For those fans, it is bad news all-round at the moment, as ticketing data experts SeatGeek revealed that prices for the 46th staging of the Super Bowl are still on-course to be at their highest average in the event’s history , with rates on Thursday afternoon recorded at $3,395.

The cheapest ticket sale in the past fortnight (described by SeatGeek as the ‘get-in price) was $2,200 (recorded yesterday), meaning that there could still be people able to get in for a lower price, although the view will naturally not be as good.

With such high prices, it is obvious that the city are prepared to have the game on whatever the circumstances, with Super Bowl organisers reportedly carrying contingency plans (such as snow plough routes) for 8 different types of weather.

Meanwhile, the NFL have warned fans against purchasing fake tickets, as they alongside local police authorities in the areas of the participating franchises have made a number of arrests in relation to fake tickets and merchandise. They claim to buyers that real tickets will have a heat-sensored Super Bowl logo and two-image hologram, and that anyone who purchases a fake will not be reimbursed by the league.

Authorities claim that they have already confiscated $4.8m worth of fake merchandise (such as hats and jackets), and that they expect to see between 100-200 fake stubs at the gates of the Lucas Oil Stadium on Sunday (is that all?). With a level of dedication and planning at a seemingly very high standard, will the Super Bowl collect its profits without a hitch, or will any ‘criminals’ manage to sneak a quick buck from the festivities?

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The court in Paris (France) decided on Tuesday that Google were ‘unfair’ to local rival company Bottin Cartographes, who complained that Google France (a regional branch of Google) used the safety net of Google’s riches to offer free extended online mapping services to selected French businesses, used as a means of convincing them to apply Google’s mapping option instead of rivals.

Bottin Carto., who launched the complaints, said that the moves were made by Google as a means of quickly getting to a dominant market position by ‘undercutting’ fee-charging rivals, with Google then likely to begin charging for their business mapping services when they had a strong [dominant] foothold in the market.

The ruling made by the court announced that Google are now required to pay €500,000 ($660,000) to Bottin in ‘damages and interest’, while Google will also pay the courts a €15,000 fine for their misconduct.

Bottin Carto’s lawyer Jean-David Scemmama said of the verdict: “This is the end of a two-year battle, a decision without precedent. We proved the illegality of (Google’s) strategy to remove its competitors… the court recognised the unfair and abusive character of the methods used and allocated Bottin Cartographes all it claimed. This is the first time Google has been convicted for its Google Maps application.”

Google France, meanwhile, were naturally not in the best of moods, as a spokesman summarised the company’s plans for the case: “We will appeal this decision. We remain convinced that a free high-quality mapping tool is beneficial for both Internet users and websites. There remains competition in this sector for us, both in France and internationally.”

It is not the first time that Google have run into legal issues in France (after a €100,000 fine last year for data privacy breaches on Google Street View), so is this further proof that at least in France, Google’s high-ranking global business status does not make them untouchable?

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The deal is currently only applicable to 14 cites in the USA (including Los Angeles, Boston, Seattle, and New York City) and several countries (such as Australia, France, and New Zealand) win which Trusted Photographers operates.

The idea is that the partnership will allow business owners to be ‘matched up’ with local photographers taking the pictures as an external source on behalf of Google, with the panoramic images (after processing and verification) later appearing on Google’s Street View and Business Listing service.

The approval process for sending a photographer out will most likely be the same, but with less direct work on Google’s part, meaning that with approved ‘freelancers’ now able to take the all-important shots, there is likely to be a higher rate of new images, taking the process of Street View indoors to even quicker and efficient levels. Will placing their trust outside of the company work well for Google’s panoramic image collection?

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Steve Hakusa, the main engineer for ‘Google Public Alerts’, claims that the aim of the service is to offer key ‘emergency information’ such as the circumstance, and how long it could have an affect on its area for, combining it simply to the main Google Maps service. The move follows on from a similar service used by Google in 2008, as a means of geo-tagging outbreaks of illnesses, such as flu epidemics.

Hakusa wrote in a blog post announcing the release of Public Alerts: “If a major weather event is headed for your area, you might go online to search for the information you need: What’s happening? Where and when will it strike? How severe will it be? What resources are available to help?”

