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The premise is simple – you create a Recipe that causes something to happen after something else happens. For example, I receive an email the day before the weather looks appropriate for mowing the lawn. I also have an email sent to me with every local Craigslist post in the Computer Service Required section. Lastly, every time FedEx emails me about something, that email is forwarded to one of my co-workers. All of this happens without any input from me.

Create your own

You can select from a wide variety of web services, or Triggers. Email and social media are the obvious choices for most people, but you may find use for the vast number of other services, called Channels. Once you’ve selected a Channel as a Trigger, you can move on.

Here I’ve selected Facebook as my Channel, giving me five options for Triggers:

I’ve selected to have something happen every time I upload a photo to Facebook.

I then select a Channel for my Action – this is the Then That part of IFTTT – and an action to occur within that Channel.

Here I’m going to send a Tweet.

I’ve chosen to Post a Tweet with an image, so now I have to tell IFTTT what I want to happen with that Tweet. In this case, I’m getting a really good recommendation – to Tweet the same photo and use the same caption I applied to the photo when it went on Facebook. I like that suggestion, so there’s no need to change it. Now I click Create Action to confirm.

The only thing left to do now is give it a name and let the automation begin.

Final thoughts

The biggest challenge to IFTTT is forcing yourself to think logically. There are a good number of Recipes that will work easily, as with the previous example. But if you want to get creative, and I encourage you to do so, try to think outside the box. You can’t combine more than two services into one action, but there’s no reason you can’t have multiple Recipes creating chains of Actions.

There are a lot of ways you can use this personally. But it’s also a great way for managers to help their staff stay organized and hold to company policies on retention and organization. I say, get creative and have fun with IFTTT.

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aNewDomain.net – Although not specifically built for enterprise, the YouTube Creator Academy will help businesses improve their message by improving their content.

The first lesson includes an introduction to the course and the language that YouTube uses when talking about things like subscribers and watch time. Lesson 2 named Under the Hood, and focuses on subscribed verses unsubscribed viewers. Lesson three dives into branding by engaging customers with quick-help tutorials and troubleshooting videos to answer the more commonly asked questions. And as anyone who’s tried making a slick video knows — it’s much more involved than just hitting the Record button on a Flip camera.

For example, a small town water store that sells softeners, filters, bottled water, salt for the softeners and service would take a loss to send a service tech out just to bypass a water softener if something goes wrong. If the customer knows about the water store’s YouTube presence, she can look up how to bypass a Kinetico water softener. That customer will find the water store’s quick and easy video on exactly how to do it, saving both the water store and the customer time and money.

Google tracks your progress to determine if you have completed the requirements. Once you have, you receive a letter of completion, which would look good on any aspiring videographers resume.

What Google is doing here will make a difference. Like any channel, YouTube has to improve its content in order to grow its audience. To do that, video makers need to be shown how that’s done. A compilation of cat videos is fine for killing a little downtime, but a well-produced video from a local veterinarian on how to administer insulin shots to a 15 year-old cat will not only improve the vet’s brand, but also bond the customer with the practice — and ensure that the cat gets her shots properly.

Be sure to check back for my post on the final three lessons in YouTube’s Creator Academy.

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Mat Lee

Based in Kalispell, Montana, Mat Lee is a Senior Editor and Podcaster at aNewDomain.net. Email Mat at Mat@aNewDomain.net.

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Ido Leffler is co-founder of Yes To beauty products.

“We want to democratize beauty,” says Ido Leffler, co-founder of Yes To beauty products. The international organic skincare brand has achieved widespread acclaim thanks to its sleek and modern packaging, good-for-you ingredients and inspiring company philosophy. Yes To is now the second best-selling natural beauty line in America, bringing to fruition the company mission of making organic beauty more accessible.

Leffler will be the first to tell you that Yes To relies on technology to empower the brand’s ambitions. Ido and co-founder Lance Kalish, equipped with a Dell laptop and a big dream in 2006, built Yes To from the ground up — and as the company expands, the entrepreneurs continue to rely on technology to bring Yes To products to fans around the world. Technology has helped catapult Yes To from a fledgling business to one of the world’s leading skincare lines by facilitating product shipments, growing the brand’s network and communicating with beauty editors.

Tech Page One recently visited the beautiful Yes To headquarters in the SOMA district of San Francisco to chat with Leffler about natural beauty, Yes To products and the ways in which Dell helps power his vision of healthy skincare for all.

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Katie Manderfield is a writer and producer based in New York City whose work has appeared in Business Insider, The Browser and Venture Beat.

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Ido (I am going to say his name a lot in this piece, because his name is also my new favorite) has a similarly shiny wife with curly-whirly brown hair, twinkling eyes and an Australian accent. They met when he interviewed her for a job, and within a few hours he was introducing her to his family. Yes, even his meet-cute story is impossibly Disney.

I have to confess that I was not an Ido fan prior to meeting him during the taping of the video we made about him for Dell, because apparently I am the last beauty-product-buying woman in the U.S. to hear about Yes To. (If you have been living under a similar rock, Yes To is the second-largest natural beauty products company in the U.S. The company name used to be Yes To Carrots and went from there according to ingredient — Yes To Blueberries, Yes To Cucumbers; you get the picture. The company makes beauty products using organic ingredients that cost no more than their chemical-filled competitors on the surrounding shelves.)

Why did Dell make an Ido video? So that I could write phrases like “Ido video.” No, actually, we made a video about Ido because people like Ido should have videos made about them and because Ido is a Dell customer. This is an actual Ido quote: “I wouldn’t have a career without Dell.” (That can’t be true, by the way. It’s true that Ido tells a story in the video about how Dell technology helped him launch his business, but I promise you that people like Ido collect friends, companies and even worshippers just by walking around and smiling broadly.)

In this video I appear briefly, standing next to Ido while he is photographed at an event and inclining my head in his general direction. (I am the lady in red.) Yes, standing next to Ido was the highlight of my week.

Don’t watch this video if you don’t want to become an Ido fan. Once you’ve clicked Play, you will have no choice in the matter.

Stephanie Losee is the Managing Editor of Dell Global Communications. And, as of this writing, a Yes To customer.

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Stephanie Losee

Managing Editor at Tech Page One

Stephanie Losee is the Managing Editor of Dell Global Communications.

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Education groups say a community effort is needed to help students succeed under the Common Core. Credit: woodleywonderworks via Compfight cc

Successful implementation of Common Core education standards will hinge in large part on how effectively school communities can rally around the new roadmap.

This is the viewpoint of education interest groups that are scrambling to prepare their respective constituencies — administrators, teachers, parents and students — for the rollout of the Common Core in 45 states.

Vocal opposition to the standards will no doubt complicate plans to build cohesive support structures for students.

But Common Core supporters, which include the major teachers’ unions, are attempting to persuade stakeholders that it’s worthwhile to prepare for the arrival of the standards, regardless of their position.

Supporters espouse a common message: administrators, teachers, parents and students need to support each other to make the Common Core a success.

Administrators

School administrators will play an important role in establishing the framework for such support systems and creating environments in which they can flourish.

EngageNY.org, a New York State Education Department campaign supporting the Common Core, has developed model agendas for a Common Core parents’ night that administrators can use to develop their own programs.

Administrators are also being encouraged to devise professional development programs for staff to help them prepare for the shift.

Teachers

Most teachers would benefit from the extra help. The Common Core represents a major restructuring of education priorities. It places greater weight on nonfiction, for instance, and requires math teachers to focus on certain topics more than others.

Teachers will be responsible for communicating these and other new objectives to both parents and students, in addition to revamping lesson plans.

Eye on Education, a publishing company, recommends that teachers communicate directly with parents on how they’re implementing the Common Core, possibly by setting up dedicated Facebook pages or Twitter accounts.

Parents

Education advocacy groups are also placing the onus on parents to study up on the Common Core. Parents who know what their children should be learning in each grade level are in a better position to make sure they stay on track.

Additionally, parents who understand the Common Core will be able to follow up with teachers and administrators if lessons and homework assignments stray from the new model.

Education Northwest, a research firm, recommends that parents ask school officials how they will teach to the standards and measure student progress.

Students

There are few recommendations out there for how students should prepare for the Common Core — except for getting down to studying as they’ve always had to do.

Some school districts, however, have published checklists that allow students to assess how they’re doing. Lists designed for children in primary grades replace pedagogical terms with age-appropriate language.

A third-grade math checklist used by the Ontario-Montclair School District in California covers simple fractions and basic algebra, as well as concepts related to reasoning and problem solving — just two areas among many that will receive added emphasis under the Common Core.

Nick Clunn is an award-winning journalist who has worked for several websites and daily newspapers, including The Record in New Jersey. He teaches journalism as an adjunct instructor at Montclair State University. Follow him @NickClunn.

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Terminology

Window’s themes have been around for quite a while, but they have improved over the years. In Microsoft’s terminology, a theme is a combination of desktop background pictures, window colors and sounds.  Most themes contain between seven and 20 pictures that can be either static or rotated, like a slide show.  The theme sounds replace default Windows sounds. So if you have a jungle theme, you might hear a lion roaring when you log in, or a snake rattling when you add a new device.

Variety

Besides having a wider variety of themes than ever before, Windows 8 has panoramic scenes specifically made for using dual monitors in Windows 8. The Forests panoramic theme and the Nightfall and Starlight panoramic themes are so beautiful that you may want to purchase a second monitor just to enjoy them.

Image credit: Sandy Berger

There are themes for every taste. If you are a star-gazer, check out NASA’s hidden universe theme. Animal lovers are sure to find the Dolphins theme very soothing. There is even a Snake theme, which proves that even snakes can be sinuously beautiful. Nature lovers will enjoy the Small world theme, which features macro images of nature and habitats.

As you peruse the Microsoft themes, you can preview each theme’s image collection by clicking Details. Transfer a theme to your computer by selecting Download.  When you select Open, the theme will become active and you will see it on your desktop.

Changing and creating themes

Changing the theme and even creating your own theme is easy in Windows 8.  Just search for Personalization in the Settings menu. A screen similar to the one below gives you choices for changing the theme, desktop background, screen saver and taskbar and window colors.

Image credit: Sandy Berger

Instead of choosing from the built-in themes, you can make your own by accessing the menu choices for changing the Desktop Background, Window Color, Sounds and Screen Saver. After creating the perfect look for your computer, save your work by choosing Save Theme and adding a title. Microsoft has detailed instructions for theme creation on its website.

Using themes is so easy that there is no reason to look at the same dull screen every day. When you spend as much time as I do on the computer, changing your theme can make everything seem fresher and can go a long way toward perking up your computing life.

Featured image credit: Wikimedia Commons

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Sandy Berger

Senior Editor at ANewDomain.net

Sandy Burger, based in Pinehurst, N.C., is a veteran tech journalist and regular contributor to Tech Page One. As senior editor at aNewDomain.net, Sandy covers tech tips and tricks, apps and gadgets in general. Email her at Sandy@aNewDomain.net.

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Leankr, a company founded last year, aims to enter this emerging social TV market. The not-so-secret sauce is the RedBox platform, that listens and watches TV channels, and then uses algorithm to select and deliver additional content and services, which are piped into a second screen or smart TV app.

The future of television? Image Courtesy: Max Cherney

According to the company, the content will get pulled – in sync with what’s on the TV – from websites like Wikipedia, Amazon, Flickr, and YouTube. But it’s hard to understand why people would want to watch more video. RedBox also works with shows saved on a TiVO or similar devices.

If you’re interested in a live demo, the company has one available, although it is in French.

Interestingly enough, Leankr says that the RedBox technology will let users search for any word spoken on TV in real time. It also determines when and how many times a search term is used in a show.  The company has a demo video of that service — also in French.

RedBox also does something that cable operators and advertisers are going to love: it displays contextual ads and product pages for products detected by the software.

The Future of Television?

Leankr bills itself as an add-on service to cable, satellite and IPTV operators. It’s likely to disrupt those industries, but it does not – as Netflix, and YouTube do – seek to move views from traditional content delivery to IP-based systems.

For existing broadcasters and content creators, Leankr also offers a social TV software package that helps community managers interact with viewers. Although Leankr’s software looks much like MTV and other existing efforts, custom solutions are costly to build, maintain and update. By offering an out of the box solution to broadcasters, I suspect many more will be willing to test social TV.

It’s impossible to know whether social TV and second screens will last. But it’s clear that the market for such services and growing– a trend Leankr is on top of.

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Max Cherney

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Max A. Cherney is a San Francisco based tech journalist. Email tips to max@anewdomain.net.

