Body Odor and Brain Waves: 5 Cool New ID Technologies | Livescience

August 20, 2014 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

Many driver’s licenses and passports have holograms and other types of sophisticated security embedded in them, but for the most part, people still heavily rely on ID cards to prove who they are. Biometric identification technologies, such as fingerprinting and iris scanning, are already being used to speed up security clearance at several airports in the United States. Iris scanning is also gaining support in the health care industry, as a way to prevent fraud and combat identity theft. Now, ID tech is moving into new realms, with devices that could distinguish individuals by their veins, brain waves and even body odor. Here are five emerging alternatives to traditional identification:

The Internet Has Grown Too Big for Its Aging Infrastructure | WIRED

August 15, 2014 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

Yesterday, the 20,000 customers who use a Lansing Michigan web hosting company called Liquid Web had some big internet problems. The reason: the internet grew too big for the memory chips in the company’s Cisco routers.

Think of it as the internet’s latest growing pain. It’s a problem that networking geeks have seen coming for awhile now, but yesterday it finally struck. And it’s likely to cause more problems in the next few weeks. The bug doesn’t seem to have affected core internet providers—companies like AT&T and Verizon, which haul vast quantities of data over the internet’s backbone, “but certainly there are a number of people that were caught by this,” says Craig Labovitz, founder of network analysis company Deepfield Networks.

World’s first surviving panda triplets ‘very healthy’ | CNN.com

August 14, 2014August 13, 2014 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

Very few pandas are born each year, but even fewer of the fragile cubs stay alive. That’s why zookeepers say it’s a “miracle” after a panda gave birth to a healthy set of triplets, who have now survived over two weeks and are reportedly doing well.

The cubs, which weighed 83 grams, 90 grams, and 122 grams, respectively, at birth, are thought to be the only living panda triplets in the world. The 12-year-old mother, Juxiao whose name means “chrysanthemum smile” gave birth to the adorable cubs on July 29 in China’s Chimelong Safari Park in the southern city of Guangzhou. The delivery took four hours, said Dong Guixin, the manager of the park.

“After nearly half a month under the care of the mother, the babies are very healthy,” China Daily reported Dong as saying.

10 Essential Tips for Email Marketing Campaigns|businessnewsdaily.com

August 14, 2014August 13, 2014 ~ lmehit ~ Leave a comment

Email has become one of the easiest ways for businesses to reach their customers. Cost-effectiveness, shareability and the speed of message delivery have made email campaigns a critical component of most businesses’ marketing strategies. However, with the increasing popularity of email marketing comes a greater risk that messages will be blocked from your customers’ inboxes. Info group, a provider of business data and marketing solutions, offered 10 tips to help small businesses create successful email marketing campaigns:

The Genius of Robin Williams in “Aladdin” | The New Yorker

August 13, 2014 ~ CBPS ~ 3 Comments

Williams could be a teacher even when he wasn’t playing one—and could instruct even in silly roles. For me, and for people my age, he was a guide into a more adult world in what was likely his very silliest performance: as the voice of the Genie in Disney’s 1992 animated movie “Aladdin.” It is no diminishment to say that I will always remember Williams as a bright-blue cartoon.

Read Article.

Small Business Marketing Blog from Duct Tape Marketing |ducttapemarketing.com

August 13, 2014August 12, 2014 ~ lmehit ~ Leave a comment

B2B lead generation seems to be a mystery to many marketers. Just do a search on the topic and you’ll find little that’s helpful.

In my opinion, there are two reasons for this. One – people are searching for that one killer lead tactic that will mask all ills or, Two – people fail to realize that successful B2B lead generation is made up of activities that are by nature very hard to quantify and pin down.

The latter then leads to plenty of articles spouting the virtues of practices such as inbound marketing and content marketing, but little hard advice on how to make any of it pay.

Here’s my take – the real problem lies in the fact that you don’t simply generate a lead today, you guide it.

You can no longer run an ad that say’s “hey, we’ve got what you’re looking for come and get it” and expect much. Once a prospect actually knows what they are looking for, they’re already looking for a price.

Trying to Understand the Impact of Minimum Wage Hikes on Small Businesses | NYTimes.com

August 11, 2014 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

Does the battle over the minimum wage pit employees against small-business owners? That was the notion put forth on the Real Clear Politics website recently. In an essay titled “Living the Wage? Try Living the Small Business,” Tom Bevan, a co-founder of the site, ridiculed Democratic politicians who had embarked on an effort to understand how people subsist on minimum wage.

Several officials, including Jan Schakowsky, a congresswoman from Illinois, signed up for a week-long challenge called Live the Wage. For that week, they attempted to spend just $77, which is the effective take-home pay for someone making minimum wage, according to the advocates who want to raise it. Mr. Bevan called this effort “a gimmick cooked up by the progressives at Americans United for Change.”

Microsoft Scraps Windows 8 Major Updates. Bets The Farm On Windows 9 | Forbes.com

August 8, 2014 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

It’s official, Windows 8 is a write-off . Sales for the operating system have been poor and now it is even starting to lose market share to Windows 7. To Microsoft’s credit it has bravely persisted addressing issue after issue. Most notable was the major Windows 8.1 Update 1 patch released in April which makes the OS a genuinely credible platform. Still it remains far from perfect and now Microsoft is prematurely pulling the plug.

In a blog post by Microsoft Senior Marketing Communications Manager Brandon LeBlanc, he explains that there will be no more major updates for Windows 8: “despite rumors and speculation, we are not planning to deliver a Windows 8.1 ‘Update 2’.”