The top 10 tech priorities of CIOs
gennaio 18th, 2012
Analytics and business intelligence will be the top technology priorities for CIOs this year, according to Gartner Inc.'s annual survey of IT executives.
This Is the Internet After SOPA [PICS]
gennaio 18th, 2012Nedroid
These sites have "blacked out" today in protest of Stop online privacy act (SOPA). It makes it just a little bit easier to imagine what the web could look like if some of the measures from the proposed SOPA bill were to become law.
Click here to view this gallery.
Today, many popular websites are going “dark” in protest of Stop online piracy act (SOPA).
The consensus among many experts, internet users, web companies and even the White House, is that SOPA is too restrictive, too dangerous, too complicated and too big a threat to our privacy. Simply put, it must be stopped before it’s too late.
In a way, today’s blackout shows what the internet might look if some of the principles in SOPA start being enforced as law. Do you like seeing big “CLOSED” signs on your favorite websites? Neither do we.
We’ve gathered the screenshots of sites which are protesting SOPA with a blackout in the gallery above, and will be adding additional pics as more sites join in. Feel free to add your favorite SOPA-protesting site in the comments below!
More About: SOPA, Stop Online Privacy Act
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The “Boost Your Business” Challenge
gennaio 18th, 2012
One of the great ironies in business is that success can also present a unique set of – well – problems. “Can your systems cope with a big increase in demand? Will customer service and satisfaction suffer if workloads suddenly increase? Are you prepared to deal with entry into new markets? These are just a few of the challenges success might force a business to contend with,” says Benno Eberle, SAP senior solution marketing manager.
To help businesses assess their readiness for successful growth, the SAP Solution Marketing team, in conjunction with SAP Business ByDesign reference customer Cloudbridge Consulting, developed the fun, interactive Boost Your Business Challenge online assessment. “The game will show you how your readiness compares with the average in your industry and help you identify the areas of your business that need the most attention,” says Eberle.
The Boost Your Business Challenge takes just a few minutes and is available in both English and German. Once complete, you’ll receive a free, detailed analysis of your performance.
“The game presents you with typical business challenges in the areas of compliance, efficiency, customer satisfaction, and business insight. Of two possible solutions, you decide which delivers the best result for your business,” explains Eberle.
There are more than 30 individual challenges covering all aspects of a typical business: marketing, sales, and service; finance, HR, and admin; project management; procurement; and IT. There are also CEO challenges that focus on the overall view. Players can tailor the analysis to their particular business by weighting each individual challenge to reflect how relevant it is to their business.
At the end of the challenge, results are presented in the form of a readiness scorecard. You can also download a free, more detailed analysis of the performance of your business and how its results compare with the competition.
Boost Your Business Challenge, English Version
Boost Your Business Challenge, German Version
iPhone 5 a settembre?
gennaio 18th, 2012Anche nei primi giorni del nuovo anno, la rete si riempie di nuove indiscrezioni sulla prossima uscita, dell’iPhone 5, lo smartphone di Apple. Probabilmente la quinta generazione di melafonini dovrà aspettare il prossimo autunno, quando l’attuale iPhone 4s, avrà compiuto il suo primo anno di vita.
L’azienda di Cupertino è abbastanza abituale nelle sue scelte e quindi c’è da aspettarsi che il nuovo iPad 3, il noto tablet dell’azienda che ha per logo una mela morsicata possa fare la sua comparsa negli scaffali degli App Store, nella prossima primavera, probabilmente tra il mese di marzo e aprile, anche se alcune fonti ottimistiche presumono che possa uscire in anticipo il prossimo mese (è evidente che tale date si riferiscono esclusivamente al mercato americano e pertanto per attendere la distribuzione italiana, bisogna aggiungere qualche altro mese), mentre il nuovo smartphone dell’azienda fondata da Steve Jobs e coordinata da Tim Cook, potrebbe uscire nelle prime settimane di settembre. I rumors si concentrano sulla forte probabilità che lo smartphone di Apple possa avere un display di dimensioni maggiori, cioè 4 pollici, altri affermano che il retro del nuovo smartphone sia stato concepito in alluminio, per aumentarne compattezza e resistenza, operazione già attuata negli iPad di seconda generazione.
