Posted on November 10, 2009 by Andy Marken
There Are Things More Important Than Size…Just Ask Flash “I’d much rather see you on my side, than scattered into… atoms.” – The Emperor Ming, Flash Gordon (Universal Pictures – 1980) We like things that spin, things that go fast. You know, like flying saucers and rocket ships…drives and flash memory. It’s a good thing, because with [...] [more]
Posted on November 9, 2009 by Eric Jacksch
(The Berlin Wall, December 1985. Photo by Eric Jacksch) Twenty years ago today the Berlin Wall fell, uniting East and West Germany. Celebrations today include fireworks, concerts, and the toppling of foam dominoes painted by school children. Spiegel Online International has a great collection of historic images and coverage of the 20th anniversary celebration. They also [...] [more]
Posted on November 9, 2009 by Eric Jacksch
A new student-run program in Indianapolis called Now Think Now encourages teens to think and make better decisions behind the wheel. Their web site explains, Now Think Now is a social site where teens and other community members can gather and share their stories, ideas and opinions. Our ultimate goal is getting teens the information they [...] [more]
Posted on November 2, 2009 by Andy Marken
If being acquired isn’t part of your business plan…prepare your survival strategy. Nothing focuses the mind better than the constant sight of a competitor who wants to wipe you off the map. – Wayne Calloway When Eric Schmidt (Google) said he paid a premium of one billion for YouTube he spelled out part of the strategy companies [...] [more]
Posted on October 29, 2009 by Eric Jacksch
As H1N1 (swine flu) continues to spread, so does misinformation on the Internet. There are several emails in circulation that are simply wrong, and web sites with false information are popping up all over. And scams are starting to emerge. We share this planet with people who still believe the earth is flat, lunatic conspiracy theorists [...] [more]
Posted on October 28, 2009 by Andy Marken
Making The Transition to a Social Business “Look, I’m all about loyalty. In fact, I feel like part of what I’m being paid for here is my loyalty. But if there were somewhere else that valued loyalty more highly, I’m going wherever they value loyalty the most.” – Dwight Schrute – The Office, ABC-TV Seriously… Tim Berners-Lee [...] [more]
Posted on October 26, 2009 by Eric Jacksch
Tens of thousands of pounds of disgusting and dangerous sewage gets pumped into the basements of homeowners in Ottawa, not just once or twice, but three or four times – in what the City claims is a “hundred year occurrence.” The top public servant in Ottawa claims the sewers are working just fine, the way [...] [more]
Posted on October 26, 2009 by Eric Jacksch
I hope that regular readers of my security column will forgive me, but today I’d like to get a few things off my chest. With the holidays approaching, we’ll undoubtedly hear Canadian retailers whinging about how the Internet is costing them revenue and begging us to “shop local.” They’ll tell us how Internet shopping hurts our [...] [more]
Posted on October 19, 2009 by Eric Jacksch
We often hear banks complaining loudly about the losses they suffer from payment card fraud. Campaigns like “Protect your PIN” and humorous commercials with a miniature armoured truck following a customer down the street must cost tens of millions of dollars. But then consumers still receive calls like I did on Saturday afternoon. The bank – [...] [more]
Posted on October 14, 2009 by Eric Jacksch
Ars Technica has a great article this morning entitled 30 years of failure: the username/password combination. One of the things that they didn’t discuss is why we continue to use passwords for authentication even though they’re known to be a serious weakness. The first reason is that, as long as we don’t include the cost of [...] [more]
Posted on October 14, 2009 by Andy Marken
New ideas are almost a dime a dozen. There’s an innovation on almost every street corner. What makes a new idea successful is a well thought out, well developed marketing plan that everyone in the organization can understand, believe in and follow. Without a solid marketing plan it is too easy for an organization to be [...] [more]
Posted on October 13, 2009 by Eric Jacksch
I recently installed Windows 7 Ultimate (32 bit) on my brand new HP Mini 110 (it ships with XP). The Windows 7 distribution included all the drivers needed to get the system up and running, including the WiFi drivers, making it a very painless process. Once running, it automatically downloaded the vendor-specific video driver, resulting [...] [more]
