By Sarah Jacobsson
February 10, 2010

Apple could cut iPad prices if the device isn’t selling well, the Wall Street Journal reports.

According to Credit Suisse analyst Bill Shope, who met with Apple executives Sunday night, Apple indicated that it would slash iPad prices if the device didn’t sell enough units. “While it remains to be seen how much traction the iPad gets initially, management noted that it will remain nimble (pricing could change if the company is not attracting as many customers as anticipated),” Shope wrote in a post-meeting note.

The iPad is already priced aggressively, at just $499 for the starting model (16GB, no 3G) — much less than initially expected. Apple is perhaps bolstering itself against the potentially lackluster iPad market — since the announcement of Apple’s wonder-tablet, the iPad has been under constant fire with regard to its name, its lack of a camera and multitasking, and the argument that the iPad is just a giant iPod touch.

Online consumer marketplace Retrevo reports that the number of people who have heard about the tablet but are uninterested in buying one, has doubled from 26% (before the tablet’s unveiling) to 52%.

The flexibility in pricing is reminiscent of the iPhone’s release in 2007 — when Apple slashed the price of the iPhone by $200 just two months after the phone’s debut.

Also in Shope’s post-meeting note: Despite what some believe, Apple officials don’t think that the iPad is in danger of “cannibalizing” other Apple lines. According to the execs, there is a clear “segmentation of capabilities” that suggests “cannibalization may be less of a concern than most currently believe.”

By remaining flexible on pricing, it might seem as though Apple is prematurely predicting a failure of sorts in its iPad. Of course, we must remember that the iPad is a tablet in a (mostly) tablet-less world. Apple has a history of changing the world with its technologies (think about the MP3 market before the iPod), and perhaps erring on the cautious side is the way Apple does it.

By Remedios V. Lucio
Contributor
February 9, 2010

The Philippine business-process outsourcing (BPO) industry has definitely grown over the last couple of years. Recently, during the 10th e-Services Global Sourcing Conference and Exhibition held at SMX, the revenues were reported to have significantly increased by 19% to $7.2 billion since 2008.

“It’s been a good year, especially in the second half of 2009, when the recovery started to kick in,” elaborated Gillian Virata, Business Processing Association of the Philippines executive director for information and research.   BPAP reported that the continuously growing sector provided more than 70,000 jobs for Filipinos last year. Meanwhile, the knowledge-process outsourcing industry also earned $1.19 billion.  It had increased by 35% in its revenues since 2008.  However, the IT sourcing sector lowered by 5.5%.  Experts foresee a possibility of attracting newer markets in animation, ESO and transcription this year.

According to the Global Services/Tholons Top 50 Emerging Outsourcing Cities report last October 2009, Philippines is considered as the second offshore nation following India.  Makati is the top location for HR outsourcing and Cebu is the number one emerging global outsourcing city.

Moreover, chairman Charlie Villasenor of the Procurement and Sourcing Institute of Asia said that “outsourcing and offshoring is all about supply management.”  He believed this was considerably one of the best years of e-services because there were more suppliers and buyers who attended the event.

He also said he believed in the talent, guts and resources of Filipinos thus leading to a possibly successful leadership in the BPO sector.  “We are getting a lot of global attention…and what I keep thinking about is that [the world] has finally found that the Filipinos have something more to offer than call centers.  And procurement BPO is a big part of it.”

Data privacy law was also discussed during the press conference.  Monchito Ibrahim, commissioner of the Commission on Information and Communications Technology, explained the importance of creating the Department of Information and Communications Technology to ensure the protection of important company data. He said it will be a way for the Philippines to measure up with other countries around the world.  “[BPO] can expect more support from the government especially in developing new markets,” Ibrahim said.

Last February, Salmat opened its BPO Solutions Center in Manila.  Dr. Philip Hadcroft, general manager of strategy at Salmat, said it will represent their strong commitment to the country’s BPO industry.  The company’s services will include “call centers, computer programming, web content management, data entry” and “IT-enabled services.”

Currently, there are 100 employees in their Mckinley Hill office.  They are expecting to grow to 800 employees in three years time.  He further noted that the facility was bigger than what they had expected.

February 9, 2010

Social networking giant, Multiply, now makes upgrading accounts much easier for its over five million Filipino users.

To get a premium account, Multiply subscribers can opt for Globe GCASH, an internationally-acclaimed mobile commerce service, which is one of the preferred modes of payment for online shopping. The partnership between Globe GCASH and Multiply for secure and convenient online payment settlement is the first in the industry.

Globe GCASH mobile wallet is available to all Globe and TM subscribers nationwide. It allows subscribers to conveniently send and receive cash electronically, make payments, as well as buy good and services.

