Collaborations: Spike Jonze, Yo-Yo Ma, and Lil Buck

The occasion: A benefit for the arts in public schools.
The musician: Cellist Yo-Yo Ma.
The dancer: LA/Memphis street dancer Lil Buck.
The camera: Director Spike Jonze.
The result: A performance that is also the best possible argument for the cause it supports. We could say more, but again, the video speaks for itself.
via flavorwire

Spending Time: A day in the life

MARGARET THATCHER, a former British prime minister, reportedly got by on just four hours' sleep a night.

Such deprivation would trouble many people, and certainly the French, who sleep for nearly nine hours on average, according to a report by the OECD.

True to stereotype, the French also spend the most time eating and drinking of OECD members—indeed, they eat for almost twice as long as the Americans.

The Japanese appear to have a tough time of it, working by far the longest hours.

However, they also devote less time to unpaid work such as household chores and childcare, activities that account for around one third of the OECD's GDP.

Thought Leader Interview: Didier Lombard

A formidable transformation is taking place in the global telecommunications industry. Over the past few years, the operating margins for many telecom companies have shrunk rapidly, as mobile phone service has overtaken fixed-line service, data traffic has outpaced voice traffic, and the old bread-and-butter phone service has become commoditized.

Meanwhile, global demand for data services has increased massively, especially with the emergence of video streaming and downloading on the Internet. This “data tsunami,” as it’s been called, has grown in intensity with the proliferation of data-enabled smartphones.

Cisco Systems Inc. estimates that the total volume of data circulating on mobile networks will grow from 0.09 exabytes (97 million gigabytes) per month in 2009 to 3.6 exabytes (3.9 billion gigabytes) in 2014, roughly doubling every year.

Even with new technologies for compressing data, the ability of mobile networks to absorb this traffic remains limited. The net result is a major challenge for telecommunications companies: finding the capital to build all the networks needed to handle this data while still maintaining the loyalty of customers and the goodwill of regulators, and fending off new Internet-based competitors such as Google, Skype, and Facebook.

The Thought Leader Interview: Didier Lombard

75% Say Their IT projects are ‘doomed’ from the Start

Software consulting firm, Geneca, recently published a report, called “Doomed from the Start?” (PDF download), that offers several startling conclusions related to IT failure. Most significantly, the report describes a highly negative situation in which most respondents expect their project to fail before it even starts!

Read the details here: Research: 75 percent believe IT projects are ‘doomed’

European Commission Easy Target for Serious Cyberattack

The European Commission, including the body's diplomatic arm, has been an easy target for cyber criminals for a long time now but it has only recently been hit by what stunned officials said was a serious cyberattack.

The attack was first detected on Tuesday and Commission sources have said that it was sustained and targeted. The Commission was caught with it's firewalls down and started to leak like a broken seive. The attackers had complete run of the systems for several hours and will have left re-entry points everywhere possible.

External access to the Commission's e-mail and intranet has been suspended. Staff have been provided with minimal information on what damage has been done and simply told to change their passwords to prevent the "disclosure of unauthorised information." Very belatedly, staff at the Commission, the European Union's executive and regulatory body, have also been told to send sensitive information via secure e-mail.

This may surprise them somewhat because they thought their email was secure! Is this a classic example of puting in appropriate security measures only after a serious incident has been discovered. it also begs the question as to how often cybercriminals have been able to test and penetrate the systems previously.

This recent event comes just days ahead of the European Council summit. The summit brings together the leaders of E.U. member states and crucial decisions will be made on economic strategy, the war in Libya and the future structure of the E.U. The seriousness of this breach cannot be underestimated and a complete security overhaul is urgently required.

Initial speculation believed that the attacks may be directed or sponsored by Libya, but surprisingly, the Commission was quick to rule this out. They believe that the attack is 'similar' to the cyberattack on the French government in the run up to the G20 Summit in February 2010. That assault involved malware and targeted e-mail, with some of the related stolen information redirected to China, a close ally of Libya and a potential harvester of Libyan oil and mineral wealth.

