce)

Sharp was an early player in the flat panel screen market, but the Japanese company has decided to leave behind their TV business in the Americas, agreeing to license their name to a Chinese company, Hisense. Sharp sold its factory in Mexico to Hisense, which will presumably supply TVs to customers in North and South America alike.

Sharp will hand over the keys and the brand name in January of 2016, and they’re the manufacturer of any TVs under that brand that you see in stores now. Well, except for the line of Sharp TVs sold at Best Buy that the retailer licensed the well-known manufacturer’s name for, and which the company said at the time are totally not just Insignia TVs with a Sharp label slapped on them.

Hisense plans to hold a press conference on this tomorrow, but the basic facts were enough to make our test-pattern-watching colleagues down the hall at Consumer Reports ponder what this change will mean for consumers. Sharp says that it will honor warranty and service commitments made to consumers in the U.S., and they don’t seem to be ending all of their U.S. operations: just TVs.

What about Hisense, though? They aren’t new to the U.S. market: they’ve been selling TVs here for a while. Consumer Reports looked back in their ratings and found that the company’s TVs were usually in the bottom half of the rankings. Maybe taking over Sharp’s factory in Mexico will help improve their quality.

Sharp exits the U.S. TV business—what you need to know [Consumer Reports]

by Laura Northrup via Consumerist

Facebook Will Actually Let People Decide What They Want To See In The News Feed

Customization can be a wonderful thing. In the case of your Facebook News Feed, it might mean the difference between confronting a daily onslaught of adorable baby photos and actually getting content you want to view. The social network added a new feature today that will allow users to designate a group of accounts that will automatically appear at the top of their News Feed.

The “See First” option that launched today allows people to identify up to 30 people or pages whose newest updates will appear at the top of the News Feed every time that users opens Facebook.

This is a departure from Facebook’s often confounding algorithm that it uses for determining what people want to see in the News Feed, a divergence from practice that the company itself points out in the blog post announcing the new setting.

“The goal of News Feed is to show you the stories that matter most to you,” Facebook explains. “To do this, we use ranking to order stories based on how interesting we believe they are to you: specifically, whom you tend to interact with, and what kinds of content you tend to like and comment on.”

While you can always click through options on a post that pops up in your News Feed to make it go away or simply have that kind of content appear less often, that doesn’t always guarantee you will or won’t see something like it again the next time you’re on Facebook.

But noting that “ultimately you’re the only one who truly knows what is most meaningful to you,” Facebook says it’s giving more control to users over what they see. Fancy that!

This could be bad for business, Re/code points out, as Facebook relies on people scrolling through their feeds to make money on showing ads to users. But that’s a risk the company is willing to take to please users and keep them coming back for more, a spokesperson explained to Re/code.

“It sounds counterintuitive, but the worse we do on rankings, the more we make people try and scroll through, the more likely they are to just go away,” the rep said. “If we show you the stuff you really really want first, you’ll come back more often.”

See First and other changes in the Preferences section will hit the Facebook app today in an update for iOS, and will roll out to Android and Web versions of the social network later.

And if you’re wondering how you’ll ever fill those 30 slots, might we ah, ahem, humbly suggest you add the Consumerist Facebook page to your list? We promise not to fill your feed with adorable baby photos, unless they are pictures of a newborn wheel of cheese or a wee gaming system in its infancy. So. Cute.

For now, we dance.

by Mary Beth Quirk via Consumerist

Chick-fil-A, Chipotle Lead In Customer Satisfaction Survey, McDonald’s Brings Up The Rear… Again

By now we’re well aware that McDonald’s has struggled to attract and keep new customers in recent years, leading to an all-out overhaul of the fast-food powerhouse. The Golden Arches’ trouble is perhaps most evident this week, as the company clocked in dead last among competition in the American Customer Satisfaction Index, yet again.

