TechStew

Reports from the previous few weeks point to the fact that the global economy is on a course for one more monetary crisis. As a matter of fact the global debt levels have risen above those of 2008, but with one major difference; it is the poorer countries which are currently leading debt creation. EU and the USA are not safe though, they are dancing a perilous waltz near another steep precipice. And the latest World Economic Outlook from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) does not look promising. While the IMF views the Eurozone as one of the biggest risks to the world’s economy, it has also pointed a slowdown in major less developed countries such as Brazil and Russia. Despite all this, stock markets are exuberant akin to that faithful orchestra which kept playing on a sinking Titanic. The Dow Jones is hitting record highs this year. A growing concern, however, is that the enlargement of the so-called  shadow banking , an unregulated and off-balance sheet activities undert...

Only a few hours before President Barack Obama is expected to announce changes regarding the NSA surveillance program, a new documents by Snowden were published that show once again the enormous magnitude of the espionage activities of the U.S. National Security Agency.  The documents revealed that the NSA collects hundreds of millions of text messages every day. Research on this issue was conducted by the British newspaper The Guardian, along with Channel 4 , and it was revealed that the NSA works closely with the British spy agency, GCHQ. Edward Snowden served these key documents to the media as usual. The documents reveal that the NSA collects nearly 200 million text messages every day, from around the world.  Furthermore, the data - collected from the messages - in some cases is used for further extraction of data such as location, contacts list, and even financial details. The Guardian mentions one special program, titled "Dishfire" which task is to collect ...

Paul Hellyer was Canadian Minister of Defense in 1960s, ruling over the country's armed forces during the time of the Cold War – and when he retired he publicly stated that we are not alone in the universe, and some guests from outer space actually live here, on planet Earth. Is this fantasy? Is someone actually watching us? Today we ask the man who says UFOs are a serious business – Paul Hellyer. Why do you say that UFOs are as real as airplanes flying over our heads? Paul Hellyer: Because I know that they are. As a matter of fact, they’ve been visiting our planet for thousands of years and one of the cases that would interest you most if you give me two or three minutes to answer is that during the Cold War, 1961, there were about 50 UFOs in formation flying south from Russia across Europe, and Supreme Allied Command was very concerned and about ready to press the 'Panic' button when they turned around and went back over the North Pole. They decided to do an inv...

It's not necessarily shocking to hear somebody claim that at least four different species of aliens have visited the Earth, for thousands of years. But it is somewhat more shocking when that person was once in charge of much of Canada's military, Paul Hellyer . In a wild interview with Russia Today, the former Canadian Minister of National Defense said that aliens would give us more technology if we would be less warlike. As it is, they are concerned about the effects our nukes might have on the universe. There has been more alien activity since the first nuclear bombs were detonated in 1945, he said. "They are very much afraid we might be stupid enough to start using atomic weapons again and that would be very bad for us and them as well." If we were more peaceful, they would be more willing to share their technology with us, he said. According to his website, in September 2005 Hellyer "became the first person of cabinet rank in the G8 group of countries ...

The Nokia of old is dead! Last year I predicted that this year would mark the demise of Nokia, at one time the biggest cell phone manufacturer in the world. After its disastrous dithering and the resulting market failure Nokia was snatched up by Microsoft for a measly $7.2b, a fraction of its worth from just a couple of years ago (in comparison, Skype was bought for $8.6b). However, I do not think that Microsoft really wanted to buy Nokia, rather it was forced into this move by Nokia’s dismal performance, and the fact that Nokia carried 90 per cent of all Windows Phone sales. Microsoft had no choice but to purchase the flailing smartphone maker in order to save its position in the market.

Ronald Pofalla, Chancellor Angela Merkel's chief of staff, discussed the ongoing NSA surveillance first before a German parliamentary committee and then in front of the media. His biggest concern was not just the information leaked by Edward Snowden which exposed the extent of the United States' global data surveillance operations, but the cooperation of German intelligence services as well. For a long time, Merkel tried to ride out the scandal; whenever she addressed the issue, she either spoke in vague terms or she simply said that she could not seriously be expected to be involved in everything.

