The solution to the problems you already have

The iPad -- again.  Why is there all this excitement around this new device?  So, you have a laptop, and an iPhone.  Yet, you still think you need this iPad?  The iPhone is a usable browser, but not perfect- the screen is too small.  No productivity requiring typing will ever be done on the iPhone -- for that you have your laptop or desktop.   The iPad solves both of these problems.  Perhaps for the first time in history is a new computing product being launched and the software and infrastructure needed are already in place.  I am ready to use Google Docs from the iPad - something I think will contribute to my productivity -- maybe I'll even write more on this blog?  Will let you know as soon as I get my hands on this beauty (if you know how to get one now, sign me up).

Have you been unfriended?

Some time ago a friend changed his LinkedIn connection type on me: I went from a "colleague" to a "friend".  I felt good, as this was sort of a promotion.  I had thought about making some similar changes to my LinkedIn contacts myself, but felt that it was sort of odd to change my position about how I envison my contacts to be "related" to me.  I concluded that I'd better leave good enough alone. Then, recently one of my MBA students complained that he simply had too many contact showing up in his instant messenger software.  He would have to "decommission" some of his friends.  So, we have introduced a new social phenomenon driven by our social networking technology: the unfriending of our friends. 

Clearly, this unfriending business has reached new heights, as this week the New Oxford American Dictionary released its Word of The Year.  This year's winner: unfriend. 

Now you know it -- get ready to be unfriended.

Google Public Data

The title says it all.  Google added public data into their search about 8 months ago.  Now, this feature is becoming a real asset to those of us who often are hunting down economic indicators and other public data.  As of last week, 17 indicators from the World Bank are included in this search.  So, if you are looking for CO2 emission data, or life expectancy, your search got easier.  Searching for "gdp of finland" will yield a nice graph of GDP development for Finland over recent year (49 to be exact in this case).  For a more complete story on this issue, see the official Google blog here: http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2009/11/world-bank-public-data-now-in-search.html

Information Privacy, Facebook, and Your Tax Records

In a warm autumn day in 1980 we were lined up as usual outside the barracks of the Norwegian Army's Infantry Officer School.  It was Friday, and that meant two things: we got paid, and, if we were lucky, a couple of days off from the grueling training.  One of my classmates, Johan, asked the commanding officer to please withhold 90% of his meager salary for taxes. We were all in shock, thinking poor Johan who would get paid next to nothing.  There was no information privacy - we all knew how much each got paid, and seemingly how much some had withheld for taxes. 

Fast forward to 2009.  Around this time of year, my wife gets mad at me for checking up on the salaries of my old army officer buddies.  Not only do I check up on their salaries, but also on their tax withholding, and their assets.  This had been going on for years, until this year someone figured out how to link to public figures to Facebook, and now Norway is at the center of attention for its disclosure policies.  The salary and tax figures have been posted on a public system, provided by the tax authorities, were a user (anyone) could query the database to find this information for someone else. The system also has a limited function where one can see the links between people in terms of organizational memberships (also public information).  It took Facebook to get a debate around this issue: Someone figure out how to link all this information to Facebook with a key-click. Is this good, is it bad, is it ugly?  I don't have the answers, but would like your insight!


And don't feel too bad for Johan, he is still listed as the richest person in Norway, with an annual income of about $10 million, and a net worth of over $2 billion, from which he paid $25 million in taxes for 2008. An example for the rest of us to follow !!!

Read more about it from MSNBC.

How to Buy Network Attached Storage (NAS)

This week I have been talking abut hardware and network storage in class. The article linked here tells you more about network storage devices -- yes, even those that you need to have in your home! How to Buy Network Attached Storage (NAS)

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Crowd-Sourcing versus the Machine

Those of you who have used the online language translation tools have probably found them not really doing a good job (try Google Translate or Yahoo's Babel Fish).  They are great for helping you get a gist of some language content, but they are far from accurate or complete.  Enter crowd-sourcing.  Crowd-sourcing is the act of "employing" the (idle?) crowds to help you out -- via the Internet of course.  Facebook has embarked on this venture where the users now translate content between languages, and then the user also vote on these translations.  Of course, the translations are stored for future use.  This becomes something like a Wikipedia of translation, where the burden of the translation now rest with the users.  The idea is to get content, as opposed to just program-related interface text, translated to any language (Facebook counts 65 languages so far).  This is a new answer to an old challenge.  The web certainly enables thinking outside the box!

File sharing for any occasion

There are many great FREE tools for sharing files online. Since many of you will be restricted in file size as to what can be sent or received in your regular email system, having access to other file sharing methods is crucial. Here are some options:

Synchronous sharing (sharing parties are online at the same time):
1. Most chat programs can send and receive files
2. Use Skype for file sending (see picture below)

Asynchronous file sharing (parties are not online at the same time):
1. Dropbox (up to 2 Gb free)- good for one-time file sharing, or storing things you must have access to always
2. Google documents (for office files, sans the new x format like docx,... -- good for collaboration)
3. Office Live (great for collaboration)