The lunbering administration machine of the Commission are already 'taking urgent measures' to close the door after the horse has bolted. A number of sub-committee meetings are being called and an admin inquiry is been launched. The Commission admitted that it is frequently targeted, but added that there was no concrete evidence that the attack was linked to the E.U. summit. Probably by next week they will have convinced themselves that it was just a bad dream and nothing had really happened at all.

Lettertype voor dyslectici in race voor award

AMSTERDAM - De winnaar van de smart future minds award wordt op 28 april bekendgemaakt.

Tijdens het evenement smart urban stage in Amsterdam strijden twaalf innovatieve projecten om deze prijs.

Alle projecten richten zich op het toekomstige leven in de stad. Een van de kanshebbers is Dyslexia van Christian Boer.

Hij ontwikkelde een nieuw lettertype waarmee dyslectici minder leesfouten maken.

3 Things that will Increase your Google rankings

We all want to attract new clients or customers, right?

So how can you get more people to discover or seek out your site?

Step 1: Comment positively on other's blogs

When you start out exploring social media, you quickly figure out that the only way to learn about this new process was to listen and accept what is reported by people who know what they are talking about. Then, listen and emulate.

Readthe popular blogs written by people Jim Connolly, Darren Rowse: Problogger, Bobbie Johnstone Gerd Leonhard: Media Futurist and others, but not just that, strike up a dialogue with them by commenting on their postings.

Most Professional bloggers and writers will respond to your comments. This will boost your confidence and encourage you more. Soon you will be happy to comment on new bloggers to comment on.

It's a slow but steady strategy that, if you stick to it, you will see your Google ratings increase and once that happens your Google profile will grow from there.

Step 2: Select your Home blog and encourage others to visit

You may only have one blog at this time but eventually you may increase that. So, select the blog you want to be known for and make sure all your comments are linked back to your primary blog.

Make it easy for readers to find you by using this as a quick link to your blog. Also try and link the comment to one of your own postings. In this way, your reader will find more relevant information on your site.

Step 3: Maintain the Relationships by Blogging regularly

Once you have started to excite and inform your readers, the last thing yo want to do is to leave them hanging or feeling abandoned.

You need to make your blog your home, your own office or back yard and, if you have a more professionally constructed web site it should be a dynamic arm of that site and intrinsically linked to it, using both url links and moreover by the content.

Once you have done all that all you have left to do is write and given the inspiring content found on professional bloggers sites, you will find plenty of triggers to spark off your muse. We can talk about how to build good content another day but for now, stop procrastinating and just write.

Generation 'C': Who are they?

They are members of a new generation that are coming into their own, over the next decade.

Its members are typically realists and materialists. They are culturally liberal, though not necessarily politically progressive.

They are upwardly mobile, yet they live with their parents longer than earlier generations ever did.

Many of their social interactions take place on the Internet, where they feel free to express their opinions and attitudes.

They’ve grown up under the influence of Harry Potter, Barack Obama, and iEverything — iPods, iTunes, iPhones. Technology is so intimately woven into their lives that the (baby boom–era) concept of “early adopters” is essentially meaningless.

We call them Generation C — connected, communicating, content-centric, computerised, community-oriented, always clicking.

As a rule, they were born on or after 1990 and have lived their adolescent years after 2000.

In the developed world, Generation C encompasses everyone in this age group; in the BRIC countries (Brazil, Russia, India, and China), they are primarily urban and suburban.

Coming to a city near you!
By 2020, they will make up 40 percent of the population in the U.S., Europe, and the BRIC countries, and 10 percent of the rest of the world — and by then, they will constitute the largest single cohort of consumers worldwide.

Are you prepared?
Executives must begin now to develop an agenda that includes an analysis of the capabilities and workforces they will need in the next decade and beyond.