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Project Management Console. Image Credit: Wimi

Wimi is a cloud-based business software that aims to connect and centralize all of an office’s data in one place – at a competitive price. With a slew of features which include Dropbox-like file sharing, project management and Google Docs integration, Wimi’s web-based app offers a compelling alternative to Microsoft’s venerable Office package.

What grabbed me about Wimi was the variety of imaginative features. For example, things like time-tracking, task management and meeting planning – standard in project management – are integrated into each project module.

Other features like Google Docs integration – although any types of files can be stored on the Wimi Disk cloud storage – give bootstrapping companies free tools for basic office functions like document production.

The cloud software also includes features like calendar sharing, and is available on mobile devices, too. The company offers mobile apps for iOS and Android.

Wimi starts at about $13 a month (€9.90) for an unlimited number of users, 5GB of storage and 10 projects. The Pro package, which costs $38 a month (€29), ups the storage to 30GB and 30 projects. Enterprise pricing varies according to the company.

If you want to see exactly how it works, the company has a live demo on its website. There are even different deployments available to try, depending on the business scenario you’re interested in.

Wimi security

Wimi Console. Image Credit: Wimi

Content on the cloud is stored on RAID 10 servers to ensure that should multiple physical disks in Wimi’s data centers get damaged, all of the data is safe.

Wimi also uses industry standard digital certificates and SSL for all project contributors, and generally uses 256-bit AES encryption to send and receive data– although the company said that occasionally varies depending on the user’s configuration.

One of the most interesting security features Wimi offers is granular access rights management for contributors. Each project has separate rights – meaning a project leader can decide which aspects of a project clients can access, and which parts are restricted from view.

Even internal projects can be managed that way. So, for example, it’s possible for a manager to allow only the accounting department to view accounting records and payroll information.

Access rights also apply to anything stored on the Wimi Disk – the cloud storage service.

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Max Cherney

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Max A. Cherney is a San Francisco based tech journalist. Email tips to max@anewdomain.net.

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Sometimes it may even seem that a project is doomed long before it’s completed, yet the project continues regardless. That’s why it’s helpful to know the signs of an IT project failure long before things fall apart at the seams. The following are some tell-tale signs your IT project may be doomed.

Image Credit: Wikimedia Commons

No detailed project plan exists
As they say, failing to plan is planning to fail. Any IT project with an estimated timeline longer than two weeks should have a solid, detailed project plan that forces stakeholders to follow the necessary phases and steps. If you don’t have a plan yourself, get senior buy-in before moving forward.

ROI doesn’t drive the technology investment decision
“The larger the company, the greater there is a chance that what drives tech investments isn’t what’s best for the business, but rather what’s best for the decision-maker’s career,” according to InformationWeek. And in large companies, those two factors rarely align.

“Rare is the executive who puts the company’s interests before his or her own (financial stability, career progression, personal brand building),” the articles states. “And that kind of behavior isn’t exclusive to executives; it’s pervasive from the boardroom to the mailroom.”

Poor communication
“Communication is the most important factor of successful project management,” says Tim Parkin, President of Parkin Web Development, in PC Advisor. “Without regularly and clearly communicating, the project will fall apart.” When a project or team leader schedules meetings suddenly, or that are in conflict with the schedules of others involved in the project, the project may be on the fast track to failure.

The solution is simple, says InfoWorld. Spend time before scheduling project meetings to learn the calendars of important team members. Publicizing the meeting times so that others don’t accidentally schedule over those times is also smart. You can even send reminders a week in advance of the upcoming meeting.

Users have had little, or no, early involvement
Tech pros are taught to involve users early on in the decision-making process of a project. Yet managers of many large and complex projects neglect to do this. Ensure real users are invited to the project from the beginning, suggests InfoWorld. The more involvement from users, the greater the chance a project will succeed. Participating users should be aware of the project’s objectives and feel they can voice their real opinion.

A lack of flexibility
You may think the project plan is solid and needs few changes. But it’s important to remain flexible, says Carol Woolfe, Project Manager at Blackbaud, in PC Advisor. “It’s good at various intervals to step back and take a fresh look at the overall project, review how things have gone so far, and how you can improve your future work based on what’s already changed along the way,” she said.

Not Having a System for Approving and Tracking Changes
“Often, success or failure of a project hinges on the changes that occur after it begins,” notes Christen Bergerud, Executive Vice President of EcoSys, in PC Advisor. Yet all too often no system is in place for approving and tracking changes. “Having a clear process that must be followed is the best way to ensure the pertinent details – how much it will cost, why it is necessary, the impact on the overall project – are known before the change is approved. It’s also extremely effective for auditing performance during and after project completion.”

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aNewDomain.net – Trolls are among the most common instigators of online conflict. But it’s not always easy for community managers to differentiate between a troll and a valued participant. Fortunately, Andrea Weckerle offers some helpful advice on how to recognize and deal with trolls in her book, Civility in the Digital Age: How Companies and People Can Triumph Over Haters, Trolls, Bullies, and Other Jerks.

Image Credits: Wikimedia Commons

“Internet trolls are attention seekers whose sole goal is to wreak havoc online for the purpose of fun and pleasure,” says Weckerle in Civility in the Digital Age. She also notes that they “delight in insulting, shocking, upsetting, and provoking others.”

The key here is ‘provoking’ – trolls are primarily interested in the responses they can successfully elicit. They come in all shapes and sizes, but most trolls are attracted to public message boards, community forums and the comment sections of online articles. But there is no single characteristic that differentiates a troll from someone who wants to engage in productive dialogue.

“Some are better writers, others less so,” said Weckerle in a recent conversation. “Some have stylistic markers that make them stand out from others, but it’s their common motivator and goal – to wreak havoc on others – that’s the unifier.”

In her book, Weckerle draws upon the research of Derek Wood, a board-certified Psychiatric Nurse with a master’s degree in psychology. According to Wood, there are several different kinds of trolls: ‘Spamming trolls’ share the same useless comments on a handful of sites. ‘Kooks’ are habitual commenters who add content with no basis in reality, whereas ‘Flamers’ leave inflammatory comments that are likely to rouse dissent. ‘Hit-and-runners’ leave one or two comments, then disappear altogether. But it’s the ‘Psycho Trolls’ who are perhaps the most interesting – they have a psychological need to feel good while making others feel bad.

So how can you interact with these online bullies while protecting your reputation – and maintaining your company’s standards?

How to deal with trolls

Fortunately, there are ways to minimize the damage trolls inflict. In Civility in the Digital Age, Weckerle recommends a ‘Do Not Feed the Trolls’ approach.

“Do not engage them in any way!” is her emphatic suggestion. Rather than attempting to interact, community managers should both ignore and disempower trolls. It sounds simple – much like the advice you might give to a child grappling with playground bullies. Nevertheless, managing trolls requires patience.

“Ignoring trolls is easier said than done,” says Weckerle in her book. “After all, when someone says something that’s ludicrous and not based in reality, or when they come after you, your natural inclination is to want to set them straight and defend yourself or your company. But this counterintuitive step is what you need to take if you want to get rid of a troll.”

More often than not, ignoring the situation won’t completely solve the problem. It’s at this point that community managers must step in and remove comments or, in severe cases, ban certain users from engaging in discussion altogether. Weckerle offers the following advice for disempowering trolls:

“If a discussion forum has a moderator, you can report the troll’s actions to him. Make sure to do so in a fair and constructive way, detailing the examples of what’s occurred, preferably pointing out that the troll isn’t adding any value to the conversation and is undermining the discussion’s continuation or group’s cohesiveness.”

But, she says, beware – trolls may disappear for a time, then return with a vengeance. The best way to protect yourself, your business or your website from trolls is to stay vigilant and be aware of your organization’s engagement policies. With a clear plan of action, you can react quickly and keep the troublemakers at bay.

To purchase your own copy of Civility in the Digital Age, visit Amazon or Barnes & Noble.

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Madison Andrews is a writer, editor, and designer living in Austin, Texas. She is founder and editor of madskillsvocabulary.com.

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Women celebrated their accomplishments in business during the DWEN conference in Istanbul last week. Credit: Dell.

Inspiring female entrepreneurs from around the globe gathered in Istanbul during the first week of June for the Dell Women’s Entrepreneur Network conference.

The annual event, also known as DWEN, champions female business leaders with three days of panels, discussions and networking opportunities to support women-helmed enterprises.

The theme of this year’s DWEN conference — Pay it Forward — encouraged attendees to take what they learned at the conference and share it with other aspiring businesswomen to foster female entrepreneurship around the world.

DWEN 2013 provided attendees with plenty of fodder to pay it forward. The event featured inspirational stories, established meaningful connections and provided a unique perspective of the challenges and rewards of female entrepreneurship.

Tech Page One traveled to DWEN to capture the highlights and thoughts of attendees. Those we interviewed spoke about the importance of DWEN, sisterhood in business and paying it forward. Others shared meaningful career lessons.

The result is a multi-part video series that will appear on Tech Page One over the next few weeks.

We’re kicking off our DWEN recap with a highlight video in which attendees reflect on their conference experience, the importance of celebrating women in business and why this year’s “Pay it Forward” theme is so essential.

Katie Manderfield is a writer and producer based in New York City whose work has appeared in Business Insider, The Browser, Venture Beat, PR Daily and The Credits.

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For graduates looking to enter the work force, an SAP (Systems, Applications and Products) certificate is often a good choice for junior consultants. Focused on business software applications, SAP is related to enterprise resource planning, which includes management knowledge in supply chain and product life-cycle.

“On the other hand, ITIL (Information Technology Infrastructure Library) foundation is open for all IT professionals who are interested in understanding the ITIL framework,” explained Linying Dong, Associate Professor of Business Management Technology at Toronto’s Ryerson University. “Also, some schools offer certifications such as Business Analysis at the University of Toronto that helps show the student has possessed knowledge and skills in a certain area.”

However, Dong noted not all certifications are suitable for new graduates when experience is taken into account. For example, a Business System Analyst certificate requires a candidate to acquire more than 5,500 hours of working experience in the areas related to business analysis, which is nearly impossible for new graduates to acquire.

“As a result, IT managers know about the difficulty for entry-level candidates to obtain an IT certificate, so any IT-related certifications would help a candidate in his/her job search,” said Dong.

Depending on the position a person is applies to, Google keeps an eye out for computer science degrees as well as experience with Java, Java Script, or C++, Google spokesperson Wendy Bairos said.

“It’s as much about what degrees and certifications a person has, and how well they fit in with a team,” she said. For example, a software engineer position in Kitchener-Waterloo, Canada requires the minimum requirements of a B.A. or B.Sc. in lieu of a degree or equivalent experience.

“Both are looked at equally, but depending on the role, it may require experience with at least one of Java, Java Script, or C++,” said Bairos. “There are some preferred qualifications, but they’re not necessary. Job postings give people a sense of what we look for, and it gives the employee a sense of what we may expect of them under an engineering team.”

Bairos added that certificates and diplomas are always welcome, but a key element IT managers look for is a good fit with the culture of the company and the ability to work in a team environment.

“In order to be successful you need to be able to work together,” she said. “We do look for people who can work and collaborate with a team, not just people who have very specific skills for a job.”

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Data at Risk 2013: Eighth in a series

1. 30 IT security risks across the enterprise ­— My series intro presents a quick overview of today’s risky security climate and lists the topics we’ll cover in the series.
2. Top 5 risks in cybersecurity — Ann Braley Smith addresses five perennial threats to your data: malware, social engineering, hactivism, web application attacks and espionage, whether government or corporate.
3. 5 social media risks for businesses — Dustin Jenkins takes a look at five social media threats that put your data at risk: botnets, phishing, insufficient access policies and out-of-date network security applications and firewalls ­— as well as not having a social media presence at all.
4. 5 ways good mobile employees do bad things — Ann Newman lists five ways that employees may inadvertently put data at risk, from weak passwords to infected or stolen devices.
5. Take charge of these 5 cloud security risks — Kristen Johnson discusses security risks you may be exposed to via your cloud service provider: data transfer, multitenant servers, your provider’s employees, service outages and physical housing.
6. When compliance isn’t enough: 5 security challenges — Ann Braley Smith covers five common threats to compliance and security plans, from an inadequate log management system to broad compliance regulations that don’t address specific vulnerabilities.
7. 5 email security tactics you should be using — Tamara Cryar provides five strategies you can use to address security risks in internal email, and why those risks aren’t going away.