“Filipinos love content and combined with their desire to connect with family and friends, they often share personal documentation of their lives online.  That is why Globe GCASH and Multiply decided to work on this collaborative effort to give more value-added services to our subscribers,” said Rizza-Maniego Eala, President of G-Xchange Inc., a wholly-owned subsidiary of Globe Telecom which operates GCASH.

Since Multiply’s unlimited photosharing facility is very attractive to Filipino Internet users, Multiply has introduced a permanent backup solution for all photos and videos uploaded to the site for just Php 799 a year or Php 99 per month.

January 19, 2010

AMD announced VISION Pro Technology, a new commercial PC platform brand that delivers a superior visual computing experience, and can help businesses increase productivity and gain competitive advantage by enabling visually stunning communications, marketing and sales materials.

Graphics matter more than ever in business communication and innovative companies are leveraging balanced PC platform technology to generate and view rich visual presentations, including videos and 3D graphics to communicate winning ideas. Studies show that more than 80% of human comprehension is gained visually and that the use of visual aids with oral presentations improves content retention as much as 6.5 times greater than using words alone. Furthermore, the increased viewing area provided by multiple monitors helps improve worker productivity by as much as 40%. Commercial PCs based on VISION Pro Technology from AMD offer out-of-the-box support for multiple monitors, seamless viewing of videos, use of video conferencing software, and the performance necessary to create and view rich presentations with embedded video and 3D graphics.

“At virtually every price point, commercial PCs based on VISION Pro Technology from AMD offer incredible value and the balanced platform performance needed to leverage today’s visually oriented business applications,” said Nigel Dessau, Chief Marketing Officer ofAMD. “With support for the latest in open standards-based security features, as well as the performance headroom needed for standard productivity applications, VISION Pro Technology has been designed to provide businesses with PC systems that generate, propagate and display world-class business materials.”

Industry Support for VISION Pro
VISION Pro Technology is an extension of the September 2009 launch that introduced VISION Technology from AMD. By focusing on real-world usage, not just technical specifications, VISION Technology can help consumers, retailers and PC manufacturers better understand and communicate the benefits and value of well-balanced AMD platform technology. The dramatically positive response from industry partners has brought VISION Pro Technology to the commercial space, enabling innovative, affordable platform technology for business users.

“VISION Pro Technology from AMD is an ideal foundation for the business-class entry ultraportable ThinkPad X100e and our full-featured ThinkPad Edge laptops designed especially for small to medium businesses,” said Sam Dusi, VP-ThinkPad Product Marketing at Lenovo. “These laptops offer features like great visual computing performance, manageability and security that give businesses an edge, and they come at prices customers will find attractive in this tough economic environment.”

“Business customers have told us that they want to use their PCs for business applications, as well as the full set of consumer scenarios in Windows 7,” said Mike Nash, corporate vice president of Windows Platform Strategy at Microsoft Corp.  ”To respond to these needs, Windows 7 Professional and Vision Pro technology from AMD deliver the manageability required by businesses without compromising the performance and functionality end users demand.”

Security and Virtualization
Security features supported by VISION Pro Technology include the Trusted Platform Module (TPM), AMD’s Enhanced Virus Protection (EVP), and key Windows 7 Professional features. AMD client virtualization technology [AMD Virtualization (AMD-V) technology] provides the full, chip-level optimization needed to support legacy applications under Windows XP Mode.

By Lexton Snol
PC Advisor
January 3, 2009

Words from the world of technology and social media are among those identified as the “Words of the Year 2009″ in a list commissioned by Oxford University Press.

The New Oxford American Dictionary had already announced the verb ‘unfriend’ (”To remove someone as a ‘friend’ on a social networking site such as Facebook“) as its word of the year, confirming the social-networking term’s ubiquity.

The new list was chosen by Countdown dictionary expert Susie Dent, who scanned the two billion word Oxford English Corpus database, reports The Telegraph.

“Tweetups” (meetings organised via micro-blogging service Twitter) is also on the list - although the more common derivation “tweet” is not.

Also derived from Twitter is the word “Hashtag” - meaning the # [hash] sign added to a word or phrase that enables Twitter users to search for tweets that contain similarly tagged items.

“Tag cloud” (a visual depiction of the word content of a Web site, or of user-generated tags attached to online content) was also picked out as one of the words of the year.

And “Slashdot effect” was another tech term included in the list. It means to slow down or crash a small Web site due to a huge increase in traffic when the Web site is linked to another, much more popular one.

“Freemiums” and “Paywalls” demonstrate that the world of free internet access may be under particular attack in 2010.