Google Public Alerts will be applying data sourced from a number of big-name outlets in the USA, including US Geological Survey (USGS), US National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), and the National Weather Service. Searches can be searched in basic or detailed views, with Google currently working on further improving ‘range and relevance’ of content based on searches. Will this update manage provide users with potentially critical when they need it most?

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That was the average price of a ticket to the event as of Thursday, with the cheapest seats still above the $2,000 mark. These fees will still most likely increase further in cost to something much higher than the original ‘face value’ of the tickets ($800-$1,200).

Fans of the NFL (and in particular the finalist Giants & Patriots) hoping to attend the event will be in for a costly trip (although they probably already knew that anyway), with travel, accommodation, and food all likely to be on the things to consider financially, with the city quite obviously using the opportunity to raise their prices for the week of added tourists.

Regardless of what many people outside of America think of the sport, the popularity of the annual event and demand for tickets makes the high prices in Indianapolis understandable, but some offers around the city just seem to be too much. The highest prices to watch live at the Lucas Oil Stadium will be an incredible $600,000+ fee each for ‘field-level suites’.

Meanwhile, a person in America who is not interested in the big game is trying to cash in anyway, offering for $1,600 the chance to do something that most people would have access to anyway (either themselves or through a friend). The unidentified user of Craigslist (who lives in Indianapolis) wrote: “I’m selling two tickets to watch Super Bowl XLVI at my house on my brand new hi-definition Samsung 55-inch 3D TV. I’m not much of a football fan so I don’t plan on watching the game myself however, since I’d hate to see such a great 3D television experience go to waste, I thought I’d give someone else the opportunity to enjoy it.”

For fans looking for a cheaper way to enjoy the week, other Super Bowl-themed attractions in the city include downtown street parties, viewing areas, and an official ‘NFL Experience’ and ‘Super Bowl Village’, amongst others.

It will be a big expensive spectacle that is set to occur on Sunday, but can the event live up to the hype both on and off the field?

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The effect is the key element of the new update, having before shown various images with clear indication that more than one was taken and ’stitched’ to others to form local maps, but with v6.2 the data is now presented in a more ’streamlined’ fashion.

Other features coming from the update (which was released yesterday), include new ’search layers’ for more detailed searching alongside auto-complete text, direction information for walking, cycling, and public transport, and interactivity with the Google+ social networking service (the ability to take and post Google Earth screenshots to your profile).

The changes have taken place on both desktop and mobile versions of the programme. A Google spokeswoman said of the update: “We are always working on making Google Earth imagery as seamless as possible. These recent changes will make the map more beautiful by showing a single source of data at high altitudes, significantly reducing patchiness from orbit. You may notice as you zoom in that there will be shifts in imagery as data from different sources transitions in but we aim to minimize this effect through special processing.”

With a key breakthrough now made in Google Earth’s imagery development process, how much closer to reality will the service now be considered?

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The city has the honour of hosting the contest due to Azerbaijan’s victory last year in Dusseldorf (Germany) through duet pair Ell & Nikki, with the event being mainly organised through national public broadcaster iTV, and set to be held between 22-26 May.

The event yesterday was considered as an ‘opening show’ to May’s contest, with decisions being announced on the official logo, the semi-final allocations for participants, and perhaps most importantly, the venue where it is all going to take place in 4 month’s time.

In a decision announced by the European Broadcasting Union (EBU, the organisation that founded and are responsible for the event), it was revealed that the entries from 43 countries will be performing at the new ‘Baku Crystal Hall’ on the city’s seafront.

The 23,000-capacity arena will be completed at the end of March at a cost of 6 million m (Azerbaijani Manat), and will have been constructed in the space of just 8 months.

While the venue will be permitted its full capacity for other events in the future (having been built as ‘multi-purpose’), organisers of Eurovision anticipate a capacity crowd of a reduced 16,000 for the competition.

EBU ‘Eurovision Song Contest Executive Supervisor’ Jon Ola Sand said of the news: “We are excited to hold the 2012 Eurovision Song Contest in a brand new, state-of-the-art concert hall. Now that we have the assurance that the construction will be ready in time, we can look really forward to the contest.”