That’s 30 risks or threats to worry about across your enterprise, from the device to the data center to the cloud. Add to that another risk: having disconnected, ad hoc security policies and tools in place that don’t work together and don’t support your business initiatives. Dell’s Connected Security solution is a comprehensive lifecycle approach that provides outside-in and inside-out protection:

• Dell SonicWALL solutions provide network security, remote access and anti-spam tools.
• Dell Data Protection | Encryption (DDP | E) offers nondisruptive endpoint encryption solutions designed to protect data wherever it goes.
• Dell SecureWorks solutions actively manage some or all of the security environment, configuration, deployment and response, using certified experts who work 24×7 to analyze threat intelligence and constantly improve your security posture.
• Dell Quest Identity and Access Management solutions tell you who has access to critical information, provide insight into who’s doing what, when and how, and enable your IT staff to comply with virtually any audit or compliance request.

Other Connected Security solutions include Dell KACE for mobile management of iOS and Android devices, Dell Wyse for cloud security solutions and Dell AppAssure for backing up virtual machines. Want to know more? Talk to a Dell expert about Connected Security.

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Regan Brown

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Regan Brown writes about security and enterprise applications for Dell.

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It’s not about technology

I think there is an inherent perception that telehealth is about technology, which comes a lot of devices, cords, cost and support issues. And believe me, walking around the expo floor at American Telemedicine Association there was a lot of “device hype” and over-prescribed use of technology. I felt like screaming in the middle of the floor, “It’s not about the technology, it’s about the delivery of quality care through technology!” But my inner voice told me to stay calm, even amidst the countless stories of telehealth carts abandoned in closets due to lack of training or integration into the care workflow.  We’ll tackle technology in the next and final blog, for now let’s look at the rest of the inhibitors to telehealth use.

Top five obstacles to telehealth adoption

1. Device hype. Take two cameras, a kit, a hub, a cart and … call me in the morning
2. Physician licensing. This might be a bigger issue in the U.S. where doctors are only licensed to practice medicine in their state, thus remote consultations are slightly more complicated
3. Lost income. Again, I think this is a larger issue in the U.S. given the nature of the healthcare system. Patient who don’t come in the door are lost income, whereas in Europe they are an avoided cost so the business model of telehealth needs to be refined
4. Reliability and support. Everything from connectivity issues to solution training; delivering care over the internet can be tricky and difficult to maintain the standard of face to face care
5. Patient engagement. Ultimately it’s about the patients and the quality of care they will receive. If they feel that their medical care is now about pushing buttons and tapping screens they won’t participate or realize the benefits, especially if we are speaking about the elderly who may feel alienated from technology to begin with. Without meaningful engagements with caregivers, then users will be unsatisfied with the service and ultimately not likely to adopt it.

We’ve explored the use cases (prisons, rural, elderly or fragile persons), the benefits (reduced costs, better patient care, workforce shortage workaround) and now the obstacles to telehealth. In the next blog we’ll look at potential solutions and devices but ultimately the outcomes of using technology for remote care. I’d love to get your thoughts, feedback and ideas in the comments, so please share them below.

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A search engine geared toward privacy 

Startpage is a search engine that, unlike others, doesn’t track you in any way. Instead, it actually protects your identity. There is a similar search engine known as Ixquick which is run by Surfboard Holdings B.V., the same Dutch company that produces Startpage. While Ixquick is a true metasearch engine gathering results from multiple search engines, the Startpage search results come directly from Google’s syndicated search. The same privacy mechanisms are built into both Startpage and Ixquick. So, if you are looking for privacy, you can try them both.

As you can see in this screenshot, Startpage looks very much like Google and other search engines.

How it works

With Startpage, your search terms and IP address are not recorded. No tracking cookies are placed in the browser and SSL encryption provides added protection. The Startpage Privacy Policy is very strict. You are never seen by any of the search engines that provide results, including Google. However, if you click on a link you leave the private search arena and are again visible.

To counter this, Startpage has added a great new feature. Through the use of a proxy service Startpage lets you search the Web and click on linked pages without being identified or tracked. To use this, you simply click on “proxy” on the search results.

When using this proxy service, the request for the webpage comes from the Startpage.com servers rather than from your own personal computer. You can be ensured of your privacy because you will see that the new webpage is in a Startpage frame.  This will slow down your surfing a bit, but offers an additional layer of anonymity. You will not be able to fill out forms, and Java script pages may not appear properly. This, however, is a small price to pay for really secure surfing. In addition, Startpage has a wealth of settings including the ability to create a private URL to keep your preferences untraceable.

Startpage has showed spectacular growth in the last three months. It now serves well over 2 million searches per day. This is not surprising. More and more people are looking for ways to make their Internet presence more secure and Startpage offers a good way to do that.

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Sandy Berger

Senior Editor at ANewDomain.net

Sandy Burger, based in Pinehurst, N.C., is a veteran tech journalist and regular contributor to Tech Page One. As senior editor at aNewDomain.net, Sandy covers tech tips and tricks, apps and gadgets in general. Email her at Sandy@aNewDomain.net.

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Disruptions can arise from natural disasters, cyberattacks or events as random as a wayward construction crew that inadvertently cuts the power.

Historic floods on Australia’s Brisbane River in 2011 provided institutional investment manager QIC with an opportunity to test its business continuity plans.

With floodwaters rising and digital records tracking more than $60 billion at risk, company officials decided to try a failover plan, which allowed automatic switching to standby servers.  And it worked.

VMware vCenter Site Recovery Manager had transferred all vital information to another location, enabling staff to access company systems from home or the two temporary offices the company set up.

“We temporarily lost some of our test and development functionality, but from our client’s point of view, the process was seamless,” said Tony Hilton, the team leader of servers, storage and Internet at QIC.

Planning ahead for disruption

An increasing number of companies are being proactive — aware that disruptions can arise from natural disasters, cyberattacks or events as random as a wayward construction crew that inadvertently cuts the power.

To manage these and other risks, many companies have turned to virtualization [SN-DT1] to help maintain business continuity and ensure efficient recovery without data loss.

Downsides of downtime

Driving this trend are eye-opening statistics on the impact of a system’s unplanned downtime. A 2012 Aberdeen Group survey of 134 organizations showed increases in hourly downtime costs. Compared with the previous year, hourly costs rose:

• 63 percent to $101,600 for best-in-class organizations
• 79 percent to $181,770 for companies in the average tier

There are indirect consequences as well. Downed systems can cause customers to seek out competitors when a technical problem prevents them from getting through. Worker productivity can also slip, resulting in missed deadlines and increased costs for projects that need extensions.

A recent survey conducted by Emerson Network Power listed end-user productivity as the fourth most costly of nine criteria, with the average event cost pegged at $96,226. The study obtained data from 41 enterprise data centers and based cost figures on events of about 90 minutes.

Maintain continuity

Virtualization guards against downtime by ensuring that the failure of a service on one virtual machine does not bring down other aspects of the system.

Having this capability is one of the reasons virtualization has been widely implemented at Facilicom Services Group, a Dutch company that provides facilities with custodial, security and other services.

Facilicom embarked on virtualization to make smarter use of hardware and gain better control over its IT environment, which serves 32,000 employees and helps managers to see the big picture when it comes to costs and operations.

Anton Harder, an IT architect at Facilicom, later realized that virtualization could also help ensure continuity with little effort.

“Within a virtual environment, it’s easier to boot the systems again at a different location,” Harder said. “Moreover, vCenter Site Recovery Manager supports the ongoing synchronization of the crucial systems, so all it needs then is a click of the mouse to activate systems again.”

Recover faster

Speed is critical for disaster recovery. Server virtualization can reduce the time to full restoration to four hours, outperforming traditional tape systems by one or two full days.

Tom Van Harn, systems support adviser at direct-selling giant Amway, identified disaster recovery as a key advantage of VMware technology along with server consolidation.

The vCenter Site Recovery Manager offers a cohesive recovery plan that includes storage replication at a second site. He said the company had made the most of the technology by virtualizing all of its most critical applications.

“I’m happy to say we haven’t had any disasters,” he said. “But if one strikes, I’m confident we’ll be OK, because SRM lets us see the big picture, including dependent systems that should be included in a recovery plan — ones we might not have identified without SRM. It helps us cover all the bases.”

For more information on how VMware could help protect your business and minimize downtime, take a look at vSphere and vCenter Site Recovery Manager.

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Nick Clunn

Contributor at Tech Page One

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Udemy is one of the more popular online learning sites available to anyone with an Internet connection. It offers more than 6,000 courses that cover a range of categories, including Lifestyle, Music, Technology, Math and Science, Crafts and Hobbies, Business, Education, Sports, Design, Languages, Games, Arts and Photography, Humanities, Health & Fitness and Social Sciences. Instructors include ivy-league professors, CEOs, celebrities and authors. Udemy’s courses skew to technology, perhaps as a result of its San Francisco headquarters and proximity to Silicon Valley.

Udemy’s main competitors include NIXTY, UDUTU, CodeLesson, Optini and Floqq, to name a few.

What makes Udemy unique is that it offers both free and paid courses. Paid courses cost between $20 to $250. Instructors of paid courses keep up to 70 percent of the revenue. Instructors use Udemy’s customized content creation platform to build online courses using video, PowerPoint, PDFs, audio, zip files and live classes. Udemy for Organizations is available for no charge at this time. Some Udemy instructors are currently making more than six figures, (this article on GigaOm tells you which instructors fit that description.)

Udemy has grown tremendously since Eren Bali and Oktay Caglar, originally from Turkey, founded the company. After being turned down initially, they raised $1 million in February 2010 through angel investors — including Yelp CEO and PayPal alum Jeremy Stoppelman, 500 Startups founder Dave McClure and AngelList co-founder Naval Ravikant. Now in its Series B round of financing, Udemy has raised a cool $12 million and is focusing on mobile devices.

“Udemy is super easy to use,” said Lili Balfour, who recently launched her Finance for Startups course on the platform. “It has two Facebook groups that are monitored by staff. It also creates webinars, blog posts and free tutorials to help the instructors get started.”

I took Lili Balfour’s course and it was as promised in her course description. The combination of tools she used—audio, video, PDFs, Excel spreadsheets and even printouts—helped me visualize interesting concepts in what might be considered a dry topic. The audio was particularly helpful. Lili’s voice was confident yet instructional, soothing and motivating. She came across as a seasoned instructor, despite that fact that this was her first Udemy course — something you wouldn’t know if you didn’t go to the end of the course where she mentions it.

Screenshot courtesy of Lili Balfour

The course took me about four hours (with breaks) to complete, and came close to covering what took me two years to learn in my MBA program. Balfour provides the tools and knowledge you need to secure funding for your startup, including building a financial model with data on your audience, competitors and pricing. You’re given a spreadsheet of a mock company with sections on assumptions, P&L and metrics and your income statement, along with your personal plan and valuation. This abundance of detail is broken down to an average of two-minute lectures.

Balfour reminds us that the number one reason startups fail is that they run out of money. She offers resources for crowd-sourcing, a financial model you can use, case studies of Facebook’s financial model and Groupon’s metrics to help you visualize important issues.

My only complaint is the end of the course recap is a PDF rather than an audio-based lecture, which leaves you feeling disconnected from your coach-instructor. If you still need help, Lili Balfour offers the third Monday of each month for Office Hours, and a promise that all email correspondence will be completed within 12 hours. You also retain indefinite access to your course even after it is completed.

Image credit: LinkedIn

I asked Balfour why she decided to teach her course on Udemy.

“In 2012, I began conducting workshops on financial modeling,” she explained. “I received several emails from people who wanted an online version.  I looked at the various platforms and decided that Udemy was the best option, as it allowed me to create a course and continue to add content. Students pay $98 for lifetime access to the course.”

She is also excited by Udemy’s global reach. “The benefit of using education technology is that you can reach people all over the world,” said Balfour. “I currently have students from The Netherlands to Russia.”

This is not my first course with Udemy. I admit I have started a few and not completed them. Was it worth the $98? There were a number of courses in her finance category for as little as $19, including one from Dave McClure, a well-known Angel Investor.  I would say a resounding yes. I was most impressed that the course kept my attention. Heavy and dry material was broken down into digestible information. Frequent quizzes kept you focused. You could take notes, ask questions, take a break and most of all, learn the material. With Balfour there to coach, provide tips and encourage you along the way, you reached a stage where you were confident enough to approach an investor, or several, to raise money for your startup.

If you want to take the course and learn how to raise money for your startup, Balfour was kind enough to provide a coupon code for a $79 ticket — JULIE20 — that you can use when you sign up at Udemy.

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I spoke with Itay Sagie, Chief Marketing Officer of Lexifone, on the phone and was treated to a demonstration of the service, which officially debuted last week.

