They’re wired for mobile learning, says Voxy.com.

It created this infographic:

Via: Voxy Blog

© 2012, TechJournal. All rights reserved.

Share/Save

Canadian organizations are starting to make the switch but are less advanced than their American counterparts, with a quarter (23%) reporting they will use the cloud for data protection.

The survey, “Insights: Data Protection and the Cloud”, shows that data loss continues to be a huge problem for companies across North America.

All of the 300 organizations surveyed across both the U.S. and Canada admitted to incidents in the last year which led to data or application loss. Despite the high levels of data being lost, only a quarter (26%) of U.S. and Canadian companies reported having an adequate data protection plan in place.

Budgets growing, strategies evolving

To combat this precarious situation, budgets are growing and strategies are evolving. Of the U.S. companies surveyed, almost half (49%) have increased their expenditure compared to last year, while only 14% have decreased it. This, together with the fact that organizations are beginning to appreciate that cloud resources can offer a solution to these requirements, should lead to fewer incidents of data loss.

About a third (36%) of organizations in the U.S. report having data stored in a public cloud, with more than three quarters (76%) storing data in a private cloud. In Canada, the cloud storage rate is lower, with 28% storing data in a public cloud and 45% using a private cloud.

Those using the cloud for data storage feel safe doing so. More than four out of five (84%) U.S. and Canadian organizations that have data residing in a private cloud are confident that it is adequately protected. The percentage of businesses assured of their data’s safety in the public cloud is also high at 73%.

“It is broadly acknowledged that cloud computing can offer many benefits to organizations that require more agile and cost-effective ways of delivering IT services,” said Bill Mann, senior vice president, Data Management, CA Technologies. “This survey reveals that one of those benefits is improved data protection—which remains a huge challenge in conventional, non-cloud environments.”

The study also highlighted the main triggers of data loss. The most common cause (76%) was IT system failures (encompassing network, storage, hardware and software failures) followed by employee or human error (41%) and external attacks on IT (35%).

When asked about the key barriers to better data protection and disaster recovery operations, businesses pointed to inadequate training of IT personnel (reported by 62% of U.S. organizations) and lack of budget (54%). Organizations in Canada also reported a lack of employee understanding of procedures in the DR plan (40%).

The study is a follow-up to a previous CA Technologies survey, “The Avoidable Cost of Downtime”, which found that the cost of outages to a company over a year is in the range of $160,000.

Three hundred companies across North America (200 in the U.S., 100 in Canada) completed the online questionnaire during December 2011. The survey was carried out by Coleman Parkes Research. All interviews were conducted in strict accordance with the rules and guidelines laid down by ESOMAR and the Market Research Society.

© 2012, TechJournal. All rights reserved.

Share/Save

Two and a half years following the end of Great Recession, hiring rates are still very low, but the number of people separating from their jobs – quitting or being fired – is even lower.

This has the guise of an improving job market, as the number of people starting new jobs outpaces the number of people leaving old ones. However, it is really a story of cautious behavior and lack of opportunity among existing employees.

“When thinking about the job market, we have a tendency to just look at the change of employment, but this is only the tip of the iceberg,” says TD’s Vice President and Deputy Chief Economist Beata Caranci, who authored the report. “We learn much more by looking at the flow of people leaving and starting new jobs. Small businesses are the main driver of these flows.”

People staying put in their jobs

“Small businesses exhibit job churn at three times the rate of larger businesses.  This reflects the greater push and pull of failure and success at the small business level. Job growth is driven disproportionately by the success stories,” says Caranci.

“Unfortunately, the Great Recession and subsequent slow recovery has curtailed the number of new start-up firms, hit the survivorship and stunted hiring intentions of those success stories. This in turn has impacted job churn in the overall labor market.”

Prior to 2006, an average of 5.3 million new hires occurred each month. Conversely, people leaving their jobs (referred to as total separations) averaged over 5.1 million. Since there were more new hires than separations, total employment grew by an average of 172,000 per month.

“At the height of U.S. job losses in 2009, the level of gross hiring fell sharply to just 3.8 million hires per month. Although separations also fell – to 4.3 million per month – it exceeded hiring, causing total employment to contract by a whopping 421,000 jobs a month,” says Caranci.