A critical step will be to make sure that the organisation as a whole understands the coming changes, and that there are already people within the organisation who are living these changes now, who don’t perceive them as a threat, and who can help integrate them into the organisation’s business plan.

Read more here

Coping with a Job Loss after 50

The economic crisis has affected many segments of the population, but it has posed a particular challenge for those confronting sudden unemployment in their 50s. This paper asks, How do people whose identities are based on their professional experience or whose sense of value is tied to job-related achievements and the power and status of their position cope with getting laid off in the middle or late stages of their careers? And how does that affect what they do next?

The answers depend on how people try to make sense of their dismissal. The authors call this process “narrative coping.” People deal with a negative event like a job loss or serious illness, the authors say, by incorporating it into their life story, seeking consolation and closure as they construct a new narrative about themselves. The paper identifies three coping strategies that go in very different directions. Although people may eventually move from one strategy to another, the way they initially deal with their dismissal has a huge bearing on the next stage of their career.

The researchers conducted their fieldwork in the latter part of 2008, just as the severity of the recession was becoming clear. They invited managers and professionals from a variety of backgrounds and jobs to reflect on their experience with unemployment. Eleven men and one woman, ranging in age from 49 to 62, were selected for the final part of the study; each was interviewed for about two hours, and some were invited to take part in further focus groups and informal discussions.

The authors noted several similarities among the participants’ stories. Many were tinged with sadness and nostalgia; participants felt that the “modern world” had become brutal and nasty, and saw age discrimination as a feature of their everyday lives, especially when it came to seeking a new job.

Despite those similarities, considerably different narrative coping strategies emerged. One group viewed the job loss as a temporary derailment. Whether in denial or in problem-solving mode, people who employed this strategy feverishly looked for another job, unwilling to concede that their careers were over.

People in the second group saw termination as the end of the line — a traumatic event that had effectively finished their career. Job loss remained an open wound discussed in bitter terms (they continually reevaluated their careers, trying to pinpoint what went wrong), and the search for a new position was erratic or nonexistent.

Those in the third group accepted the fact of their unemployment and attributed it to social factors beyond their control. This led them to view their termination in philosophical terms, as a moratorium on identifying themselves with their jobs and an opportunity for a new chapter in their lives. With their careers no longer serving as their central focus, they pursued temporary jobs, study programs, or volunteer work.

In an interview, one of the authors, Yiannis Gabriel, identified several reasons that an individual would embrace a particular coping mechanism. “The way the sacking took place, the compensation offered (and its financial impact), family support, and other factors rooted in each respondent’s background and childhood [all] have a strong bearing on which coping strategy” a person adopts, he said.

But an individual can switch strategies over time. Gabriel reported that the researchers have just begun examining data on a follow-up study that tracked most of the participants over the next two years. They found that two of the “end of the line” respondents had reentered the workforce, settling for less well-paying jobs, and two remained stuck in a kind of jobless limbo. Of the “temporary derailment” respondents, several had moved back into jobs.

“Effective coaching,” Gabriel said, “may help a person move from an ‘end of the line’ to a ‘moratorium’ or even to a ‘derailment’ position.”

Bottom Line:
When people are laid off late in their careers, they resort to one of several narrative strategies to understand and explain the event in light of their life stories. For some, the job loss is seen as the “end of the line.” For others, it is viewed as a “temporary derailment.” And for a third group, it is a chance to shift their life focus entirely. This process of “narrative coping” has a major impact on how people view their careers and what they do next.

Coping with a Job Loss after 50

CES 2010: Samsung Transparent Display of the Future - WIRED Video

Is the iPad craze a flash in the pan?

As for the overall tablet industry, this week Gartner upgraded its growth prediction for the market from 7.5 per cent to 9.5 per cent over the next year.

People clearly want tablets, as do businesses. And given Apple has around 90 per cent market share, it’s clear who they’ve been going to.

Is the iPad craze a flash in the pan? | IT PRO