“This is the first time that small and medium businesses around the world have the opportunity to have these translated calls, which is only something that big enterprises could enjoy until now from human interpreters … but those are about 20 times more expensive than Lexifone,” Sagie told me.

At the moment, Lexifone is accessed by registering for an account via the web or an Android app. The service works in a manner similar to many conference call and call recording services that require users to dial in to one of many central access numbers in a number of different countries and regions. Once connected “Hotels, retailers, rental companies, manufacturers and so many other types of companies have struggled to conduct business even in English as a second and third language and certainly when there’s no common language,” continued Sagie. “Now the very importance of each word and expression can be naturally spoken on both ends of the call.”

Lexifone identifies the user’s native language via caller ID and account settings. The next step is to select the number to call and the foreign language that contact will be speaking.

Once both parties are connected, Lexifone acts as a digital assistant and translator for both parties that is controlled through a combination of dialed and spoken commands.

The Lexifone experience can be a little jarring and crowded at first due to the presence of the extra digital voices on the call, but it’s certainly no less unwieldy than having to speak through two human translators on each end of the call or, even worse, trying to pass each sentence through a third party translation app like Jibbigo or Google Translate.

The most impressive feature of Lexifone during the brief demonstration I was given was the speed and accuracy of the translation, which were both markedly better than the aforementioned apps. Sagie and I attempted a Spanish-English conversation and, being somewhat fluent in both languages, it seemed to me that Lexifone was spot on in its translations and with practically no processing delay.

According to a release, Lexifone can handle translations in English, French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, German, Russian, and Mandarin.

In addition to translating calls, Lexifone also provides face-to-face translation for people in the same room. Simply put Lexifone on speakerphone and it translates the conversation.

When using a prepaid Lexifone account, the service provides translated calls for as low as 15 cents a minute, and can also be used as a basic international calling service. The company’s CallMe service also gives businesses the option to provide a unique access number for customers who speak a foreign language, effectively avoiding lost business due to language barriers and misunderstandings.

“Hotels, retailers, rental companies, manufacturers and so many other types of companies have struggled to conduct business even in English as a second and third language and certainly when there’s no common language,” said Sagie’s father, company founder and CEO Ike Sagie. “Now the very importance of each word and expression can be naturally spoken on both ends of the call.”

The senior Sagie is a computational linguist who developed the proprietary Linguistic Optimization Engine at the core of Lexifone.

“This is his life’s work, basically,” his son told me.

Sagie admits that Lexifone’s translation is not 100 percent accurate, but points out that perfect translation may not even be possible and insists that the service’s linguistic engine is at the forefront of automated translation.

At the moment, new Lexifone accounts come with a $1.25 credit to try it out, and Sagie says the Android app provides a streamlined experience. An iOS version is on the way.

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Eric Mack

News Editor at ANewDomain.net

Based in Taos, N.M., Eric Mack is a veteran tech writer and news editor at aNewDomain.net. Email him at Ericm@aNewDomain.net.

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Why do you need to be ready for a crisis?

In 1989, the Exxon Valdez oil spill disaster occurred and is documented as one of the worst environmental disasters caused by human error in history. You might also remember that damage control was mostly handled via print and broadcast media.

Fast forward to 2010’s British Petroleum (BP) oil spill. It was estimated that the amount of oil in this incident was four times more than the Exxon Valdez incident.

At the time, BP was left reeling from the wrath of activists and protesters – expressed largely via social media – in the wake of its apparent inability to plug the leak quickly and its perceived lack of honest communication over the incident. A Facebook Page called “Boycott BP” reached almost 800,000 fans. Meanwhile, on Twitter, the official BP account was overtaken in number of followers by a parody account, which mocked BP’s cleanup efforts. To add fuel to the fire, BP CEO Tony Hayward’s speech went awry with Americans, as he claimed to want his life back in the wake of casualties on the rig. BP spent millions in a PR and search ad campaign, versus providing relief for Gulf of Mexico families affected by the tragedy.

It took BP a month to roll out an effective social media crises communication policy, to control the backlash and undo some of the damage.

This was a costly lesson for BP, but one that all brands should heed: be prepared. Real-time social media and user-generated content mean it’s easy for a brand’s messaging or image to quickly get sidelined in times of crisis. If brands are not prepared with a social media policy to handle such incidents, the conversation will still take place… without them.

How to Set Up a Social Media Crisis Communication Policy

To set up a crisis communication policy, the following key elements need to be identified and documented:

• Designate spokesperson(s) and your crisis communication team, along with roles and responsibilities for each. This ensures one point of contact for communication and reduces miscommunication.
• A communication process chart identifies who will recognize key messages, who will write them, and who will deliver them. This ensures consistency in messaging and reduces ambiguity.
• Your communication matrix defines who the internal and external audiences are, what messages are to be delivered, and what avenues to use for delivering these messages. This ensures that all key stakeholders receive appropriate information when required.
• A Contact Log includes key people who can be contacted 24/7 in case of a crisis. This ensures that everyone knows who to contact and can reach them quickly.

During a crisis, remember volunteers and important community partners. Their input could turn the tide and help you create an opportunity out of the crisis.

How to Turn a Crisis into an Opportunity

There are two ways to look at the opportunities a crisis can create for your company: before and after a crisis happens.

• Before a crisis occurs, social media can be used to listen, learn and invest in two-way dialogues with your customers.
• During a crisis and in the aftermath, the needs of an individual or group of customers can create important opportunities for your company.

Dell’s Social Media Listening Command Center provides intelligence across the entire business by engaging over 1000+ customers every week, and monitoring over 25,000 posts per day. It’s a direct link to incident monitoring and gives us continuous knowledge about our customers.

Social listening is critical in identifying the topics, people and conversations that present opportunities to correct misinformation, distribute time sensitive crisis-related information to help those affected, etc. Plan in advance to reach out to brand advocates, press contacts, and industry influencers to help guide social conversations in the most helpful direction.

A few questions you should answer before setting up your crisis communication procedures are:

1. Where do your customers and prospects spend the most time online?
2. What are they talking about when it comes to you, your products, the industry and your competitors?
3. Who are the key online influencers in your industry?
4. How could you identify a crisis that’s developing online and how quickly would this information reach you?
5. What’s the best way for you to quickly interact with your customer before the crisis skyrockets?

The time to build a crisis communication policy is when the sun is shining. If you’re looking for someone to partner with for your own Listening Center, check out our social media services. When handled promptly, social media can be the water to diffuse a crisis situation – you just have to be prepared. Do you agree?

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Margo Smale

Dell Contributor at Tech Page One

Margo is a social media advisor for Dell’s EMEA Commercial team based in Dublin, Ireland. I graduated from Syracuse University and earned my MBA at Trinity College in Dublin. Before joining Dell, I worked in media planning at several advertising agencies.

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“Supplies?” I said warily.

It used to be that trips were arduous journeys across countless miles in slow steamers, uncomfortable wagons, or dirty crowded trains. You didn’t leave for days, you left for months, and you packed large trunks full of every conceivable belonging that might come in handy. I felt like that sort of traveler when Wendy announced she would be working much of our eight day trip. Today’s illustrator doesn’t just use pens and paints and a drawing pad. She also needs a printer, a scanner, a light box, and a computer. I wondered: did they even accept steamer trunks on airplanes? Shouldn’t we lengthen our stay to make it all worthwhile?

But today’s tech items keep getting smaller, even as they ramp up their power. It would have been unthinkable to transport a printer in a suitcase just a few years ago. But the new light box, scanner and printer Wendy bought for the trip were each about the size of her laptop computer. She packed it all into a carry-on bag.

Upon our arrival, the items were lifted out as gingerly as newborn kittens, and inspected. Everything was fine! Nothing broken, nothing cracked. Amazing!

The next morning, Wendy began to lay everything out. I marveled at how easy it had been to set her up with all she needed. We were transporting her studio 3000 miles with little hassle.  Wendy began to arrange her desk with all she needed.

For a long time, Wendy assembled her new, temporary studio. She prodded and poked and fussed and fidgeted each item into place, then stood back, tilted her head, and sighed. More poking and fussing, another scrutinizing gaze, a new sigh. Finally she turned to me.

“This isn’t working,” she said.

Isn’t working? All the right lights were blinking, and each item hummed in its particular way. What was she talking about?

It turned out that our studios may be portable, but our mindsets are not. Wendy was used to her space in San Francisco, and setting up a new one wasn’t just about having the right equipment. The new portability of technology worked in all ways, except psychologically.

We do our jobs on the go all the time now. Our cars allow us to command them to send emails, subways and buses are connected with wireless, and tech items are getting smaller, sturdier, and better all the time. It’s a godsend for those of us who want the freedom to travel, even as work demands our attention. It’s just that, as Wendy and I found out, humans adapt slower than the technology we want. Was there a solution to speed the adaptability process? Some high tech answer I hadn’t thought of?

Later, as evening fell, I walked to a nearby store. I returned and centered a package smack in the middle of Wendy’s new desk area. She looked up from her drawing, bleary-eyed. Then she smiled widely; in front of her was a Bud Light with Lime, the beer she ritually drank in her studio at home as the sun goes down. “I think it’s starting to work,” she said, as she opened a bottle and looked around.

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Caroline Paul and Wendy MacNaughton

Columnists at Tech Page One

Caroline Paul is the author of "East Wind, Rain and Fighting Fire," and she co-wrote "Lost Cat: A True Story of Love, Desperation and GPS Technology" with her partner Wendy MacNaughton. MacNaughton's illustrations have appeared in The New York Times, Juxtapoz, and Print Magazine. "Lost Cat" was inspired by the curious disappearances of their beloved Tibia.

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Diigo is an acronym for ‘Digest of Internet Information, Groups and Other stuff’. Part collaborative research tool and part community knowledge-sharing, Diigo lets users highlight portions of web pages or attach sticky notes to specific parts of web pages. Unlike other tools in the market, Diigo highlights and sticky notes are visible any time you return to the original web page. Diigo also lets you work collaboratively. Share your research with a team or study group, share specific links and notes with specific people or share them publicly.

Image courtesy: Happy Batatinha via Flickr Creative Commons

A side benefit of the thousands of users creating online annotations via Diigo is the ability to search through this quality content for more thoughts on whatever you might be researching. Arguably better than a traditional search engine, searching through the Diigo site gives you access to the annotations and research of all viewers who came before you.

The many organizing tools on Diigo include tags and lists, all of which you can keep private, share with specific individuals or share publicly. The read later feature is one of my favorites. It allows you to visit a webpage and mark it for later with one click, freeing up some of the multiple tabs many of us tend to keep open at all times. Using the “diigolet” bookmarklet lets you bookmark, highlight, sticky note or share without even logging into your Diigo library. If you use the Diigo sidebar, you can view other notes and bookmarks from Diigo users for any web page you visit, which gives you access to related content and a parallel social browsing experience.

Diigo also offers several browser add-ons, mobile and desktop apps, and web services. Diigo Power Note for Android is available for devices running Android OS 1.6 or later. Diigo Offline Reader is available for the iPhone. iPod Touch, and iPad and requires iOS 2.2 or later.

This is not your average social bookmarking site. While the social bookmarking and networking opportunities are part of the fabric of the service, the focus on research and sharing of collective knowledge takes social bookmarking to a more sophisticated level.

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According to the report, 40% of companies with SMM budgets are using more consumer-oriented social media communities, such as Facebook, to connect with customers. However LinkedIn, with over 200 million users worldwide, attracts 39% of B2B companies surveyed. One of the key reasons for LinkedIn’s significant slice of the SMM pie is its marketing tool set, which goes far beyond status updates and paid advertising.

One of the companies using LinkedIn as a key component of its online marketing campaign is GE. The multinational company has seen great success leveraging the various marketing tools offered by LinkedIn, to build not only visibility but valuable customer relationships, as well.

With a diversified portfolio of  B2B and B2C business units encompassing finance, healthcare, energy, and transportation, GE is one of the world’s most visible and recognizable brands. However, its strengths can also be its weaknesses; companies the size of GE run the risk of seeming impersonal. Brands this large, with wide-ranging operations, must also take care to get the right messaging in front of the right audience.

These challenges led GE’s director of global digital marketing, Paul Marcum, to LinkedIn as he searched for ways to establish relationships with business and government policy leaders. They needed to make GE more accessible to customers in general.

According to Marcum, the greatest value of LinkedIn for brand marketers lies in the opportunities it offers to build valuable business customer relationships. Companies and audiences come together around mutual shared interests and values, with openness and conversations that simply haven’t taken place before through traditional media or consumer-oriented social media.