“In the first three months of 2012, the gross hiring rate has improved from its recessionary bottom, but at 4.3 million hires per month, it’s still well below the pre-recession level.”

Low churn worrisome for younger workers

TD Economics says low job churn has had implications for younger Americans, who tend to see the greatest wage gains via churn and are more likely to be employed at younger (and smaller) firms.

“The sharp decline in labor mobility these past few years is particularly worrisome for younger workers, as it could mean lower life-time earnings for those currently trying to enter the job market,” says Caranci. “Hiring rates – particularly for younger workers — will not return to pre-recession levels until conditions for small businesses do. Unfortunately, this is going to be a slow grind upwards.”

However, according to TD Economics, there are positive signs that conditions are improving for small businesses. Commercial and industrial lending, which fell by 26% between October 2008 and October 2010, is up 13.5% in early April from year ago levels.

There is also expected improvement in personal consumption expenditures over the next year, and fewer small business owners are reporting that a lack of sales is their biggest challenge.

TD Economics also predicts that although real estate prices will be slow to recover, a bottom will most likely be reached this year. With time, this will accelerate the repair of household balance sheets, boost consumer and business confidence, and open up another credit channel for small businesses looking to use real estate as collateral.

“Hiring rates will not return to normal without the express participation of small businesses and the churn they create,” says Caranci. “It will take more time, but the prospects for economic growth and a stronger labor market will rise significantly as conditions continue to improve for small businesses.”

TD Economics provides analysis of global economic performance and forecasting, and is an affiliate of TD Bank, America’s Most Convenient Bank.

The complete findings of the TD Economics report are available online at http://www.td.com/document/PDF/economics/special/jm0510_small_business.pdf.

© 2012, TechJournal. All rights reserved.

Share/Save

Cover of Walter Isaacson's Steve Jobs biography to be filmed by writer/director Aaron Sorkin.

Aaron Sorkin, the writer who penned “The Social Network,” about Facebook’s rise, and “The West Wing,” will write and direct a film based on Walter Isaacson’s biography of Apple’s late co-founder Steve Jobs.

Hollywood has been hot to jump on the Jobs mania bandwagon since his death.

Ashton Kutcher is staring in the unauthorized “Jobs,” a different film that traces his rise to iconic status.

Sorkin will make his directing debut on the film based on Isaacson’s best bio, which sold 2.25 million books, making it the best selling hardcover of 2011.

Sorkin won an academy award for his adaption of “The Social Network,” in 2010.

We look forward to seeing what Sorkin does with the Jobs bio. He isn’t likely to whitewash Jobs’  less than sterling personal qualities.

Despite all the lionizing of the late Apple CEO, many of his own employees and colleagues didn’t particularly like him. Personally, we think he was as much a showman and huckster as he was a far-seeing CEO.

Yet he built Apple in the world’s richest company, so his vision cannot be denied.

Sorkin also has a summer show, “The Newroom,” set to debut on HBO this summer. — Allan Maurer

© 2012, TechJournal. All rights reserved.

Share/Save

The database includes over 600,000 projects from more than 5,000 sites, and is updated with thousands of new projects on a regular basis.

The surge in new projects reflects twofold growth in mobile projects since 2010, continuing the trend of double annual growth in new projects in each of the last three years.

“Black Duck metrics highlight momentum and opportunity in the market, both for open source software and for enterprise developers and organizations as well,” said Jay Lyman, senior analyst, 451 Research.

“Just as we see in cloud computing, open source software is prominent in the mobile space where vibrant mobile operating systems, applications and communities require sufficient knowledge of codebases and proactive approach with policy for efficiency and innovation.”

New project growth appears to be fueled by interest in the open source Android platform.

Burgeoning growth in Android shipments and the platform’s installed base (about two times as many Android phones have been sold versus iOS(1)), interest in OSS platforms, and community support for Android reinforce the new project data.

Looking at platform trends of those OSS projects that specified a platform, highlights include:

• Over 70 percent of new mobile OSS projects were created for Android
• While the absolute number of iOS projects also increased in 2011, overall iOS share of new projects declined from the prior year to 20 percent
• Remaining platforms make up approximately four percent of new project activity

Enterprise mobility represented a significant trend, accounting for almost 10 percent of new projects.