Words of the Year 2009

Tweetup - noun: a meeting or other gathering organised by means of posts on the social networking service Twitter. [from tweet + up on the pattern of MEETUP].

Hashtag - noun: a # [hash] sign added to a word or phrase that enables Twitter users to search for tweets (postings on the Twitter site) that contain similarly tagged items and view thematic sets.

Tag cloud - noun: a visual depiction of the word content of a Web site, or of user-generated tags attached to online content, typically using colour and font size to represent the prominence or frequency of the words or tags depicted.

Slashdot effect - noun: the slowing down or crashing of a small Web site due to a huge increase in traffic when the Web site is linked to another, much more popular one.

Unfriend/defriend - verb: to remove from one’s ‘friends’ list (e.g. on a social networking Web site).

Bossnapping - noun: (in France) the prevention of senior managers from leaving company premises for a period of time by their employees, in order to protest about large-scale redundancies and cutbacks.

Zombie bank - noun: a financial institution whose liabilities are greater than its assets, but which continues to operate because of government support.

Geoengineering/ecohacking - noun: the deliberate large-scale manipulation of an environmental process that affects the earth’s climate, in an attempt to counteract the effects of global warming.

Jeggings - plural noun: close-fitting leggings made of fabric that resembles denim in appearance [from jeans + leggings].

Minute mentoring - noun: a system of advising aspiring professionals based on the format of speed-dating.

Phantonym - noun: a word that looks as it if means one thing but in fact means something quite different. [from 'phantom + antonym] (for example fulsome, used by President Obama to mean ‘full’, when in fact it is now chiefly used in reference to excessive flattery).

Staycation - noun: a holiday spent in one’s home country rather than abroad, or one spent at home and involving day trips to local attractions.

Simples - exclamation: used to say that something is very easy to achieve [from the 'compare the meerkat' TV advert].

Great Recession - noun: term for the current recession, modelled on the Great Depression.

Freemium - noun: a business model in which some basic services are provided for free, with the aim of enticing users to pay for additional, premium features or content.

Paywall - noun: a way of blocking access to a part of a Web site which is only available to paying subscribers.

January 2, 2009

When asked about what will happen in 2009, a rise in global epidemics was at the top of Kaspersky Lab’s prediction list.  Kaspersky Lab,  a leading developer of Internet threat management solutions that protect against all forms of malicious software, has seen that prediction to be true —  2009 was dominated by sophisticated malicious programs with rootkit functionality, Conficker, Web attacks and botnets, SMS fraud and attacks on social networks.

With the start of 2010, researchers and analysts from Kaspersky Lab have come up with a list of six predictions for what will be the New Year’s greatest threats and newest attack vectors.

1.       A rise in attacks originating from file sharing networks.
This year, we will see a shift in the types of attacks on users, from attacks via Web sites and applications toward attacks originating from file sharing networks.

2.       An increase in mass malware epidemics via P2P networks.
In 2009 a series of mass malware epidemics has been “supported” by malicious files that are spread via file sharing networks. This method has been used to spread notorious threats such as TDSS and Virut as well as the first backdoor for Mac OS X. In 2010, we expect to see a significant increase in these types of incidents on P2P networks.

3.       Continuous competition for traffic from cybercriminals.
The modern cybercriminal world is making more and more of an effort to legalize itself and there are lots of ways to earn money online using the huge amount of traffic that can be generated by botnets. In the future, we foresee the emergence of more “grey” schemes in the botnet services market. These so-called “partner programs” enable botnet owners to make a profit from activities such as sending spam, performing denial of service (DoS) attacks or distributing malware without committing an explicit crime.

4.       A decline in fake anti-virus programs.
The decline in gaming Trojans witnessed in 2009 is likely to be repeated for fake anti-virus programs in 2010. Conficker installed a rogue anti-virus program on infected computers. The fake anti-virus market has now been saturated and the profits for cybercriminals have fallen. Additionally, this kind of activity is now being closely monitored by both IT security companies and law enforcement agencies, making it increasingly difficult to distribute fake anti-virus programs.

5.       An interest in attacking Google Wave.
When it comes to attacks on Web services, Google Wave looks like it will be making all the headlines in 2010. Attacks on this new Google service will no doubt follow the usual pattern: first, the sending of spam, followed by phishing attacks, then the exploiting of vulnerabilities and the spreading of malware.

6.       An increase in attacks on iPhone and Android mobile platforms.
The year 2010 promises to be a difficult time for iPhone and Android users. The first malicious programs for these mobile platforms appeared in 2009, a sure sign that they have aroused the interest of cybercriminals. The only iPhone users currently at risk are those with compromised devices; however the same is not true for Android users who are all vulnerable to attack. The increasing popularity of mobile phones running the Android OS combined with a lack of effective checks to ensure third-party software applications are secure, will lead to a number of high-profile malware outbreaks.