Delivering Content and Context

Marcum has been able to effectively utilize LinkedIn outreach tools such as sponsored InMails and targeted content ads. They use a variety of content types, such as video case studies and downloads created for industry professionals and government policymakers, for example. This allows the company to provide valuable, relevant content in the right context, demonstrating a deeper understanding of GE’s diverse business units and their audience’s needs.

He said LinkedIn works because it attracts people looking to do business, start dialogs, and establish relationships. As a result of its LinkedIn marketing program, GE has experienced active growth in target audience engagement and a achieved measurable business goals, including a robust sponsored InMail open rate of up to 13% and an average content ad interaction rate of 5.75%. In fact, content ads alone accounted for over 1300 unique content downloads.

Managing LinkedIn Advertising Challenges

There are, of course, some potential issues for marketers using LinkedIn. For example, some advertisers report low ad click-through rates (CTR) and low leads using the company’s self-serve advertising program. As with any advertising platform, LinkedIn campaigns should be monitored closely and adjusted as necessary. Keep ad creative fresh and experiment with bids to achieve the lowest cost per click and more importantly, cost per acquisition.

Also, targeting too narrow an audience can reduce your click-through rate. While choosing a more general audience may seem counter-intuitive to most marketers, just adding one more criteria to your target audience may help improve your CTR.

If you’re interested in making LinkedIn part of your social media marketing program, here are three things you should consider:

Company Page

A Company page provides the ability to send updates to followers, gather insights from current and potential customers, and start conversations to help you build brand identity, visibility, and value.

Sponsorships

Sponsor ads, groups, and polls to establish a presence in locations and ways that appeal to your target audience.

Analytics and Research

These tools enable you to gain insights into both your audience and your campaigns, to help you create more value for your customers and your organization.

Are you already using LinkedIn for relationship building? Feel free to share your thoughts and ideas in the comment section!

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Connie Bensen

Global Digital Marketing, Social Media and Community Executive at Dell

Connie Bensen is a leading Community Strategist who has provided resources and mentorship for Community Managers since 2007. Her definition for the Community Manager role is linked from Wikipedia and has been referenced by many organizations. She can be found presenting at leading social media conferences around the world. She has authored a series of ten white papers on the ROI of Social Media.

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A subsequent investigation revealed that the latches to the two engine bays hadn’t been secured prior to takeoff. The metal cowls that cover the bays reportedly ripped off and ruptured a fuel line. It was a rare occurrence — not nearly as common as what many initially feared had been the cause: bird strike.

Which brings me to this advice: Do not Google “bird strike.” In addition to seeing all manner of gruesome images, you’ll come away convinced that our species is on one long crash course with our winged friends, and it’s only a matter of time before this occasional problem becomes all too common. (And by “occasional” I mean thousands of strikes each year. The federal government has a database on the subject; between 1990 and 2008 it received over 87,000 strike reports. The Federal Aviation Administration estimates this represents just a fifth of all the strikes that actually happened.)

It’s not just that birds are striking our planes. More birds are striking more planes than ever before. The FAA says the number of reported collisions in 2012 was almost twice as many as in 2002, and four times as many as ten years earlier. As USA Today reported, that’s only partly because of increased reporting. Bird flocks are growing, we’re sending more flights into the skies and our planes are getting quieter.

As a somewhat frequent traveler, I was somewhat consoled to read up on the technology that’s sprung up in response to this problem.

Precise Flight, for instance, developed something called Pulselite, which, yes, emits a pulsing light to frighten away birds. The company claims that airlines using the Pulselite have reduced bird strikes by 20 to 30 percent.

The U.S. Air Force, for its part, has developed a system that uses GIS technology to create a Bird Avoidance Model — an online, near-real-time tool for flight planning that analyzes and correlates data on bird habitat, migration and breeding characteristics, plus environmental and man-made geospatial data.

Meanwhile grass management, pyrotechnics and other techniques have all been used at various airports, with promising results. But surely the neatest bird-strike science is happening at the Smithsonian Institution’s Feather Identification Lab, in Washington, D.C. That’s where research assistant Marcy Heacker performs thousands of forensic feather identifications each year. If at this point I’ve got you worked into a lather, I encourage you to lose yourself in this fascinating interview with her. The birds aren’t going away, but sometimes it’s heartening just to know smart people with big microscopes are on the case.

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Chris Colin

Columnist at Tech Page One

Chris Colin is the award-winning author of "Blindsight," named one of Amazon’s Best Books of 2011, and "What Really Happened to the Class of ‘93", which the National Press Club selected for its 2004 author awards. He’s a frequent New York Times contributor and a contributing writer at AFAR magazine. He’s written for the New York Times Magazine, Wired, Smithsonian, Mother Jones, the Atavist, Pop-Up Magazine, Conde Nast Portfolio, VIA, McSweeney’s Quarterly and several anthologies. He wrote the long-running On the Job column for the SF Chronicle, was an early writer/editor at Salon.com and is the co-author of The Blue Pages. He lives in San Francisco with his wife, Amy Standen, and works and teaches at the Writers’ Grotto, a writers’ collective. Email him at chris@chriscolin.com

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aNewDomain.net — Exactly 20 years ago, comic theorist Scott McCloud wrote a book called Reinventing Comics: How Imagination and Technology are Revolutionizing an Art Form. In it, McCloud predicted the trajectory of comics from dead-tree media to digital media. His arguments were so compelling and irrefutable; no one thought twice about his logic. But today, webcomics are making only a small splash. Amazon’s recently released Kindle Comic Creator may just be what the industry needs to break into the digital technology arena.

Historically, the comics industry has been hesitant to make the transition away from paper pamphlets to all-digital comics. Companies know that comic books are often collectors’ items. Collectors like their pristine libraries, and covet books not unlike the way Scrooge McDuck likes to swim in pools filled with gold and jewelry.

It’s a matter of time. Even the most old school comic fans have come around to the inevitable: the future of comic books is digital. Comics will be consumed digitally on phones and tablets, even PCs. Journalist Valerie Gallaher even predicts that comic books will only be printed in small batches, exclusively for hardcore collectors. She writes on her website Occasional Superheroinethat everyone will eventually read comics in digital form.

In many ways, the move to digital comics is already happening beneath our very noses. In a recent interview, Hank Kanalz, the Senior VP of Digital Comics for DC Entertainment, revealed that his company experienced a nearly 200 percent increase in digital sales in 2012. Compare that to a measly 12 percent increase in print sales.

Clearly, what the world needs most of all is a reader-friendly digital platform that pleases the reader and the creator equally. Many sites offer digital comics such as Comixology, ComicsPlus, Graphicly, Thrillbent, and Madefire, but none have produced a seamless paper-to-screen reading experience. Many of these sites are creaky and too inflexible to embrace the medium’s inherent explosive creativity. Most don’t even address the right-to-left reading preference of manga fans.

But that may be changing. Amazon recently debuted a promising platform for comic creators called the Kindle Comic Creator. Comic artists can transport their comics onto Amazon’s e-reader. The Comic Creator is free and lets artists render e-comics with double-page spreads, facing pages, and appropriate page turns. It even aids the reader with helpful navigation and individual panel views. The e-book revolution didn’t happen until the Kindle showed up. Perhaps it’s time for a real disruption in the comics industry now.

Photo Image for article: Image via Amazon.com

“The Kindle Comic Creator seems like it might be a viable tool for some indy artists to test the waters for digital, especially if they’re new to the whole idea,” says Greg Hatcher, a columnist for ComicBookResources.com. “But the real advantage is the branding, the fact that the Kindle stuff is available through Amazon. That’s a HUGE push to the front of the pack.”

But others disagree. Artist David Grimshaw is one example. “There are so many webcomics available for free, and sites that host webcomics for free,” says the Texas-based cartoonist who publishes under the byline Pow Flip. “I’m not really sure how much room there is for something like this.”

In a way, Grimshaw is correct. The digital comic book revolution has already happened. It was called webcomics. In no way is Amazon sparking a revolution. It’s merely providing options and a marketplace.

The Kindle tool also addresses the technological issues in converting print comics to digital comics. They’ve made the process a lot easier, says children’s book author Aaron Shephard. “The genius of the Comic Creator is that you can create your pages in almost any program you’re familiar with and then just import them.” Shephard spent about 20 minutes converting and importing his book The Adventures of Mouse Deer to the Kindle platform and experienced nary a hiccup.

The trick for Amazon will be to persuade consumers that digital comics are worth paying for. “The person who cracks that digital nut is going to be richer than God,” says Hatcher. Changing the longstanding culture and mindset of comic readers is the real issue, he concludes. “It has nothing to do with format.”

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Eric Searleman

Contributor at ANewDomain.net

Based in San Francisco, Eric Searleman has worked as a newspaper reporter, a fiction editor, a comic book artist, and a rock star (confirmation required).

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IT has traditionally focused on perimeter security and network-based monitoring to detect when outsiders are coming into the network and trying to access data. Or worrying about what devices the attacker may try to use. The problem is, once the adversary has made it into the network, that no longer looks like malicious. If the breach was the result of stolen user account credentials, that attacker now looks like a normal user, with all the privileges and rights granted to that account.

Keeping that in mind, IT needs to shift their energies to a more data-centric view of security. It doesn’t pay to have all kinds of secure authentication and network monitoring tools in place, if once in, all the data is in plain text and accessible through the database.

Administrators need to think about data protection – both for data at rest and while in transit. Below, we go over five things to keep in mind when protecting data from criminals, spies, and malicious insiders.

1. Identify your data security needs

The first step is to really understand what kind of data you have in the first place. Security is not about protecting every single file and information the same way, but rather, about applying appropriate levels of protection to different types of data. A proper audit will help identify all instances of data that needs higher levels of protection because of compliance reasons, to be in line with security best practices, or because they happen to be the company’s crown jewels.

2. Encrypt the data

Encryption is a critical part of data-centric security. The file is encrypted using a strong encryption algorithm so that even when attackers breach the network barriers, the information is not accessible. Selecting strong encryption is important, as there is no security in using algorithms that have already been found to be weak or easy to brute-force.

Encryption doesn’t apply to just data on servers and databases, but on endpoint devices, such as portable hard drives, laptops and USB sticks. That way, even if the device is lost, the information doesn’t get exposed.

3. Emphasize strong passwords

Employees need to be reminded to select strong passwords so that attackers can’t just brute-force their way into applications and servers to steal data. The IT department also has to make sure there are no default passwords or hard-coded passwords that can give attackers a backdoor into the network. Whether we are talking about default passwords for printers, VoIP systems, or content management systems, enemies try to break in using default login credentials.

4. Transfer files securely

Have policies set up so that employees know they shouldn’t just email sensitive documents around. Instead, they should be using secure file transfer services, where users can send encrypted messages or use secure networks to ensure the information does not leave corporate servers. The same policies should remind employees they shouldn’t be using open wireless networks without the protection of VPNs. Sending files to people over an open wireless network means anyone eavesdropping on the network would be able to intercept that file. Users should have access to encrypted USB drives for file transfer, as well.

5. Look into data leak prevention (DLP)

Invest in data leak prevention to make sure files are not leaving the enterprise network without authorization. DLP ensures that insiders aren’t sending out data without proper protection, but also any malicious file transfers that may be occurring.

If you take steps to protect the data within the network, you make it harder for attackers to walk off with sensitive data. Perpetrators will take any data they can find on the company servers, such as Social Security numbers, email addresses, invoices, or credit card numbers, and just sell them for quick cash. Using these steps, IT administrators can drive up the cost of attack by making the stolen data hard to use, making it likely attackers will just move onto a weaker and easier target.

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Fahmida Y. Rashid

Contributor at Tech Page One

Fahmida Y. Rashid is an analyst for networking and security at PCMag.com. She focuses on ways businesses can keep their data and networks secure without going bankrupt chasing after the wrong kinds of protection. Prior to landing at PCMag, she was a senior writer covering security, core Internet infrastructure, and open source at eWEEK. She was also a senior technical editor at CRN Test Center reviewing open source, storage, and networking products from 2007 to 2008. Before setting out her journalism shingle, she was a technology consultant, first at PricewaterhouseCoopers, and later with the Business Consulting Services group in IBM Global Services. She has worked in the trenches as help-desk, QA tester, software and Web developer, and network administrator.

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This latest item in Dell’s IT portfolio integrates servers, storage, networking and management into one small, manageable package. Indicative of the early response to VRTX, it just got awarded five out of five stars — and the IT Pro Innovation award  — by IT Pro, UK. Jolly good indeed.

Major plusses for SMBs, remote offices

Dell found a way to pack the essential components of IT (servers, storage, networking, management) into an extraordinarily small space with capacity and scalability like you wouldn’t believe.