With the rest of Europe ready to descend on Baku for a week of musical and broadcasting festivities, will the preparations in the city run smoothly?

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As of 1 March, Google will be launching a more consumer-friendly and open privacy policy, whilst their collection of services will become more integrated, with featured applications that are set to be combined including Google Maps, Google Calendar, and Google+,, amongst others.

Google’s director of ‘privacy product & engineering’ Alma Whitten said of the plans: “We believe this new, simpler policy will make it easier for people to understand our privacy policies as well as enable Google to improve the services we offer. In short, we’ll treat you as a single user across all our products, which will mean a simpler, more intuitive Google experience.”

It seems as though the main motivation for the privacy policy changes (which include greater transparency in their processes) is based around protecting themselves from potential legal cases.

However, it seems as though the opportunity for changes may have become an excuse for new updates, with planned new options including creating adverts based on a user’s preferences or dislikes, and ‘Maps’ combined with ‘Calendar’ dates to offer more detailed directions based on time and local traffic. While little else is known about the potential match-ups that may now occur within Google, how many will the geographical stylings of Google Maps fit into?

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In under a fortnight’s time, the city, capital of US state Indiana, will be hosting Super Bowl XLVI, the pinnacle annual game of american football. Held this year in the Lucas Oil Stadium on 5 February, the event will be a rematch of a historic game played in 2008, when the New England Patriots lost out on a chance to go the (19-game) season undefeated when the New York Giants scored a winning play with 35 seconds remaining.

The hosting in Indiana is notable for being only the fourth occasion that the Super Bowl has been staged in a ‘cold-weather’ city in its 46-run history. This means that while Indianapolis might be used to a major sporting event coming to town (such as the annual Indy 500 race), it is believed by locals that they have not hosted anything on this scale before, and that everyone needs to put on their best face for the good of the city’s image, and with a lack of more conventional transportation links (with only a modest bus service providing regular public transportation internally), taxi drivers are thought to be on the front line in this scenario.

As the city, which is expecting at least 150,000 visitors over the next fortnight, has a supply of around 700 ‘cabs’, it could be considered a very busy and stressful period for the people behind the wheel, but they have been instructed to provide ’service with a smile’ to help provide a good welcoming experience to the visitors.

Tips being offered to the drivers include offering advice on local attractions and events, making sure that they are made available as much as possible, and a ‘20-12 foot rule’ for engaging with customers (eye contact & smiling).

University of South Florida ‘urban transportation’ researcher Steve Polvin said of the importance of visitors being able to travel efficiently: “If somebody is stuck for hours and misses events, they’re going to be frustrated, and that could definitely have a backlash. You have to execute well.”

The added and more frequent work load provided by out-of-towners is not all bad news for local service providers though, as with it is set to come a healthy income boost. Local taxi driver Abdal Rhrim stated: “It’s going to be wonderful. I’m going to be retired after the Super Bowl.”

While city-based taxi drivers look forward to a week of potential goldmine, will they be enough to save Indy from mass congestion and traffic/transportation chaos?

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The move is designed to help integrate maps of poorer nations (previous beneficiaries of such projects include Uganda, Haiti, and Southern Sudan) by clearly showing locations of local (and sometimes overlooked) settlements, roads, water distribution points, and hospitals.

The announcement seems to be claiming that the two parties will work even closer together to provide more opportunities for global mapping projects, in particular on the continent of Africa. It is also making the Google Map Maker service more readily available to the recipient national governments, especially in the aftermath of a natural disaster.

World Bank [Africa Region] vice-president Obiageli Ezekwesili said of the benefits of this arrangement: “Today’s technology can empower civil society, including the diaspora, to collaborate and support the development process. This collaboration is about shifting the emphasis from organizations to people, and empowering them to solve their own problems and develop their own solutions using maps.”

While the main purpose of Google coming together with World Bank may be seen as a contingency mapping plan in the event of any potential disasters, will it be used most of the time as a way to bring smaller nations up to a higher standard with their online map offerings?

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