The ACSI recently unveiled its annual Full-Service Limited-Service Restaurant ratings [PDF], which compares a dozen name-brand burger, sandwich, pizza, and coffee chains, as well as sit-down dining establishments.

For the sixth year in a row, and the 19th time in 20 surveys, the iconic fast food restaurant brought up the rear with a score of 67 — three points below its score last year, and 19 points below new leader Chick-fil-A.

Speaking of Chick-fil-A, the company had a strong showing in its debut in the ACSI ratings, tallying a rating of 86,  the highest ever score by a company in the quick-service category.

The restaurant wasn’t the only first-timer to the report to have an impressive showing: Chipotle ranked second with a score of 83, while Panera came in third with a score of 80.

“The fast casual segment of quick service restaurants is nicely situated for the confluence of changing consumer tastes and a rebounding economy,” ACSI Director David VanAmburg said in a statement. “Consumers have a bit more money in their pockets, but are still pressed for time. Fast casual outlets offer higher-quality ingredients, freshness and fast service – all at a reasonable price.”

Other newbies, Arby’s and Jack In The Box, didn’t benefit quite as well as their fellow rookies, scoring 74 and 72, respectively.

Last year’s leaders, Papa John’s and Pizza Hut, both shed several points this year, each scoring 78 points.

In fact, nearly all of the restaurants named in the survey saw a drop from their previous rating, with Little Caeser’s 7% drop from 80 to 74 being the worst. Domino’s, Wendy’s, Burger King and McDonald’s each faced a significant drop of at least 5%.

The only establishment to improve in rankings this year was Dunkin’ Donuts, with an increase of 4% from 75 to 78.

Full-service restaurants tended to fare better in the ACSI rankings, with the lowest score — belonging to Ruby Tuesdays — coming in at just 73 points.

Once again, a new entrant took top billing, with Texas Roadhouse rating an 83. Rounding out the top 5 (which included one tie) is LongHorn Steakhouse (81), Cracker Barrel (80), Olive Garden (79) and Outback Steakhouse and Applebee’s (78).

by Ashlee Kieler via Consumerist

Lawsuit Claims Amazon Local Stole Provider Lists, Other Info From Rival Angie’s List

Though some might say that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, achieving that verisimilitude by stealing information from a competitor is not going to go over well. That’s what Angie’s List is alleging in a new lawsuit against upstart Amazon Local, a subsidiary of the ecommerce giant, claiming that the new rival on the scene boosted provider lists and other proprietary information from Angie’s website.

The federal lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court Indianapolis, where Angie’s List is based, accuses Amazon Local executives and some employees of gaining access to Angie’s information by signing up as members of the site, then copying provider profiles, member reviews and other information, reports the Indianapolis Star.

Angie’s List says in the lawsuit that Amazon Local is taking all those juicy details and using it to build up its competing service. The company says its member agreement “explicitly prohibits the use of Angie’s List’s accounts and information for commercial purposes.”

According to the lawsuit, more than a dozen Amazon employees named as co-defendants in the lawsuit violated those terms. Basically, Angie’s says Amazon Local is acting like the popular kid in class mooching off a smarter classmate’s test.

“Amazon Local has chosen not to devote the necessary time, resources and effort to compete legitimately with Angie’s List. … Instead, Amazon Local and its employees have chosen the shortcut of surreptitiously accessing and misappropriating Angie’s List’s proprietary information … through dozens (if not more) of Angie’s List membership accounts that were fraudulently obtained and misused,” the lawsuit says.

The lawsuit also claims Amazon Local tried to sign up businesses using names obtained from Angie’s List online profiles, by going over provider lists to find the top-rated companies and, in some cases, using the site’s own messaging system to contact them and try to bring them over to the Amazon Local side.

Amazon is new on the scene, debuting Amazon Local last year as a test, and recently re-dubbing its home services section, aptly, Amazon Home Services. Much like Angie’s List, the goal is to connect customers with plumbers, home repair services, electricians and the like when they need something done around the home.