It’s uncommonly quiet, and can run on 110v power, so it’s well-mannered in the office with no extra rewiring, cooling or sound insulation required. But VRTX can also run on 220v power and fits in a tower or a 5U rack, so it’s a great option for the data center as well. And its intuitive unified management gives you easy control over all elements, locally and remotely.

“SMBs and remote offices looking to consolidate IT services on a single hardware platform should consider Dell’s new PowerEdge VRTX,” IT Pro, UK, advised.

“It’s far more affordable than a blade server and its unique storage and PCI-e shared architecture makes it very versatile.”

Customer-driven design

VRTX came about when Dell and its and customers collaborated to address an unmet need. Dell sales reps had noticed a huge number of businesses struggling to make ends meet in IT with patchworks of components, tangles of cables, and nightmarish conglomerations of management tools. Customers had too, so they all talked – a lot. And with that excellent input and great innovation from Dell engineers, VRTX was born.

What’s the upshot of it all? If you manage IT for a small/medium sized organization or remote office — or if you like congruent, efficient simplicity in your large data center — you might want to take note: VRTX can vastly improve your IT landscape; IT Pro, UK is already a fan; and Dell’s the only place you’ll find it.

To learn more about VRTX, you can visit Dell’s Shared Infrastructure site. Also, you can follow the VRTX story on Direct to Dell and Inside Enterprise IT:

• PowerEdge VRTX: Meeting the Needs of Dell Customers
• Innovating for Efficiency: Introducing PowerEdge VRTX for Systems Management

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Beverly Palm

Digital Marketing Content Writer/Editor at Dell

Beverly Palm is a technology writer and consultant for Dell, where she writes copy for Dell.com on topics as diverse as 12th generation servers, blades (the computing kind), servers and networking. In her spare time, Bev reads the classics (German and Russian), the New York Times Science section and nonfiction, and practices Bikram Yoga.

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Yet, in order for entrepreneurs to take full advantage of their position and successfully innovate, they need access to capital, networks and knowledge — resources large corporations have at their fingertips. Corporate executives and entrepreneurs often have needs and strengths that are both opposite and complementary. By joining forces we can achieve our goals, be it a small company looking to grow quickly or a large company seeking innovation – and together have a great impact on turning our economy around.

Dell’s approach to business development and acquisition is a great example of this. Many of our acquired companies were scrappy small- to mid-sized enterprises serving a market of their peers, and since becoming part of Dell they are bringing new, innovative thinking with them and expanding their capabilities to give large companies – like Dell – the benefits of agile, scalable IT.  We’re taking full advantage of these capabilities inside of Dell, and I’m meeting with hundreds of large customers who are also finding value in our  “design to scale” approach as well – meaning we give them open systems that are highly affordable, user-friendly and designed to grow as they grow.

At Dell, we use Dell Boomi cloud integration technology to integrate new acquisitions like Compellent and SecureWorks, moving quickly to combine separate sales pipelines and sales channel partner deal registration programs into one system. The normal integration process would have taken months, but using the Dell Boomi AtomSphere application platform we were able to shorten integration time-to-value and in the process, strengthen data security and prepare for future acquisitions.

And through our acquisition strategy, Dell has remained true to its startup roots. While VCs tend to be focused on ROI, at Dell we’re focused on integration and incubation first. We provide brand awareness and go-to-market capabilities to smaller companies through acquisition, enabling them to go big with their innovative offerings. Systems management company KACE runs on a “startup” inside of Dell and growing the business at a record pace while staying true to the Dell KACE value proposition. It’s our M&A efforts and solid relationships with the startup community that have brought Dell its strongest-ever portfolio of solutions, intellectual property and differentiated products, backed by new skills and capabilities in our global team.

Acquisition isn’t the only route to developing mutually beneficial relationships with growing businesses. There are many ways big businesses can open their doors and make resources available to support their growth and success. One great example is Goldman Sachs, which runs a $500 million program called 10,000 Small Businesses. It supports small companies by providing them with mentors, management training, and access to capital. By investing in entrepreneurs at this stage, Goldman is building a strong brand affinity early on and supporting job creation, something our global economy so desperately needs.

Recently at Dell, our Office of the EIR (Entrepreneur-in-Residence) hosted a first-of-its-kind event called Tech Innovators Day that gave promising entrepreneurs the opportunity to meet and pitch their firms to me and other senior-level executives. We discussed their business needs and priorities, while giving them critical feedback on their pitch, company, and business plan, and making connections where appropriate. Companies in attendance ranged from Datafiniti, the world’s first search engine for data, to security platform Risk I/O, to pattern-based analytics solution provider Emcien.By supporting the growth of entrepreneurship, companies like Dell and Goldman Sachs can play our role in resolving issues in the current small business landscape and help cultivate the future generation of entrepreneurs.

All big corporations have the ability to make a positive difference in the lives of entrepreneurs and their companies and sponsor innovation in a way that benefits us all. It just takes understanding how much entrepreneurial thinking can influence their success, and as a result, how their success can influence entrepreneurship for the better.

Steve Felice is president and chief commercial officer of Dell Inc.

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Stephanie Losee

Managing Editor at Tech Page One

Stephanie Losee is the Managing Editor of Dell Global Communications.

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Once installed on your computers, you can access LogMeIn from anywhere on the web for a display of your available connections.  Select the computer you want to access, and within seconds you are presented with a web based screen to log onto that computer from your remote location.

So long as your bandwidth is reasonably high speed, you should have good performance as you work over your remote connection.

What You Can Do

Control your remote computer to run programs and view your desktop.  You can also cut and paste between computers.  The free version supports wake on LAN if your remote computer is sleeping, and the remote computer can be rebooted with reconnection, even into safe mode.  The program also supports chat and logs and will report on sessions and user access.

Security

Your session is transmitted over the Internet using safe AES 256-bit encryption and includes SSL/TLS intrusion detection and IP address lockout.  The setup requires no configuration of firewalls, routers or proxies.  And since you connect and log into the remote computer, no special setup of remote PC admin rights is necessary.

Other Services

For fees at various levels you can access your computers using a mobile device to gain access to file transfer, sharing and remote printing. Office managers who also double as systems administrators can remotely manage and monitor multiple computers from anywhere. It has a new Windows Updates feature, you can deploy all updates like Windows Server Update Services, which is is overkill for a small office.

Admins can also execute remote commands, distribute files and run batch files and scripts across multiple computers.

Support

Support for the services is available by way of toll free numbers, a robust knowledge base, or by a help ticket.  There is also an active online community with ongoing expert advice.

LogMeIn must be one of technology’s great values given all you can accomplish with its free version, and with added cost LogMeIn will scale up to meet just about any need for remote management of computers.  It is easy and intuitive to use, give it a try the next time you need a remote connection.

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Mike Rothman

Tech Evangelist and Senior Writer at ANewDomain.net

Based in San Francisco, Mike Rothman is a tech evangelist and senior writer at anewdomain.net. Email him at mike@anewdomain.net.

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Reply all can save time as long as it’s used wisely and with caution. Credit: RambergMediaImages via Compfight cc.

Reply all is either the best or worst technological invention of the computer age — depending on who you ask.

The email function, which allows users to respond to every address on a thread — sometimes reaching hundreds or even thousands of people — has generated some extremely awkward and inappropriate professional situations.

One college admissions staffer at the University of California San Diego accidentally sent a mass congratulations message to more than 28,000 applicants who were actually rejected by the school.

Unfortunate incidents such as this require a lot of back-pedaling, fixing and, of course, apologizing. It has even prompted the creation of a reply all-blocking program that businesses can install on their email systems.

Other instances involve personal emails that reach too many friends, and those situations can be extremely difficult.

The real career-killers, though, happen when personal and professional emails merge. Aljosha Novakovic, founder and CEO of Medko, a website that helps people find doctors, recalled a reply-all debacle involving a job applicant who had received a rejection email from a business incubator.

He meant to forward the message — and some negative commentary about the company — to his friend.

“Instead he replied to the entire staff,” Novakovic recalled. “The best part
 is that he followed up the email a few minutes later greatly apologizing 
and saying that he really didn’t mean anything he said.”

Such matters happen all the time within companies as well, like when a hotheaded employee mouths off about a project in an email inadvertently sent to the entire network.

Shawn P. Walsh, president and CEO 
of New Hampshire-based Paradigm Computer Consulting, encountered one of these cases after referring a programmer to one of his clients. The programmer had used mass emails to keep in touch with his clients, but Walsh’s client apparently didn’t realize that and accidentally responded to the programmer’s entire network in an unprofessional manner.

“The client I had referred to the programmer accidentally hit reply all on the email he sent, and sent an email to him and all his clients, ripping him to shreds about the length of the project, the project being over budget … also, going into some information about her personal and business financial situation, and on and on,” Walsh said. “Needless to say, when I received this email, it was a very uncomfortable situation. Of course, nowhere near as uncomfortable as it was for the business owner, when she realized what she had done. About an hour later a new reply-all came out with a very regretful apology. I think the programmer pretty much got a pass on all future issues on that project.”

It’s an interesting case that questions the nature of professional emails, Walsh said.

“This experience has reinforced my long standing belief that positive or neutral things can be communicated by email — bad things or emotional things should always be communicated in person,” he added.

Business-to-business reply-alls are most common because that’s where the function is used most. It can be an effective and time-saving form of communication. Sometimes, though, reply all can have the opposite effect by including recipients in discussions they have nothing to do with, wasting their time.

“Reply all is one of the worst inventions of all time,” said Scott Regan, founder and CEO of the business management consultancy AchieveIt, which specializes in eliminating inefficiencies. “I don’t need to be CC’d on every email.”

Andrew King is a former editor and business reporter for the Journal News in New York. His work has also appeared on the website of USA Today.

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Nick Clunn

Contributor at Tech Page One

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Image courtesy of Gigwalk

aNewDomain.net — Gigwalk helps business owners hire labor to complete small tasks. The on-demand labor force can perform tasks such as collecting market research, demoing a product, and auditing retail locations, according to the company.

This web-based platform – Android device support is coming soon – is designed as a stand-in temp agency with a digital and flexible edge. The venture-funded company raised $6 million in capital in 2012, looks something like Amazon’s Mechanical Turk, and oDesk.

Image Courtesy of Dell

Where Gigwalk differentiates itself is that the flexible labor force is able to complete offline tasks – like interviewing a customer at a cafe. The ability to complete tasks that aren’t electronic is one of the service’s key strengths.

There is always the question of the cost. Gigwalk takes a 30 percent cut for every gig, and payment is made up front. Gigwalk recommends charging between $10-$15 for a job that will take about an hour – travel time is also included.

Image courtesy of Gigwalk

Most of the gigs I found in the San Francisco Bay Area were between $10 – $20.

Gigwalk’s service also comes with technology that can automatically assign workers to a task based on their skills, availability, and experience. According to the company the software removes workers who don’t complete tasks on time.

Employers can manually select workers for a task. As companies find Gigwalkers they like, it’s possible to add them to a trusted team – who will get access to gigs before other workers.

For enterprise, too

I initially thought Gigwalk would be especially useful for entrepreneurs, and SMBs, it turns out some blue chip companies are also Gigwalk clients. For example, when I investigated the types of gigs available in the Bay Area, I noticed quite a number of Microsoft Bing postings.

The Bing gigs – all are similar – generally involve taking a few pictures of a local business, and answering several survey questions. All of that for $10.

Large customers can to take advantage of the company’s 250,000 workers across the 50 states and in Canada. It’s an educated group and 93 percent of the workers are college educated. Gigwalk workers have profiles that include ratings from prior employers, and other metrics.

Inexpensive, flexible labor that’s useful on a large scale is really Gigwalk’s win, and makes it appealing to organizations of many sizes.

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Max Cherney

Contributor at ANewDomain.net

Max A. Cherney is a San Francisco based tech journalist. Email tips to max@anewdomain.net.

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Education groups say parents can help their children adjust to the Common Core. Credit: Matt McGee via Compfight cc

New Common Core curriculum standards that most states will adopt over the next several years represent a major shift for students, but also for their parents.

The change for mothers and fathers whose nightly chores include helping with their children’s homework will become apparent when the backpacks open up after school.

English lessons will focus more heavily on nonfiction and expanding vocabulary; while math assignments will concentrate on helping students obtain a deeper understanding of fewer topics.

Certain Algebra 2 and Geometry content is out, critics charge. Sixth graders, meanwhile, will spend a lot of time studying ratios and “proportional reasoning.”

The revised curriculum, known as the Common Core State Standards, have been adopted by 45 states, but only Georgia, North Carolina and a handful of others have introduced the curriculum in schools.