With the proliferation of various social networks and intrusion of technology into our living rooms and private lives one cannot stop to wonder where this new way of social interaction will lead us. There is a general consensus that the Internet technology will shape the twenty first century akin to the way the motion pictures shaped the previous century. The end of the nineteen century, known as the ‘gay nineties’, ushered vast changes in the way humans interacted with one another; it was the age when the new technological advancements entered our homes in the form of a telephone and a telegraph making communication almost instant. Other advances such as automobiles, washing machines, refrigerators, and vacuum cleaners along with shortened work hours meant that people had more time for leisure and interpersonal relationships than ever before. Automobiles and telephones made the world smaller and more accessible. With the advent of motion pictures at the beginning of the twenti...

So, you made a video, you think it is great and entertaining and want the world to know about it? How do you go viral within a short period of time with your latest visual art-piece? First of all you need to build a strategy and not just sit and pray that your video suddenly takesoff . Most likely this is NOT going to happen. One of the strategies one often finds on the net is to do a ‘video response’ which basically means trying to piggyback on someone’s successful video with a large audience. Just because someone has a large audience, doesn’t automatically make them an ideal partner. This strategy does not pay off for a couple of reasons; you need to be approved by the owner of the said video channel which is highly unlikely, and the second is if you actually do get approved that the viewers of the other video will scroll down and click on your video. There are just to many ‘ifs’ in this strategy to safely rely on it. Viral CAN be created, but it takes some se...

Samsung infringed a key portion of an  Apple   patent by including a text-selection feature in its smartphones and tablets, an International Trade Commission judge said in a preliminary decision. South Korean-based Samsung did not infringe portions of a second Apple patent that allows a device to detect if a microphone or other device is plugged into its microphone jack, the judge said in a decision that was issued on March 26 but kept confidential until late Thursday to allow the companies to redact sensitive  busin ess  information.   The full commission must now decide if they will uphold it or overturn the judge's decision. A final decision is expected in August. If it is upheld, the  ITC  can order any infringing device to be barred from importation into the United States. Apple has alleged that Samsung's Galaxy, Transform and Nexus devices, among others, were among those made with the infringing technology. Apple had fi...

Summary : Some new numbers reveal the degree to which Skype surveillance has increased since leaving Luxembourg; Europe finds privacy violations in Microsoft M icrosoft has tried to catch up with Google on some transparency and based on numbers from Microsoft, in 2012 Microsoft and Skype got a total of 75,378 law enforcement requests, potentially impacting 137,424 accounts. US laws mean that Microsoft needed to comply.  Skype , originally a European product, is in US hands now, through Microsoft. Microsoft offers no privacy and the Microsoft booster says that  US law enforcement is the biggest recipient of Microsoft customer data . A few months back  the EU investigated Microsoft for privacy violations . To quote: “Bloomberg reports that Microsoft’s recent service agreement update to its online services has caught the eye of data privacy watchdogs in the EU. The data protection commission, led by Luxembourg and France, sent a letter to Microsoft CEO Steve...

So you got your website or a blog up an running and want to get some traffic to it? Well, it is not easy and it will take some patience and hard work. But, with time and a lot of effort on your part, the site can take off and finally generate substantial traffic . Lets examine some of the first steps you need to take in order to make your site more noticeable.    

Have you ever wonder why did the richest man in the world leave the biggest tech company in the world? Bill Gates The answer may be found in an internal memo that Gates sent out on October 30, 2005 to the top engineers and most trusted managers of Microsoft.  The memo stated that there was potentially a very disruptive technological revolution, which was about to sweep over the entire world, forever changing the way we get information and do business. He also warned that this revolution could wipeout the $200 billion business empire that he spent his life building. Windows 8 Will Cost You $120 After Jan. 31 What he was referring to was the mammoth windowless warehouse built by Design LLC, code named Project 2. The International Herald Tribune described the towering monolithic structures as looming like an information age nuclear power plant. While this may sound like something out of a science fiction novel, the results of this undertaking are n...