Leading projects include:

• Payment applications such as Zimbrew for secure mobile payments, and QR code scanners like YardSale which enables users to make purchases through PayPal
• Security applications like OATH.net which implements HOTP and TOTP algorithms for two-factor authentication
• Cloud applications such as Cumulus, a CloudStack Android client, and acloud, the Android version of iCloud
• Database engines for mobile apps including TouchDB, a lightweight Apache CouchDB-compatible engine suitable to embed into mobile apps
• The device agnostic OpenMEAP, an HTML5 mobile enterprise application platform, is a complete end-to-end solution using Secure Socket Layer (SSL) for connectivity and supports the Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) for the secure transfer of data via a variety of mobile networks

“The mobile industry and open source community have the undivided attention of enterprise development organizations,” said Peter Vescuso, executive vice president, Black Duck Software.

“As mobile apps displace desktop applications and mobile devices displace laptops and desktops, the high-quality apps we’ve seen thus far will become more popular, undoubtedly bringing the level of OSS interest and use within enterprises to an all-time high.”

For open source project and license information and trends, visit the Black Duck Open Source Resource Center.

© 2012, TechJournal. All rights reserved.

Share/Save

A new study identifies 5 types of digital mom.

Digitally connected moms can be divided into five types, each with different spheres of influencers, motivations, and preferences when connecting and sharing with others via social networks.

That’s according to a study released today by MWW Group, one of the top ten global independent public relations firms.

The study is based on a survey conducted by MWW Insights in March, which surveyed more than 1,000 moms from a variety of ages and sociodemographic backgrounds on their use and interaction with social and digital media.

We’ve seen every type of digital mom described below among our friends and associates. How about you?

See “Influencing Digital Moms” infographic 

The five types of digital moms are:

Mobilizers: These moms are the youngest segment (average age is 33) and the most hyper-connected, driven by the desire to connect with friends and pop culture. They are the segment most easily influenced by celebrities and prefer mobile devices as their primary tool for staying connected and on top of trends.

Urban Originals: This is the smallest, yet the most influential segment of Digital Moms. With an average age of 35, living in mostly urban areas, this segment of moms view themselves as influencers and frequently share opinions and interact on social media.

Ninety percent (90%) of content generated by moms is created by this segment, and they are ahead of the digital curve.  One hundred percent (100%) post product reviews and 85% tweet regularly. This segment of digital moms are the biggest influencers to other moms when it comes to social media trends and parenting.

Practical Adopters: This segment is composed mostly of working moms, with an average age of 45. These moms use digital technology to harmonize their professional and personal lives and manage their families.

These moms are too busy to be on the cutting edge of trends and are more likely to be second generation adopters of social media. They look to “Urban Originals” and “Mobilizers” to learn about new trends.

Casual Connectors: With an average age of 47, and the lowest average income, this segment’s main motivation for using digital technology is to connect with their close circle of family and friends, particularly their children, and they are influenced most by these groups. They prefer simple technology and have the lowest percentage of smartphone adoption.

Wallflowers: Just as the name suggests, this segment of digital moms – average age is 34 – prefer to browse and consume content rather than create it themselves. More than half are full-time homemakers, and they are visual and entertainment-focused.

These moms are highly interested in tablets, more for the ease of use than the mobility, and want to read what others have shared, which attracts them to platforms like Pinterest. They are most likely to be influenced by posts and conversations among “Mobilizers.”

“As we know, moms are not one monolithic audience, but this study revealed the core behavioral archetypes where moms fall – providing brands with insights on how to create relevance and engage these moms,” said Doug O’Reilly, vice president of MWW Insights.

“These moms are uniquely influenced – and hold influence – over others, including celebrities, friends, families, and other networks. By understanding how different segments of moms share and receive information, we can design programs that are microtargeted and unique to the kinds of moms brands want to reach.”

So, do studies of this sort help sharpen your targeting? Do they focus your thinking? Or are they a distraction? Let us know in the comments.

© 2012, TechJournal. All rights reserved.

Share/Save

Over 80 per cent of IT managers think that enterprises with a Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) policy hold a competitive advantage over other organizations, according to research commissioned by BT.

The research, which surveyed attitudes towards employees’ use of their own laptops, tablets and smartphones for work, covered 2,000 IT users and IT managers in 11 countries and from a range of sectors.