Angie’s List was founded in 1995, and has a national listing of those same types of businesses. Members then rank the services, and others can check out those rankings when deciding which service to hire.

Among the charges aimed at Amazon Local: Misappropriation of trade secrets, theft, computer trespass, civil conspiracy and violations of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act. Angie’s List is seeking unspecified damages, and wants Amazon Local banned from using information taken from Angie’s.

“Angie’s List has spent more than 20 years developing our substantial database of proprietary information relating to home improvement service providers, consumer preferences and expectations, and industry standards across the country,” a spokeswoman said. “This information is available to Angie’s List customers for personal use — not for other businesses to use for commercial gain. We welcome competition, but on fair and legal grounds.”

Amazon didn’t reply to the Indy Star’s request for comment.

Angie’s List sues Amazon Local [Indianapolis Star]

by Mary Beth Quirk via Consumerist

Lawsuit Claims Amazon Local Stole Provider Lists, Other Info From Rival Angie’s List

Though some might say that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, achieving that verisimilitude by stealing information from a competitor is not going to go over well. That’s what Angie’s List is alleging in a new lawsuit against upstart Amazon Local, a subsidiary of the ecommerce giant, claiming that the new rival on the scene boosted provider lists and other proprietary information from Angie’s website.

The federal lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court Indianapolis, where Angie’s List is based, accuses Amazon Local executives and some employees of gaining access to Angie’s information by signing up as members of the site, then copying provider profiles, member reviews and other information, reports the Indianapolis Star.

Angie’s List says in the lawsuit that Amazon Local is taking all those juicy details and using it to build up its competing service. The company says its member agreement “explicitly prohibits the use of Angie’s List’s accounts and information for commercial purposes.”

According to the lawsuit, more than a dozen Amazon employees named as co-defendants in the lawsuit violated those terms. Basically, Angie’s says Amazon Local is acting like the popular kid in class mooching off a smarter classmate’s test.

“Amazon Local has chosen not to devote the necessary time, resources and effort to compete legitimately with Angie’s List. … Instead, Amazon Local and its employees have chosen the shortcut of surreptitiously accessing and misappropriating Angie’s List’s proprietary information … through dozens (if not more) of Angie’s List membership accounts that were fraudulently obtained and misused,” the lawsuit says.

The lawsuit also claims Amazon Local tried to sign up businesses using names obtained from Angie’s List online profiles, by going over provider lists to find the top-rated companies and, in some cases, using the site’s own messaging system to contact them and try to bring them over to the Amazon Local side.

Amazon is new on the scene, debuting Amazon Local last year as a test, and recently re-dubbing its home services section, aptly, Amazon Home Services. Much like Angie’s List, the goal is to connect customers with plumbers, home repair services, electricians and the like when they need something done around the home.

Angie’s List was founded in 1995, and has a national listing of those same types of businesses. Members then rank the services, and others can check out those rankings when deciding which service to hire.

Among the charges aimed at Amazon Local: Misappropriation of trade secrets, theft, computer trespass, civil conspiracy and violations of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act. Angie’s List is seeking unspecified damages, and wants Amazon Local banned from using information taken from Angie’s.

“Angie’s List has spent more than 20 years developing our substantial database of proprietary information relating to home improvement service providers, consumer preferences and expectations, and industry standards across the country,” a spokeswoman said. “This information is available to Angie’s List customers for personal use — not for other businesses to use for commercial gain. We welcome competition, but on fair and legal grounds.”

Amazon didn’t reply to the Indy Star’s request for comment.

Angie’s List sues Amazon Local [Indianapolis Star]

by Mary Beth Quirk via Consumerist

Making Money with Af

Making Money with Affiliate Marketing - thumbnails.visual... #SEO #SEM #OrganicSearch #Search #Traffic #Rankings



from Worth Reading..... http://ift.tt/ZAMasa

via IFTTT