The Reason Why Android Gets Apps Later Than IOS

Description: There are too many operating systems, devices, and models for app developers to keep up. This diversified market makes the future of apps look  more corporate than entrepreneurial.

Source: Mashable.com

Date: March 6, 2013

Even though there are more Android phones than iPhones in the United States, the number and variety of Android apps lags compared to Apple’s offerings. For instance, Android users had to wait a year before they got Instagram or Pinterest apps. New research helps explain why.

There’s got to be more to the story than the number of phones. Flurry, a mobile-app analytics firm, released a report this week that helps explain the problem, laying out the challenges app developers face. It also shows that Android apps are unlikely to catch up and that small developers coding for either device will get squeezed out of the market READ REST OF STORY

 Questions for discussion:

1. Which operating systems or devices do you think would be most profitable for app developers to focus on?

2. How can app developers meet the needs of all users?

‘The Bachelor’ Gets Social With Real-Time Tweets on TV

Description: The way we watch TV has changed. Today, viewers sit on the couch with the TV remote in one hand and their mobile device in the other. This new socially connected audience is bringing about a major change in programming.

Source: Mashable.com

Date: March 13, 2013

The 17th season of ABC‘s quest-for-love reality TV show “The Bachelor” wrapped on Monday night, and just like with every season, fans took to social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter to discuss in real-time what unfolded on screen.

But in the last few episodes leading up to the finale, “The Bachelor” has merged its chatty online audience with the actual airing of the show, thanks to superimposing tweets onto episodes in real time. Although these tweets are redundant for viewers who are already following the #Bachelor hashtag, the effort is encouraging fans watching at home to join the online conversation.  READ REST OF STORY

 Questions for discussion:

1. What has the reaction been to The Bachelor’s social integration?

2. What is the process for ABC to get a tweet on air?

A Strange Computer Promises Great Speed

Description: Our digital age is all about bits, those precise ones and zeros that are the stuff of modern computer code.

Source: NYTimes.com

Date: March 21, 2013

A powerful new type of computer that is about to be commercially deployed by a major American military contractor is taking computing into the strange, subatomic realm of quantum mechanics. In that infinitesimal neighborhood, common sense logic no longer seems to apply. A one can be a one, or it can be a one and a zero and everything in between — all at the same time.

It sounds preposterous, particularly to those familiar with the yes/no world of conventional computing. But academic researchers and scientists at companies like Microsoft, I.B.M. and Hewlett-Packard have been working to develop quantum computers.  READ REST OF STORY 

Questions for discussion:

1. What are quantum computers?

2. Why is quantum computing so much faster than traditional computers?

Jack Dorsey: He’s too hip to be Square

Description: Twitter founder Jack Dorsey speaks about his latest project and his original: the site that started a revolution.

Source: CNN.com

Date: March 21, 2013

Click on Link for video

http://cnn.com/video/?/video/tech/2013/03/21/exp-lead-dorsey-twitter-square-intv.cnn

Payments company Square is different from many consumer technology startups in that many businesses use the service all day for retail transactions in brick-and-mortar locations.

The transactions are critical to these businesses and have to work in many different situations in the “real world.” So Square’s multi-tiered testing program is a key part of its development process for its hardware and software.

The quickly growing payments company, headed by Twitter cofounder Jack Dorsey, last year announced a major deal with Starbucks and raised a major funding round valuing the company at $3.25 billion. Behind that growth is an in-depth testing program with small businesses to not only get feedback on new products but to keep Square connected with its merchants and learn about their most pressing business needs. While Square is ultimately used by consumers, Square’s essential customers are its merchants and the testing is an important part of its relationship with them.

Questions for discussion:

1. What is Square Technology and who are the target segments for this market ?

2. What is the business model for square technology and how does this technology make money (revenue model)?

Google to pay $7 million for privacy violation

Description: Google on Tuesday acknowledged to state officials that it had violated people’s privacy during its Street View mapping project when it casually scooped up passwords, e-mail and other personal information from unsuspecting computer users.

Source:CNN.com

Date: March 13, 2013

 

The agreement paves the way for a major privacy battle over Google Glass, the heavily promoted wearable computer in the form of glasses, Mr. Cleland said. “If you use Google Glass to record a couple whispering to each other in Starbucks, have you violated their privacy?” he asked. “Well, 38 states just said they have a problem with the unauthorized collection of people’s data.”

 Questions for discussion:

1. Do you feel Google is serious about protecting your privacy?  Why or Why Not

2.  what can you do to secure your privacy as an individual or an organization?

Parents losing race to monitor kids’ social media activity

Description: Relieved your kids aren’t posting embarrassing messages and goofy self-portraits on Facebook? They’re probably doing it on Instagram and Snapchat instead.