Wikipedia Goes Black in Protest of SOPA
gennaio 18th, 2012
As announced, Wikipedia’s main page is “blackened” today in protest of the controversial Stop online privacy act (SOPA).
“For over a decade, we have spent millions of hours building the largest encyclopedia in human history. Right now, the U.S. Congress is considering legislation that could fatally damage the free and open Internet. For 24 hours, to raise awareness, we are blacking out Wikipedia,” says the message on the page.
The actual articles on Wikipedia are actually accessible for a short period of time, after which they redirect the visitor to the blackened main page.
For millions of Wikipedia visitors today, the message will be clear: one of the most influential sites and communities on the internet is clearly against SOPA. Many other sites, including Reddit, will join the protest by shutting down or “blacking out” their homepages today.
More About: SOPA, trending, wikipedia
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The Wikipedia Blackout Begins in SOPA Protest
gennaio 18th, 2012
On Wednesday morning at 12:01 a.m., Wikipedia went dark for the first time in history over a high-profile and highly controversial protest against pending legislation in the U.S. Congress that could, if enacted, forever change the Internet as we know it.
“For more than a decade,” the Wikipedia site reads, “we have spent millions of hours building the largest encyclopedia in human history. Right now, the U.S. Congress is considering legislation that could fatally damage the free and open Internet. For 24 hours, to raise awareness, we are blacking out Wikipedia.”
In October 2011, the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) was introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives. On the surface, SOPA was aimed at eliminating the illegal copying and dissemination of movies, music, and other digital content.
But the proposed legislation was quickly accused of over-reaching in its desired authority. As a result, Google, Facebook, Wikipedia, Twitter, and other behemoths of the Web stood united in their opposition to SOPA.
And today, Wikipedia and other large online entities are going dark in protest.
“While I support their goal of reducing copyright infringement (which I don’t believe these acts would accomplish),” says Google co-founder Sergey Brin, “I am shocked that our lawmakers would contemplate such measures that would put us on a par with the most oppressive nations in the world.”
Do you believe the Wikipedia blackout will influence members of Congress to kill SOPA before SOPA, as critics claim, kills the openness of the Internet?
Please weigh in with a thought of comment below.
Google goes dark in protest over SOPA, but not how you would expect
gennaio 18th, 2012
January 18 is here and a large number of businesses, brands and global technology giants are putting into place their actions to protest the SOPA and PIPA bills — one of them being Google.
Today, if you reside in the U.S and you access Google.com, the search giant has blacked out its logo in protest against the SOPA and PIPA, stating that it believes politicians should “end piracy, not liberty” as the bills would “cenesor the Internet and slow economic growth.”
Given that millions of people visit Google.com each day, Google is doing its best to ensure the message is delivered and its users are aware that their Internet freedoms are in jeopardy. To better explain the protest and the bills themselves, Google has added a link on its homepage (as we reported yesterday), to a landing page detailing what the acts (if passed) would mean to Internet users not only in the U.S but all over the world.
It also provides a form to allow visitors to sign the petition against the act.
Those outside the U.S will not see Google’s blacked-out logo, but they will be able to follow the link on the homepage to read more about its actions:
Google lists 67 other brands, businesses and websites that have taken action today, including Wikipedia, which has gone dark but allows users to access its site via their mobiles or by disabling JavaScript, Reddit and Mozilla — which have all chosen to protest in their own ways (some are already down, others are due to in a matter of hours).
Wikipedia users are already complaining about the blackout; one Twitter account is even capturing the anguish of Twitter users by actively retweeting any Twitter user that complains about the site being inaccessible.
Today, one thing is for sure — if you don’t care about SOPA or PIPA, you should probably stay off the Internet.
