Communications Technology

A British millionaire businessman whose company builds and markets the Segway upright scooter died when he apparently rode one of them over a cliff and into a river.

West Yorkshire police said Jimi Heselden, 62, was found in the River Wharfe, at Boston Spa, near Wetherby, on Sunday.

“The incident is not believed to be suspicious and the coroner has been informed,” a police spokesman said.

Heselden made his fortune when his Leeds-based firm Hesco Bastion developed the “blast wall” basket, which protect soldiers in Afghanistan and Iraq, as a replacement for traditional sandbags.

Last year he led a British team which bought the US-based Segway firm that makes and distributes the distinctive two-wheeled self-balancing scooters.

The chief executive of Leeds City Council, Tom Riordan, said councillors were “devastated and saddened” to learn of Heselden’s death.

“Jimi was an amazing man who, apart from being a wonderful success story for Leeds due to his business acumen, was also remarkably selfless and generous, giving millions to local charities to help people in his home city,” Riordan said.

“As a council we enjoyed great success with Jimi and Hesco Bastion, working together with them to achieve a historic gold medal for the city at this year’s Chelsea Flower Show, and everyone who knew him will remember his quiet manner, good nature and tremendous pride in being from Leeds.”

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Google chief executive Eric Schmidt said that Microsoft’s Bing search engine was the company’s main threat, not Facebook or Apple.

“While it’s true web search is not the only game in town, searching information is what it is all about,” Schmidt said in Wall Street Journal interview video posted online.

He described Apple as a well-respected competitor and Facebook as a “company of consequence doing an excellent job in social networking,” but said that Microsoft’s latest-generation search engine was Google’s main competition.

“We consider neither to be a competitive threat,” Schmidt said, referring to Facebook and Apple.

“Absolutely, our competitor is Bing. Bing is a well-run, highly competitive search engine.”

Microsoft’s Bing and other internet search services overtook Yahoo! for the first time to become the number two search engine in the United States in August, according to The Nielsen Co.

Microsoft’s Bing, MSN and Windows Live had a 13.9 per cent share of US search volume in August, up 0.25 per cent from July, while Yahoo! had a 13.1 per cent share of US internet searches, down from 14.6 per cent in July, Nielsen said.

Google continued to dominate the lucrative search and advertising market with a 65.1 per cent of all internet searches in August, Nielsen said.

Year-over-year, Microsoft sites have increased their search share from 10.7 per cent in August 2009 to 13.9 per cent in August 2010 while Yahoo! has fallen from 16.0 per cent a year ago to its current 13.1 per cent, Nielsen said.

Google held steady at 65 per cent.

Yahoo! and Microsoft forged a web search and advertising partnership a year ago that set the stage for a joint offensive against Google.

Under the agreement, Yahoo! will use Microsoft’s search engine on its own sites while providing the exclusive global sales force for premium advertisers.

Microsoft last month began handling all Yahoo! online searches in Canada and the United States and will eventually power internet searches at Yahoo! websites worldwide.

Google both competes and partners with Apple, the maker of iPhones, iPods, iPads, and Macintosh computers, according to Schmidt.

Schmidt resigned from the Apple board as Google weighed into the smartphone arena with devices running on its open-source Android mobile software.

He said in a Charlie Rose interviewed published in Business Week that a deal to have Google as the default search engine on iPhones was renewed and that the internet firm provides mapping and other services for Apple gadgets.

Schmidt said that Apple and Google are “two companies I care a lot about” and will remain close. He also said that Google could be improved by making features more social while providing users tools to manage their privacy.

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A US man has tracked down a man he says molested him 40 years ago and posted a video of his apology on YouTube.

Ron Tebo, 47, claimed he and his sister were sexually assaulted by a 15-year-old neighbour, “Butch”, in 1970 when he was six and she was four.

On the video, “Butch” can be seen saying: “I’m truly sorry, that’s all I can say. Nothing more I can do.”

Tebo, a web designer, said he was scared when he found “Butch” after a three-year search and an internet campaign.

“How was I going to spring this on him? My intention was to get a confession, that’s what I wanted to do, that was my goal,” Tebo told AOL News.

Tebo had not been able to bring the case to police, as the statute of limitations for the crime had passed.

“Of course it’s frustrating,” District Attorney bureau chief Rosanne Johnson told AOL News when talking about being unable to charge people who have confessed.

Tom Spulecki of New York State’s police department said: “One of our last conversations was that he wanted some closure and wasn’t sure what he would do when he found him.”

Tebo embarked on his hunt for the alleged molester in 2007 after tracking down a confessed paedophile, Jack McClellan, who set up a website on how to prey on young girls without getting caught.

His campaign, which included an anti-McClellan website, grabbed the attention of the national media, and led to McClellan’s arrest.

It also led Tebo to reveal his personal experiences on US TV network CBS.

Tebo then went back to his old home, where he located “Butch’s” house and found his surname on the vacant home’s letterbox, AOL News reported.

He used property records to track down “Butch’s” father’s name, scoured the internet to find his obituary, and found “Butch’s” name as the next of kin.

He started knocking on people’s doors to find “Butch”.

But the turning point came when Tebo had a client who lived near “Butch”. When he asked her if she knew him, she said “Butch” worked for her and she pointed out his home for Tebo.

Two days later, Tebo returned and secretly recorded a video of his meeting with “Butch” and then posted it on the internet.

But Tebo’s sister, who did not want to be named, said the meeting brought back difficult memories for her.

“I remember [being] in a car and I also remember a barn,” she told AOL News.

“I’ve never forgotten, but I don’t think about it [constantly].

“But there are times when I wondered, not necessarily ‘Where is he?’ or ‘What is he doing?’ but ‘How many other people has he done this to?”‘

“I have thought about that - does he have his own children. Is he doing it to them?”

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