A large group of states are gearing up for a major rollout of the program in September, however, including New York, California and Illinois, which are among the most populous.

The standards are designed to better prepare high school graduates for college or the workforce, and to improve how the United States performs academically relative to other countries.

Education groups reach out to parents

But getting the nation’s students up to speed will be a challenge, and a number of education groups are attempting to ease the transition by preparing parents as much as possible.

EngageNY.org, a campaign created by the New York State Education Department to support administration-led reform efforts, has published a chart that recommends what steps parents can take to help their children meet the new objectives.

Parents can support the emphasis on nonfiction reading by supplying more nonfiction books at home and fostering positive associations with the genre by having “fun with nonfiction in front of them,” the guide recommends.

National PTA has taken a more granular approach by publishing guides for each grade that suggest what activities parents can do at home to support their children’s learning.

It has also provided tips on how to best talk to teens about planning for college and careers. The group suggests that parents make sure their children are following the right course sequence to meet post-graduation goals, and to seek out internships to build work experience.

Different ways to reach the same goal

The best approach to implement the Common Core can vary among districts.

The Council of the Great City Schools, an advocate for educating diverse student bodies, has recommended an approach that prescribes different levels of intervention based on what behavioral and educational supports a student needs.

Parental involvement is a key component of the system, according to a council report.

“Research and common observation show that parents’ engagement with their children’s schooling and the educators who work with their children has a significant impact on student progress—both academic and behavioral,” the report stated.

Nick Clunn is an award-winning journalist who has worked for several websites and daily newspapers, including The Record in New Jersey. He teaches journalism as an adjunct instructor at Montclair State University. Follow him @NickClunn.

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Nick Clunn

Contributor at Tech Page One

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Carley Roney, founder of the XO Group, speaking at an event for the Dell Women’s Entrepreneur Network. Credit: Dell

Print may not be dying after all.

The medium that many pundits predicted would evaporate amid the disruption caused by the Internet even seems poised for a resurgence in some corners.

It may come as a surprise that tech entrepreneurs are pushing this trend.

Eloise Bune, CEO of Gracious Eloise, and Carley Roney, editor in chief of XO Group Inc., are among those who are saving print by revamping it for the digital age.

Bune’s Gracious Eloise makes handwritten notes “as easy as email,” while Roney has used magazines to help advertisers reach customers despite having built up an online empire that includes a popular wedding site, The Knot.

Both women spoke about the value that print brings to their businesses during a networking event for the Dell Women’s Entrepreneur Network in March.

About 60 people attended the event at XO Group headquarters in New York City, where panelists also discussed online retail and its challenges.

Note-writing without hand cramps

Bune, who founded Gracious Eloise several years ago, was interviewed by a Dell film crew at the networking event as part of video series on women entrepreneurs.

Her business provides an alternative for anyone who has needed to write a large number of handwritten notes.

Gracious Eloise relies on patented technology that collects and stores handwriting samples from its users. The site then creates a “handwritten note” in the penmanship of its users based on whatever they type. Notes are then mailed.

Bune refers to note writing as a “high-touch experience” that she said remains popular with newlyweds and corporations. The biggest luxury retailers send more than 1 million notes annually; newlyweds collectively send more than 160 million.

“In the world that we live in, we’re all inundated with email and Facebook and Twitter,” Bune said. “Gracious Eloise is this new way to signal to somebody that you care. It’s getting through the clutter and getting your message across.”

Connecting through print

Roney, who co-founded XO Group with the launch of a website in 1996, said she later turned to print because it seemed the best medium for connecting brides with the gown industry.

XO published the premiere issue of The Knot Wedding Gowns magazine in February 2000 — even as The Knot website was becoming extremely popular.

Roney said “not one of us wanted to be in the wedding magazine business,” which she said is regarded by the publishing industry as “the ugly stepsister of the entire magazine world.”

Yet she could not think of a better medium for presenting wedding gowns. The Knot magazine completely revamped the traditional layout of bridal magazines by organizing ads and listing prices alongside each gown.

“At the end of the day, I consider my job making connections,” Roney said. “I believe you make a better connection with wedding dresses by browsing through a big, fat, juicy magazine where you can flag the page, lean over and show your mom and carry it with you. It’s a very tactile experience.”

Nick Clunn is an award-winning journalist who has worked for several websites and daily newspapers, including The Record in New Jersey. He teaches journalism as an adjunct instructor at Montclair State University. Follow him @NickClunn.

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Nick Clunn

Contributor at Tech Page One

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There are literally hundreds of social media tools available, but chances are just a few will suit your particular needs.

Altimeter Group has very handily segmented social media tools according to five use cases and here, we suggest a free tool that may fit each need.

1. Buffer for Measuring Engagement Levels

If you’re a brand with a high volume of content and need to respond to customer queries rapidly, you want a tool with the ability to do at least the following:

• Listen and monitor alerts.
• Identify brand sentiment and industry influencers.
• Assign tasks to appropriate team members .

As an analytical tool, Buffer is still in its infancy, but has recently added some great monitoring capabilities. Launched as a Twitter scheduler, it now also includes support for Facebook and LinkedIn, with plenty of app integrations and browser extensions. One of the best things about the tool is its ability to help you see which posts are performing better than others, which in turn can help you determine why and adjust strategy accordingly.

2. Hootsuite for Segmented Broadcasting

Companies that publish a variety of real-time content such as news, deals, coupons, and other types of time-sensitive information typically need a tool for managing their broadcasts, according to their target market’s demographics. These organizations may want to create content in different formats, for different audiences, and promote their brand across social networks.

HootSuite empowers teams to engage effectively while maintaining control over content and messaging.

Hootsuite does all the above and is a popular social media tool used by small and medium businesses to large enterprises. Their free plan allows you to monitor and track Facebook, Twitter and Linkedin using a dashboard-style interface. You can assign workflow and manage conversations with your team, receive basic reports integrated with Facebook Insights and Google Analytics, and add multiple apps such as YouTube and Instagram for more insightful reporting options.

3. Simply Measured Social Media Tools for Campaign Management

Some brands choose to maintain a heavy presence on just one or two social networks and launch contests, games and other custom interactivity from these platforms. If you are such a brand, you need social media tools native to the platform you are using.

Simply Measured provides a plethora of free analytical reports downloadable to Excel or viewable on the web. Each report is platform-specific, so you can hone in on how each social platform is contributing to your social media activity. For example, for Facebook, you get a free Facebook Insights report, Facebook Content Analysis report, Facebook Competitive Analysis report, as well as a Facebook Fan Page report.

4. Social Bakers for Global Insights

Some brands have a large network comprised of hundreds or thousands of social accounts, spread over countries, languages and business models. Such firms may need an integrated social media marketing solution that provides regional reports and offers support for diverse languages.

Fake Followers app from SocialBakers

Social Bakers is a great social media tool used across 75 countries. They focus on media monitoring of the big 5 – Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, Google Plus and YouTube – and allow you to see user stats segmented by country, industry, region, influencer, etc. They also provide a great resource center for training, which includes industry-specific Key Performance Indicators (KPI) reports. One of their popular free tools is the Fake Follower tool, which allows you to see how many fake accounts are following you!

5. Social Reports from Google Analytics for Custom Analysis

Organizations in heavily regulated industries or those who require full customization might opt for this option. Here, they’ll get a built-in social media training and resource platform, along with custom reporting options.

Social Reports from Google Analytics are a great way to measure the impact of social media on your business goals and conversions. You can see where traffic is coming from, engagement levels for each social network, conversion rates for measuring metrics, and social plugins for amplifying your content across the Google network.

The key to using social media tools effectively is not to use every tool on the block. You may not find a single option with all of the features you need, but a few select tools that answer your unique requirements can help you realize the best results.

These 5 free tools and their suggested applications are just a few of the myriad of options available to suit a business’s multiple needs. For a detailed list, check out this helpful Wiki of social media monitoring tools.

Where can you find me?

Twitter, Google+, LinkedIN, DellTechCenter

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Dennis Smith

Dell Contributor at Tech Page One

Dennis is the networking and storage evangelist for DellTechCenter.com. He also manages the Dell TechCenter social accounts; click on the tabs above to be connected to them. Dennis has also been recognized as aVMware vExpert.

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Image credits: Sandy Berger

If you want to carry your phone in the pocket of your skinny jeans, this will not be the phone for you. While size will be the biggest detriment for some, its size offers many bonuses. When you check your email, you don’t have to scroll as much. Reading a book is as pleasurable as reading on a dedicated e-book reader such as the Kindle. Videos look great on the widescreen with a 16:9 aspect ratio. Even the keyboard has enough screen space for the number keys to have their own row.

Although the 5.5-inch HD Super AMOLED screen (1,280 x 720-pixel resolution) doesn’t meet the pixel numbers of the iPhone and other similar phones, the details are very clear. The blacks are deep and the colors are vibrant.

Similar to other Galaxy phones, the build is a little plastic-y, but the rounded edges and silver bezel make it sleek and slim. The first few days, the phone felt huge in my hand and awkward at times. Yet I quickly got used to the size. As I discovered the many features of the phone I became less aware of its largeness and more aware of its capabilities.

The Android 4.1 Jelly Bean operating system, a quad-core processor, an extra-large battery shown below, and an excellent 8-megapixel camera made the phone a joy to use. It bests the iPhone with its user-replaceable battery and micro SD card slot. The Note II’s specification list is expansive, including NFC and S Beam.

The Note II has a physical hardware Home button below the display, along with two touch-sensitive buttons for Menu and Back. In addition to the seven customizable home screens, Samsung has added an “easy boot” mode that puts widgets of most-used apps, settings, and contacts on the home screen. It’s amazingly useful and, of course, all customizable.

You can easily view two apps on the screen at the same time and Samsung has added Page Buddy, a context-relevant home screen that pops up when you remove the stylus, plug in the headphones or dock the phone.

The pull out stylus can be used for S-Notes, drawing, and a wide-variety of included productivity tools that are all easy to use.

This Galaxy Note II has a lot to offer. Reception is excellent. Battery life is good. The camera is great. My only two disappointments are minor. The speakers sound a bit tinny and S-voice needs work. It’s not bad, but can’t yet compare to Siri.

There is no denying that this phone is big and won’t be for everyone, but the bottom line is that its functionality won me over. It is, overall, one of the best phones I’ve ever reviewed.

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Sandy Berger

Senior Editor at ANewDomain.net

Sandy Burger, based in Pinehurst, N.C., is a veteran tech journalist and regular contributor to Tech Page One. As senior editor at aNewDomain.net, Sandy covers tech tips and tricks, apps and gadgets in general. Email her at Sandy@aNewDomain.net.

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Credit: Dell
Government’s role in enabling innovation is the subject Dell President and CCO Steve Felice’s speech at the 2013 FedTalks conference.

The challenges facing entrepreneurs today are great, but so are the opportunities — especially if government can become an enabler of innovation rather than an obstacle.

That’s the central message Dell President and Chief Commercial Officer Steve Felice will deliver Wednesday to the top 1,000 IT leaders gathering for the annual FedTalks conference in Washington.

The call for a more innovative government comes as public officials are grappling with unprecedented IT demands and shrinking budgets, but also as technological advances hold the promise of helping the private and public sectors emerge stronger from the economic slump.

Government needs more entrepreneurial spirit, given the challenge of learning to do more with less, Felice will suggest in his speech, according to a transcript provided to Tech Page One.

The idea would be to bring the private and public sectors together to not only meet today’s great challenges, but also to capitalize on the opportunities that technological innovation can provide, he says. It would reimagine government as more efficient and customer-centric, and break down obstacles to job creation.

A policy initiative that Dell has been supporting over the past year would let government agencies reap the benefits of in-house innovators under an entrepreneur-in-residence program.

A proposal modeled after Dell’s EIR

The legislation is rooted in an idea that Dell made part of its operations. The company was one of the first in the Fortune 50 to appoint an EIR. Ingrid Vanderveldt, Dell’s EIR, the first to hold the position, helps the company keep in tune with its roots by “bringing the outside in,” says Felice.

A successful innovator and businesswoman in green IT, Vanderveldt amplifies Dell’s ability to listen and act on the needs of its customers, especially small and medium-size businesses.

An EIR could play a similar role for agencies at the state and federal level, according to Felice. Entrepreneurs could ­enable public officials to be more responsive to the evolving needs of constituents, such as by identifying obstacles to starting a business. EIRs could also provide government agencies with an innovative, outside perspective to problem solving.