It suggests that BYOD has arrived — over four in five companies say they already allow BYOD or will do so within the next 24 months and sixty per cent of employees claim they are already allowed to connect personally-owned devices to the corporate network.

The study reveals that both employees and decision makers are positive about the opportunities presented by the growing use of personal devices on corporate networks.

Sixty-four per cent of IT managers think that having a BYOD policy will enable employees to be more productive.

Forty-eight per cent think it will also allow employees to work more flexibly and 47 per cent think it will enable employees to serve customers better. This sentiment is shared by employees — 42 per cent of employees using their own device for work believe that they are more efficient and productive as a result.

It makes IT managers nervous

Despite these benefits IT managers are nervous. Only one in ten think that all BYOD users recognize the risks and less than one in five believe all users understand the access/permissions related to their mobile devices.

And it appears IT managers are nervous with some justification. Of employees who use their own device for work, one in three see “no risk” in using their own device in a work context and just a quarter recognize the significant risk they pose to company security.

Neil Sutton, vice president, Global Portfolio at BT Global Services said: “There is no denying it. The BYOD genie is out of the bottle, bringing with it unprecedented opportunities for enterprises but also new threats. The new perimeter is everywhere, defined by employee-owned devices, clouds, and extranets. The risk of abuse and attack has multiplied along with this massive expansion.

“To meet these challenges head-on, enterprises need to have a clear policy, a combination of the right tools to implement it, the trust with which to deliver it to employees and the processes in the business that everyone understands and buys into.

“IT security has always been about a blend of people, policy, process and technology, and the right blend is even more critical in a BYOD world. Rather than being perceived as a barrier to agility or flexibility, security can act as an enabler which improves an organization’s ability to adapt to the BYOD trend.”

Thirty-nine per cent of enterprises have experienced a security breach due to employees bringing in unauthorised devices — most commonly in the fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) and pharmaceuticals sectors. More than four out of five (83 per cent) of IT decision makers believe that putting 24/7 access to corporate systems into the hands of an increasingly mobile workforce is now the main threat to corporate IT security.

Sutton added: “So while pressure to allow BYOD is high, IT decision-makers need to tackle a range of issues before they feel able to introduce a BYOD policy. Security is the highest priority, with 73 per cent of IT managers stating that they first had to overcome the security challenges of BYOD.

“That’s the thinking behind BT Assure. We work with our customers to navigate the complexity and ensure they have appropriate policies, procedures, solutions in place to take advantage of the benefits presented by BYOD without compromising security.”

© 2012, TechJournal. All rights reserved.

Share/Save

Accordingly, WordStream Inc., a provider of search engine marketing software and services, has released new research comparing the value of Facebook advertising to Google’s Display Network – the portion of Google’s advertising business that allows advertisers to place display ads on Google sites.

Those include YouTube, Gmail, and Blogger and over 2 million other websites, including popular news sites, blogs and other niche sites across the internet, rather than alongside search results.

Results of the study include:

• Facebook and Google both have huge potential reach, with Facebook boasting 845 million monthly active users and Google owning the world’s largest online display advertising network.
• The average click-through rate (CTR) of an ad on the Google Display Network is 0.4% – almost 10 times as high as the typical Facebook ad. Average CTR on Facebook is under 0.05%, about half the industry average for online banner ads. At the same time, costs per thousand impressions on Facebook are climbing.
• The Google Display Network offers twice as many ad formats as Facebook, including in-video ads, mobile-game ads, support for industry-standard image ads, and more.
• Facebook does not yet support mobile advertising and has more limited targeting options than Google.

The comparison suggests that Google currently offers advertisers more value in terms of both options and results for advertisers, and that Facebook has a lot of catching up to do to provide advertisers with the best possible advertising solutions.

“So far, Facebook’s advertising platform hasn’t kept pace with the explosive growth of its social network, and it remains to be seen if CEO Mark Zuckerberg even wants to focus on advertising as a source of revenue. In his 2,500+ word letter to shareholders this month, he mentioned advertising just once,” said Larry Kim, Founder and CTO of WordStream.

Wordstream created this infographic summarizing its research:

© WordStream, a Google Keyword Tool, and AdWords Tool Provider.

© 2012, TechJournal. All rights reserved.