“Malware will continue to further its sophistication in 2010 with specific malware families requiring significant resources from anti-malware companies to adequately fight them,” said Roel Schouwenberg, senior malware researcher at Kaspersky Lab. “Third party program vulnerabilities will continue to be the target of choice by cybercriminals with Adobe continuing to be the main target. And finally I believe that with the introduction of real-time search, black hat SEO and social networks will become an even bigger focus of cybercriminals.”

December 29, 2009

Jesus “Boboy” Romero, enterprise segments head of Globe Business; Gil Genio, head of Globe Business; Bong Borja, President of Aegis PeopleSupport; and Curt Gooden, head of IT at Aegis PeopleSupport.

Globe, a leading telecommunications company in the Philippines, has announced that it has been chosen as the network services provider of Aegis PeopleSupport for its domestic data needs. Globe provides MPLS (Multi-point Layer 3 private IP service) and Domestic Leased Lines for the connectivity requirements of Aegis PeopleSupport through Globe Business.

Globe Business, the corporate arm of Globe, enables Aegis PeopleSupport to connect to its clients and to its various sites in Manila, Cebu and Baguio. Its E1 Domestic Leased Lines offer dedicated point-to-point clear channel connections between two offices, which is preferred for enterprises that require full time, guaranteed and dedicated private connectivity for data, voice and video applications.

Its MPLS gives enterprises a highly reliable and secure private netw0rk for their connectivity requirements. The multi-service IP MPLS network of Globe Business is the first and only pure IP MPLS network in the country.

Aegis PeopleSupport, as a high performance provider of outsourced customer management transcription and captioning, accounts receivable management and additional back-office services, benefits from the strong domestic data offerings of Globe Business. Aegis PeopleSupport provides for US-based Fortune 500 and other industry-leading clients that see offshore outsourcing as part of a worldwide strategy to optimize the people supply chain.

Globe Business offers wireless and wireline data and voice solutions relevant to the needs of various local and foreign small, medium and large enterprises from diverse industries. It understands the needs of enterprises and provides them with solutions that perfectly match their business demands, whether cost efficiency, security, mobility, IT integration, and reliable connectivity.

December 28, 2009

Globe, a leading telecommunications company in the Philippines, participated in the Carrier Ethernet World APAC Congress 2009 held recently in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. This is Asia Pacific’s largest meeting place and educational forum for the Ethernet networking and service industry.

Offering Ethernet services since 2000, Globe shared insights on developing innovative Ethernet offerings that would deliver the communication solutions that business customers want. Globe provides Ethernet services through Globe Business, its corporate arm.

Speaking at the conference, Globe Business Technical Services architect Gilbert Virtucio said Ethernet, which has long been used in local area networks of businesses, has emerged to become a carrier-class service. Ethernet today delivers to enterprises a simple and cost-effective wide area network (WAN) solution to meet their connectivity needs.

“Carrier Ethernet is an ubiquitous, standardized, carrier-class service and network defined by five attributes that distinguish it from familiar LAN-based Ethernet, namely its scalability, reliability, service management, quality of service and standardized services,” Virtucio said.

He added, “As enterprise customers need more bandwidth for the applications they use, try to keep the cost structure down for WAN services, and face limited in-house technical resources that they have to keep network services simple, these will drive the demand for Ethernet services.”

Globe Business Technical Services architect Gilbert Virtucio during the 2009 Carrier Ethernet World APAC Congress

The major factors that led to the emergence of Ethernet services are its simplicity, scalability and low cost to implement. Ethernet provides simple yet high-bandwidth to transport converged voice and video applications, can easily scale from 1 Mbps or even 10 Gbps, and has global reach.

Virtucio said enterprises today look for the capability to provide bandwidth on demand, quality of service and network monitoring in choosing network services. This he shared during the discussion on Developing business customers from wholesale P2P Metro Ethernet services to L2 multipoint connectivity services, where he was a panelist at the conference.

With Ethernet able to deliver these customer needs, Carrier Ethernet services have emerged as viable choices for enterprises for their WAN connectivity requirements.

Enterprises also increasingly require monitoring of latency, packet loss and jitter, in addition to bandwidth availability and utilization. The service management feature of Carrier Ethernet covers these needs.

By Jared Newman
December 24, 2009

After months of rumors, we still know very little about Apple’s tablet device — but that could change very soon. Apple is reportedly holding a media event in San Francisco on January 26, where the company is expected to make a major product announcement.