Enabling entrepreneurship and innovation

New, innovative thinking is needed to help government keep pace with fast-changing technologies at a time of budget cuts and sequestration, he says. Investing scarce taxpayer dollars in knowledge — in innovation — would help save money in the long run and act as a down payment for a more dynamic economy.

The Technology CEO Council, which is chaired by Dell Chairman and CEO Michael Dell, shows some of the ways technology can transform government and save over $1 trillion in a recent report by called “One Trillion Reasons.”

Helping to win passage of EIR legislation in Congress and statehouse would be a good place to start, says Felice.

Calling the bill “straightforward, yet revolutionary,” he explains that it would create a fellowship program for entrepreneurs, similar to Presidential Innovation and Management Fellows.

Bill to bring the outside in

A select group of 30 EIRs would be placed in key federal departments for a couple of years at a time. Reporting to agency heads, these innovators would suggest ways to make operations more efficient and responsive, while exposing officials to new ideas.

Just like at Dell, government EIRs would seek to “bring the outside in” by providing fellow entrepreneurs with an advocate in government who understands their needs and challenges, he said.

Felice says he is optimistic about the creation of a formal EIR program in the federal government this year, a measure that is supported by Silicon Valley’s own congressman, Rep. Mike Honda.

Six to eight states could also soon pass EIR legislation, Felice says, creating a great benefit to people and businesses trying to succeed in those parts of the country. Bills have been introduced in several states, including Texas, Massachusetts and Ohio. The legislation was enacted in Virginia, though it must be passed again next year before taking effect.

Felice will urge public and private sector leaders in the room to help make that happen, saying innovation can help both entrepreneurs and governments overcome today’s obstacles.

Tom Barkley is a business journalist with nearly 20 years of experience, most recently at Dow Jones and The Wall Street Journal.

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Nick Clunn

Contributor at Tech Page One

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Image credit (MyCar Locator Free): Sandy Berger

For Android users, MyCar Locator Free by nomadrobot is a great choice. Just press the Park icon to mark your location. Then press Navigate to let it help you find your car.  You can see a variety of maps and can even get verbal walking instructions. It doesn’t have a lot of bells and whistles, but it has good maps and gets the job done. There are ads at the bottom of the screen of this free app. You can enjoy MyCar Locator ad free by upgrading to the paid version.

Image credit (Where Did I Park): Sandy Berger

For Windows Phones, I like Where Did I Park by iPragmatech & TetFX Studio, a free app available in the Windows Store.
This app is easy to use with red Park and green Find buttons. Clearly marked icons under the map let you take several pictures of the area, write notes, and easily clear your previous location. All the location information is shown on one easy-to-read screen. There is also a parking timer with alarm alerts.

Image credit (Parkbud): Sandy Berger

For Apple users, I recommend an app called Parkbud – Parking & Travel Guide by Wunderstadt GmbH. This is the only app in this round-up that has a fee. The $1.99 fee gives you some additional perks. Not only can you park, take pictures, make notes and then find your car, but Parkbud excels at helping you park. It has a classy-looking parking meter and the amount of time remaining even appears right on the app icon. You can also use the app to pay for parking anywhere that mobile payments are accepted. It bookmarks nearby parking areas and points of interest like restaurants and navigates you to them.  It has a beautiful interface, animations, and sound, and it allows you to hook in your favorite navigation tool, so you can use Apple Maps, Google Maps, TomTom, and more.

If like me, you have trouble remembering where you parked, any of these apps are sure to make you never lose your car again.

Featured image credit: Wikimedia commons

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Sandy Berger

Senior Editor at ANewDomain.net

Sandy Burger, based in Pinehurst, N.C., is a veteran tech journalist and regular contributor to Tech Page One. As senior editor at aNewDomain.net, Sandy covers tech tips and tricks, apps and gadgets in general. Email her at Sandy@aNewDomain.net.

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Document Management

Recently Cometdocs upgraded its services. It still provides excellent file conversions, but the most notable difference is it has morphed into a free online document management service. The Cometdocs interface is clean and easy-to-use.

Image credit: Sandy Berger

Simply upload the file you want to work with and drag it to one of the four tabs to start. Each tab has a unique function:

• Convert – Converts the document to another format with the choices listed
• Transfer – Email the document to someone else
• Store – Keep it online for longer than 24 hours (registered users only)
• Host — Get an anonymous 24-hour valid public link

All of this is free. You simply fill in your email address and Cometdocs will send you the converted document, send you a public link, or store the document for you.

Conversions

Cometdocs was able to handle all the conversion I threw at it, including complex PDF documents. These included PDF to Word, Excel, and PowerPoint. It also can go the other way – converting these and other formats to PDF. It can also handle XPS documents and will often identify and convert a document even if the extension is missing and you don’t know what type of document you are dealing with. A full list of available conversions can be found here.

You will have to look elsewhere for audio, video, and ringtone conversions, but if it is document conversions you need this is an excellent site. It does an especially good job with PDF conversions.

Document Storage

You can perform some conversions and other functions without registering on the site. If you register, you get added functionality, including  1 GB of online storage, a file size limit of 100 MB, 15 conversions per week, and options for controlling the visibility and privacy of the documents that are uploaded. The link to a converted file is only good for 24 hours if you have not registered, but if you have registered it can be part of your online storage to be kept longer.

Premium and Pro Services

Simple conversions and storage are free. Additional services are available for a fee. The Premium service is $9.99 a month. The Pro service is $19.99 a month. These fees get you more storage, a larger file size limit, unlimited conversions, and the ability to work with multiple documents. It also lets you transfer files to more than on person at once and has the ability to perform useful OCR conversion. Details of exactly what you get for the paid service can be found at the Comentdocs website.

Summary

As a document management and storage system Cometdocs has a lot of competition from companies like Google, Microsoft, and  Evernote. Unless you do a lot of document conversions, there is little reason to choose Cometdocs over the others. However, Cometdocs excels at file conversions and provides a great free service in that area.

Featured image credit: wikicommons

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Sandy Berger

Senior Editor at ANewDomain.net

Sandy Burger, based in Pinehurst, N.C., is a veteran tech journalist and regular contributor to Tech Page One. As senior editor at aNewDomain.net, Sandy covers tech tips and tricks, apps and gadgets in general. Email her at Sandy@aNewDomain.net.

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1) Redefine time to value (TtV). While return on investment (ROI) is a benchmark to prioritize projects, we’re working and living in an environment of rapid change.  Previously, “traditional” IT culture required up-front capital for on-premise tools and building obsessive requirements for standards and policies for procurement; software took weeks or months to install. Today, users, customers and businesses live in a world requiring greater innovation and on-demand access in minutes. Therefore, a speed “premium” needs to be used to capture the value and the dynamism of cloud investments.

2)  Acceleration of career growth and direction. In the minute it takes to read this topic, 100 hours of new video is uploaded to YouTube.com. While it’s not all educational, hundreds of vendors have used cloud capacity to bring virtual education to the masses while reducing costs and eliminating travel. Consumerization of IT and mobility means employees learning becomes a constant; learning while at home, at lunch or at the airport. The digital content is easily consumed, easy to track and maximizes productivity with less time out of office.

3) Putting the client first, then doing it better. Humans become distracted, delayed, or mired in projects not entirely benefiting clients. A 2008 study found that 62 percent of IT projects failed to meet their schedules. Cloud for delivery of IT services can enhance chances of implementation success as well improve the client experience and empower the workforce with information to make better decisions for clients. Cloud finally affords the ability to go beyond legacy software, usability constraints and quality/availability of service, and finally shift investments from licensing or maintenance into something innovative.

4) New plateau of value creation for customers and shareholders. Value creation is the ultimate measure by which a business is judged. Finding new ways to add value to the enterprise comes through trial and error. Unfortunately, IT was one of the most cost-prohibitive means of experimentation for small and midsize business; that is finally changing. Risk modeling, DNA sequencing, fraud detection required mainframes, or massive quantities of CPU and storage, putting innovation out of reach. The economics of shared computing have eliminated large portions of up-front IT cost, and therefore much of the risk. Cheap and abundant computing offers the ideal conditions to easily build up and tear down experiments and reach a new plateau of value creation.

5) Declaring business without the walls. A Cornell University study of nine large companies found that 50 percent of the employees work remotely. Cloud computing can make a business without walls a reality by making it easier to implement changes in tools, improve collaboration, and ensure those “outside” the office are maintain productivity.  Firms can save $20,000 a year for each full-time employee who works remotely but savings are quickly lost if employees have diminished collaboration and productivity.  Virtual desktops, zero-clients and software as a service (SaaS) keep employees connected to the latest applications without need to be “tethered” to offices.

To learn more of what your CIO doesn’t say about cloud innovation, go here to download the white paper.

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Matthew Mikell

Sr. Advisor - Global Cloud Messaging at Dell at Dell

Cloud Evangelist with Dell, providing leadership, customer support, and future perspectives for cloud computing. Worked over 20 years in software, alliances, and product marketing for global organizations. Previous to arrival at Dell, worked 15 years with analytics vendor SAS Institute in Cary, North Carolina in roles of product marketing for Small/Midsize Business, Managed Services, Software-as-a-Service(SaaS) and Alliances. Previous to arrival in North Carolina, I've spent five years as Director of Alliances & Channels in Heidelberg, Germany. During that time, I've formed alliances with integrators and resellers at all points between Spain to Singapore and Scotland to South Africa.

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Yet, how can you be sure that your social media marketing efforts here are measurable? LinkedIn measurement is key in determining the return on your investment in talent, content, tools and advertising on the platform.

Measuring Social Influence on LinkedIn

The LinkedIn team appreciates that users want to understand their social influence. This is demonstrated through a toolbox of user data combined with visually appealing charts.  LinkedIn provides two distinct and insightful social metrics, measuring both the quantitative and qualitative statistics of user histories.

LinkedIn Measurement – Qualitative and Quantitative Metrics Explained

Why are there two types of social media data on LinkedIn? Quantitative metrics provide access to the numbers that count, such as the number of people in your network as it grows, the number of people who have viewed your profile, and the “likes” generated by a new post. For businesses with a LinkedIn Company page, these numbers can indicate the overall health and engagement of your social community.

Comments, Likes and Shares offer valuable insights for marketers and can help drive future content, identify opportunities for relationship building, and even inform internal processes like product development.

On the other side of the equation, qualitative metrics highlight the actual value of interactions, such as content shared across groups, comments and feedback received, and recommendations or endorsements for the page, content or products and services. These metrics go further, offering information about users who have interacted with your business profile or content.

Let’s take a closer look at LinkedIn metrics and how this can support social media best practices for a business.

Making Use of LinkedIn Metrics

LinkedIn explains all of the different metrics a page administrator can see in this Help resource, including page views, unique visitors, visitor demographics and more. Click the arrow beside “Page Insights data” to see the full list.

There are several ways to evaluate and use the LinkedIn metrics that your business or professional profile generates. While these are just suggestions, it’s helpful to understand how and why LinkedIn metrics can produce social success stories.

• Better understand your target markets. Participate in conversations and engage with those in your target market not only on your own Page, but wherever they are on LinkedIn. Chat with others in groups where your prospects are. When you do, what interests them the most? Frequent sales pitches turn off social users; instead, connect with your market through meaningful conversation and content. Use the data available to you through these interactions to determine which tactics and topics resonate and make use of LinkedIn tools like Targeted Status Updates to reach the right audience with your brand messaging.
• Evaluate the quality of the content you share. Every time you share information via LinkedIn, you are building your business brand online. Invest in writing and design resources to ensure each piece of social content is a professional representation of your company as a whole.
• Measure and build your market influence. While LinkedIn provides information about who is reading your posts and checking out your profile, it’s up to you to proactively follow-up. Make it easy for people to follow you, share meaningful information, and check back promptly with those who comment or send internal connection requests.
• Understand your business goals and how LinkedIn strategy aligns with those objectives.  What is the purpose of your presence and initiatives on LinkedIn? Your business goals may be increased sales, traffic to your website, awareness for an issue or product, etc. Determine which metrics are the best indicators of the achievement of your goals.

As part of your social business strategy, make it a regular part of your marketing planning to review all of your social media metrics, including your reports from LinkedIn analytics. Use the metrics applicable to your business to drive future content and social strategy.

Which LinkedIn measurement tools and metrics do you find most useful for your company? Share your thoughts in the comments.

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Margo Smale

Dell Contributor at Tech Page One

Margo is a social media advisor for Dell’s EMEA Commercial team based in Dublin, Ireland. I graduated from Syracuse University and earned my MBA at Trinity College in Dublin. Before joining Dell, I worked in media planning at several advertising agencies.

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