Source: THEGLOBEANDMAIL.com

Date: March 18, 2013

Educators say they have seen everything from kids using their mobile devices to circulate online videos of school drug searches to male students sharing nude pictures of their girlfriends. Most parents, they say, have no idea.

“What sex education used to be – it’s now the ‘technology talk’ we have to have with our kids,” said Rebecca Levey, a mother of 10-year-old twin daughters who runs a tween video review site called KidzVuz.com and blogs about technology and educations issues.

Eileen Patterson, a stay-at-home mom of eight kids in Burke, Va., said she used to consider herself fairly tech savvy and is frequently on Facebook, but was shocked to learn her kids could message their friends with just an iPod Touch. She counts nine wireless devices in her home and has taken to shutting off her home’s Wi-Fi after 9 p.m., but Patterson calls her attempt to keep tabs on her kids’ online activity “a war I’m slowly losing every day.”  READ REST OF STORY

 

Questions for discussion:

1. Do you feel parents should monitor their kids social media activity?  Why or Why Not

2.  What can parents do to secure their kid’s privacy and protection in the social media world?

Google Elbows Into the Cloud

Description: Google said Tuesday that it was doubling its office space near Seattle, just miles from the campuses of Amazon and Microsoft, and stepping up the hiring of engineers and others who work on cloud technology.

Source: NYTimes.com

Date: March 12, 2013

It is part of Google’s dive into a business known as cloud services — renting to other businesses access to its enormous data storage and computing power, accessible by the Internet.

In cloud computing, dozens or even thousands of computer servers are joined to create a giant machine capable of handling many tasks at once, from storing data to running Web sites and mobile apps to tackling complicated analytical problems.

Individual software developers, large companies and governments rent these services to run their operations often at a fraction of the cost of buying and managing their own machines.  Read Rest of Story 

 Questions for discussion:

1. Do you feel Google will be able enter this business Cloud market as a late entrant and be successful?  Why or Why Not

2.  Which of Porter’s generic strategies do you feel Google is pursuing in the Cloud market space? What about their competitor’s strategy?

Disruptions: Digital Era Redefining Etiquette

Description: Some people are so rude. Really, who sends an e-mail or text message that just says “Thank you”? Who leaves a voice mail message when you don’t answer, rather than texting you? Who asks for a fact easily found on Google?

Source: NYTimes.com

Date: March 10, 2013

Then there is voice mail, another impolite way of trying to connect with someone. Think of how long it takes to access your voice mail and listen to one of those long-winded messages. “Hi, this is so-and-so….” In text messages, you don’t have to declare who you are, or even say hello. E-mail, too, leaves something to be desired, with subject lines and “hi” and “bye,” because the communication could happen faster by text. And then there are the worst offenders of all: those who leave a voice mail message and then e-mail to tell you they left a voice mail message.  Read Rest of Story 

 Questions for discussion:

1. Do you feel there is a real difference in ettiquite between online vs off line personal communications?  Why or Why Not

2.  What are your top five pet peeves with other people’s use of digital communication?

Why spend $1,500 for these glasses?

Description: Google unveils new glasses that can help you text and record video hands-free.

Source: CNN.com.com

Date: Feb 21, 2013

 Questions for discussion:

1. Do you feel this product will be a success in the marketplace?

2.  Will Google be rewarded for being a first mover in this hardware category the Apple was rewarded for being a first mover in the tablet marketspace?  Why or Why not?

3.  Would you buy a pair of these Google Glasses?  Why or why not?

Google unveils new glasses that can help you text and record video hands-free. Zain Asher reports

Disruptions: Data Without Context Tells a Misleading Story

Description: Several years ago, Google, aware of how many of us were sneezing and coughing, created a fancy equation on its Web site to figure out just how many people had influenza. The math works like this: people’s location + flu-related search queries on Google + some really smart algorithms = the number of people with the flu in the United States.

Source: NYTimes.com

Date: Feb 24, 2013

In today’s digitally connected world, data is everywhere: in our phones, search queries, friendships, dating profiles, cars, food, reading habits. Almost everything we touch is part of a larger data set. But the people and companies that interpret the data may fail to apply background and outside conditions to the numbers they capture.  “Data inherently has all of the foibles of being human,” said Mark Hansen, director of the David and Helen Gurley Brown Institute for Media Innovation at Columbia University. “Data is not a magic force in society; it’s an extension of us.”  Read Rest of Story 

 

 Questions for discussion:

1. How can Data without context be misleading?

2.  Will Big Data eliminate error, uncertainty, and risk?