According to the Financial Times’ unnamed sources, Apple will make the announcement at the Yerba Buena Arts Center, the same place where Apple chief executive Steve Jobs showed off new iPods in September.

Other rumors back up this story. Business Insider reports that Apple will demonstrate the tablet in January. Business Insider also says that Apple has told select developers to get ready, saying their apps will run fine if they’ve been designed for full-screen resolution. The New York Times reports, via an unnamed senior Apple employee, that Steve Jobs is “extremely happy” with the device. No one’s saying the device will launch next month — March seems more likely — but it’ll be the first time Apple actually comes clean with its plans.

For some perspective on how ridiculous the rumor mill has become, think of all the Apple tablet coverage you’ve read over the past half year, then try to tell someone at your next holiday dinner party what the device will be. You really can’t; reports about the device’s capabilities and design have been all over the map.

We’ve heard that the Apple tablet will offer a 9.7-inch screen and sell for $800, or maybe a 6-inch screen, and will sell for under $700. We’ve also heard it will feature a 10.1-inch screen and retail for a cool $1000. As if that’s not enough, yesterday Boy Genius Report said there’s a 7-inch model (price unspecified) in addition to the 10-inch tablet. An analyst recently said the tablet will either run OS X or something like the iPhone OS. We’ve heard that it will play HD video, read e-books, and save the newspaper industry. With all due respect, I’d expect any other tablet to do the same.

So I’m thrilled that the rumors may finally be put to rest in January. But since those hopes are pinned on rumors themselves, we’ll just have to exercise a little patience.

By Gregg Keizer
Computerworld
December 23, 2009

Mozilla yesterday said that its planned overhaul of Firefox’s interface will be pushed back to Firefox 4.0, the major release now slated to ship before the end of 2010.

Previously, Mozilla said it would revamp the look and feel of its open-source browser in a two-step process , with part of the redesign debuting in Firefox 3.7 — a minor refresh scheduled for late in the first quarter of next year — with the rest following in version 4.0.

Mozilla’s interface plans, particularly those intended for Firefox for Windows, have attracted attention because the company last September said it would “ribbonize” the browser by borrowing graphics concepts from Microsoft ’s Windows 7 and Office 2007. Users blasted the idea.

Later, Mozilla clarified its intentions , saying that although it was going to eliminate the traditional top-of-the-frame menus in Firefox, it was not going to turn its browser into a graphical doppelganger of Office 2007.

Mozilla’s newest plans for Firefox 4.0 center around a so-called “App Button” that will take the place of the menus long-seen in Windows applications, said Stephen Horlander, a designer and longtime contributor to Firefox’s interface.

In a blog post outlining the single-button approach, Horlander said the App Button would replace the idea of a dual-button concept — one marked “Pages,” the other “Tools” — that Mozilla had previously considered. He acknowledged that the App Button, like the talk of “ribbonizing” Firefox, was borrowed from Microsoft. “[The] App button … is similar to the single menu approach taken by Windows 7 native applications [such as] Paint and WordPad, and by Microsoft Office,” Horlander said.

The App Button, which would appear at the top left of the Firefox window, would take up less space, consolidate all menu commands under one roof, and reduce clutter, he said.

Firefox 4.0 would also give users the option of moving the browser’s tabs to the top of the application’s display, a so-called “tab-on-top” look that other browsers, notably Google’s Chrome, have adopted.

Mozilla’s browser will not, however, combine the search bar with the address bar — the latter is where the URL is entered or appears — as does Chrome. “With the LocationBar containing an increasing amount of functionality it may be best to retain a clear distinction between the two fields,” said Horlander, referring to Mozilla’s name for the address bar.

Horlander posted numerous screen shots of the Firefox 4.0 interface design ideas on his blog, including a head-to-head comparison between the revamp and the current look and feel in Firefox 3.5.

User reaction, as judged by the nearly 100 comments left on Horlander’s blog since yesterday, were generally positive. Most of the criticism came from users who were disturbed by what they saw as the “Chromifying” of Firefox, that Mozilla’s browser was too anxious to copy the look of Google’s Chrome.

“Firefox should be careful not to just chase Google too much, though,” said a user identified only as “Woody” in a comment added yesterday to Horlander’s post. “Chrome is Chrome, Firefox shouldn’t try to play catch-up … they should stay innovative.”

“Trying to copy ideas from Microsoft Office and Google Chrome must lead to a big fail,” warned another user.

People uncomfortable with the change will be able to restore the more familiar menu bar, Horlander promised.

According to a recently published timetable , Mozilla will ship a public review of Firefox 4.0 in June 2010, and final code in the fourth quarter.