Summer Coding: U.S. CTO Wants You to Get Tech Skills This Year
gennaio 18th, 2012
Missed out on that New Year’s resolution to learn a programming language — the goal that 300,000 people signed up for, including New York Mayor Bloomberg? Too busy with school to make it happen? You’ll get another, even easier shot at that goal this summer.
Codecademy, the brand-new entity behind that plan, has announced “Code Summer +” — a condensed version of its curriculum, starting this May. The announcement was part of an event with U.S. Chief Technology Officer Aneesh Chopra.
The White House CTO was in San Francisco on Tuesday to push President Obama’s Summer Jobs + plan — and to rack up some new commitments from the tech industry.
“Codecademy is accessible to everyone,” Chopra said. “I’m very bullish on encouraging these tools.”
Standing alongside Chopra and Codecademy co-founder Zach Sim was Mitch Kapor, founder of Lotus and head of a number of foundations that he pledged to help Summer Jobs +. The Level Playing Field Institute and the College Bound Brotherhood will place disadvantaged and minority students in top Silicon Valley firms and Universities.
Kapor recounted that his own career began with a summer job in 1966 that had provided him access to a computer for the first time. “Half the battle with young people is getting the idea that there’s a world they can aspire to,” he said. “We can do a much better job in Silicon Valley of being open to the people knocking on our doors, and overcoming our hidden biases.”
Chopra also announced that the government would create a Schema.org database of summer jobs within 60 days — similar to one that has already been created for Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans.
What do you think? How important are summer jobs in shaping the future of employment and education? Do Chopra’s commitments go far enough, and what else could the government be doing? Let us know in the comments.
More About: barack obama, Codecademy, Lotus, mitch kapor
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Social Business: If You Build It, Will They Come?
gennaio 18th, 2012
CIOs have the opportunity to drive the discussions about external- and internal-facing social business strategies, and a close look reveals that, in fact, the two are really inextricably entwined. The real question to ask now is: Do “sanctioned” social media and mobility solutions handed down from within an organizational hierarchy stand any hope of being embraced productively and enthusiastically by an enterprise workforce? - Anyone whos been paying attention knows that social media,
big data, cloud computing and mobility are colliding in the enterprise,
transforming the way we live and work. Along the way, these factors are raising
a host of challenges for the IT organization, as well as the governance and
complianc...
Clearwire and China Mobile team up to test TD-LTE mobile technology
gennaio 18th, 2012
Struggling US mobile technology provider Clearwire has taken its partnership with China Mobile to the next level after announcing that the duo would begin joint testing of TD-LTE technology, according to Wireless Week.
The link-up comes with much need benefits for the duo, both of which are part of the Global TD-LTE Initiative, and it could lead to the development of devices which can be used on networks in the US and China.
For Clearwire, the deal is a welcomed interest in the 4G technology, its own roll-out of which is massively dependent on generating new funds, as GigaOm points. Sprint stepped in to aid the beleaguered WiMAX provider back in December, but Clearwire is now eyeing China’s mobile market, which outgrew the US last year, and 640 million subscriber strong China Mobile, which is adding customers at a rate of two per second.
The significance of the move for China Mobile could prove to be a new technology to make mobile data work in the country. The Chinese government has failed to gain widespread adoption of its own 3G standard, TD-SCDMA, so the chance to test a technology with the potential to be taken up worldwide, would give more options to China Mobile, the government and other operators in the country.
For example, one key stumbling point that has thus far prevented China Mobile from partnering with Apple to offer the iPhone, has been that Apple is reluctant to support the network. China Mobile does support unlocked devices — which has seen it rack up more than 10 million iPhone users – but it is yet have an Apple device of its own.
Clearwire has been “intending” to add LTE to its network since August having hit reported speeds of 120 Mbps during trials. Clearwire, China Mobile and other operators that are part of the Global TD-LTE Initiative will begin testing the technology this month, before interoperability testing between selected operators takes place later this year.