Share/Save

As speculation surrounding the possible launch of an “iTV” from Apple continues to mount, new research from the Strategy Analytics Connected Home Devices (CHD) advisory service shows that nearly half of existing iPhone users would be very or somewhat likely to buy an Apple iTV soon after its launch.

The report, Apple’s Smart TV: Assessing Purchase Intention and Willingness to Pay,” provides results from the latest Strategy Analytics ConsumerMetrix survey of 6000 consumers across the US, France, Germany, Italy and the UK, fielded in March 2012.

“More than one-quarter of non-Apple TV owners could potentially migrate to an Apple-branded TV in a fairly short period of time.”

“Although the details of a possible Apple smart TV are still unknown, existing Apple customers clearly demonstrate strong interest,” says Jia Wu, Director and report author.

“Meanwhile, consumers are still sensitive to price, even if Apple does launch another groundbreaking product. The success of an Apple iTV hinges on Apple’s ability to match innovation with appropriate price points.”

Apple, traditionally reliant on high device margins, would be challenged to find the right price/demand balance for an iTV. While 35 percent of surveyed US consumers indicate willingness to pay $1000 or more for an Apple-branded TV, only 14 percent would be willing to pay any more than $1600.

“Samsung, Sony, LG and other major TV manufacturers are most threatened by the prospect of an Apple iTV launch,” notes Kantideep Thota, Analyst. “More than one-quarter of non-Apple TV owners could potentially migrate to an Apple-branded TV in a fairly short period of time.”

Personally, we may wait a while to buy an Internet TV and in the meantime we’re using an inexpensive Sony Blu-ray DVD player with wireless built-in and a number of apps for things such as Netflix, Amazon video, Hulu, and many other services.

It was one of the easiest tech devices we’ve ever used in terms of set-up (painless) and use (equally painless). The apps it comes with and that get added as it updates more than meet our needs at the moment. Actually surfing the web from the device isn’t the easiest thing in the world, but the apps make much of that unnecessary.

Considering the cost difference (a thousand dollars or more), anyone considering an Internet TV should at least take a look at much less expensive stand-alone connection devices and the connected DVD players. — Allan Maurer

© 2012, TechJournal. All rights reserved.

Share/Save

So says The Relational Capital Group (RCG) in its ground-breaking brand research in collaboration with renowned social psychologists at Princeton University and University of Louvain has been published in the April 2012 edition of the Journal of Consumer Psychology.

The research applies a well-established human perception framework, pioneered by Dr. Susan Fiske at Princeton, to the study of 22 well-known brands.

The researchers found that consumers respond to brands using the same pattern of perceptions, emotions and behaviors as predicted by Dr. Fiske’s work on the Stereotype Content Model, which has been used extensively in the study of societal stereotypes and ethnic bias around the world.

This indicates that consumers perceive and judge brands and companies using the same criteria they use for people and social groups, which has major implications for the future study and management of brands of all kinds.

Consumers more distrustful and disloyal than ever

“It turns out that recent efforts by brands and companies to digitize, automate and outsource their interactions with consumers are fundamentally at odds with the way humans perceive, judge and build loyalty to brands,” said Chris Malone, co-author of the lead research paper and Chief Advisory Officer of The Relational Capital Group.

“As a result, consumers are more cynical, distrustful and disloyal toward large brands and companies than ever before,” he added.

The brands studied in the research include Advil, AIG, Amtrak, BP, Burger King, Campbell’s, Coca-Cola, Goldman Sachs, Hershey, Johnson & Johnson, Marlboro, McDonalds, Mercedes, Minute Maid, Porsche, Rolex, Rolls Royce, Shell, Tropicana, Tylenol, US Postal Service and Veterans Affairs Hospitals.

“We’ve found strong statistical correlation between consumers’ perceptions of each brand’s warmth and competence and their intent to purchase and remain loyal to that brand,” said Dr. Fiske.

“These findings are consistent with other studies we’ve conducted that validate the influence and predictive power of warmth and competence on human behavior.”

So, we wonder, how should brands deal with consumers then? Obviously, a personal touch is necessary, even in social media responses.

What do you think? Are too many brands sacrificing consumer loyalty for the expediency of outsourced or automated responses?

© 2012, TechJournal. All rights reserved.

Share/Save