Category Archives: Technology

Bing Warns Shoppers: Don’t Get Scroogled This Holiday Season

By Guest PostNovember 28, 2012Technologybing, black friday, cyber monday, getting scroogled, google product search, google shopping, honest, Microsoft, new practice, pay to rank, product listing advertising, scroogled, search engine, search results

Microsoft launches national campaign to alert Americans to Google’s new pay-to-rank shopping search practices.

REDMOND, Wash. — Nov. 28, 2012 — Bing, Microsoft Corp.’s search engine, today is launching a national campaign to highlight Bing’s commitment to honest search results and to help explain to consumers the risks of Google Shopping’s newly announced “pay-to-rank” practice, in which the shopping search results customers see are not true search results such as they see elsewhere on Google; they are actually ads that are ranked, in part, by who pays the most. More information on these practices is available at https://www.scroogled.com.

Instead of showing you the most relevant shopping search results for the latest coffee maker you’re looking to buy mom, Google’s new redesigned shopping vertical now decides what to show you — and how prominently to display what product offers they show — based partially on how much a merchant selling the product has paid Google. Merchants can literally pay to improve their chances to display their product offers higher than others inside of Google’s shopping “search,” even if it’s not necessarily better or cheaper. That’s not right, it’s not transparent, it’s not what you expect from search, and it’s not how we at Bing think search engines should help consumers get the best prices and selection when shopping. Consumers are urged to visit https://www.scroogled.com to learn more about how to avoid getting “Scroogled,” a term used by Bing to describe Google’s new practice that leaves people with fewer choices and potentially higher prices. (more…)

Female ‘Halo’ Player Takes Her World-Class Gaming to Microsoft

By Guest PostNovember 26, 2012Technologyalex crushed, alex hebert ruiz, barbie, chris charla, christmas, crystal hot sauce, def jam rapstar, halo 4, halo player, kinect star wars, Microsoft, microsoft game studios, microsoft studios, nintendo, play xbla, the frag dolls, video games, xbla tart, xbox headquarters, xbox live arcade

A onetime top 10-ranked “Halo” player, Alex Hebert-Ruiz is now at Microsoft, where she advocates for Xbox LIVE Arcade games when she’s not playing “Halo 4.”

REDMOND, Wash. — Nov. 26, 2012 — Alex Hebert-Ruiz remembers the day she got her start as a gamer.

It was the Christmas she got a Barbie house and her brother got a Nintendo. She was 6, and she was hooked – on her brother’s gift.

“Don’t get me wrong, I loved my Barbie house,” she says, “but beating him at Duck Hunt was one of the great challenges of my young life.” (more…)

Twilight: Breaking Dawn – Part 2 Commands Moviegoer Social Sentiment During Record Breaking Thanksgiving Weekend

By Guest PostNovember 26, 2012Entertainment, Technologybreaking dawn, ibm film forecaster, social sentiment index, twilight, twilight breaking dawn, usc annenberg

USC Annenberg and IBM Film Forecaster Reveals Box Office Winners

LOS ANGELES – 26 Nov 2012: Twilight: Breaking Dawn – Part 2 continued to infiltrate the Twitterverse during Thanksgiving weekend, with competition from Box Office leaders Skyfall and the newly released, Rise of the Guardians – according to the University of Southern California (USC) Annenberg Innovation Lab and the IBM Film Forecaster, a Social Sentiment Index. (more…)

IBM Makes $4 Billion in Financing Available for Business Partners; Announces New Mobile App to Speed Access to Credit within Minutes

By Guest PostNovember 15, 2012Technologyanalytics, android mobile device, bishop company, business challenge, business partners, China, client, cloud, credit qualified, global financing, gracious home, ibm, ibm study, ipad, iPhone, mark hennessy, new york, oxford, puresystems, retailer, united states, university, vai analytics system, zobrist consulting

Extends Financing to Help Businesses Drive Growth with Advanced Technologies: Cloud, Business Analytics and PureSystems

ARMONK, N.Y. – 15 Nov 2012: IBM announced today it is providing IBM Business Partners worldwide with $4 billion in financing for credit-qualified clients over a period of 12 months. This financing, through IBM Global Financing, can make obtaining credit easier and more accessible to enable IBM’s global partner ecosystem and their clients to acquire advanced technologies such as cloud, analytics and PureSystems. As part of today’s news, IBM is also launching a new mobile app as another step to simplify the way IBM’s Business Partners can apply for and secure financing for their clients within minutes via any mobile device — anytime, anywhere.

With 10 billion mobile devices forecasted by 2020, the proliferation of mobile technology is fundamentally changing the way people think, work, act, and interact.¹ Already, 90 percent of mobile users keep their device within arm’s reach at all times, and complete many kinds of transactions across these smart devices. ²The new mobile app from IBM Global Financing is designed to address this changing business environment by making it easier for IBM Business Partners to provide their clients with price proposals and generate credit approvals within minutes using an iPad, iPhone or Android mobile device. The mobile app will be available in the United States this month and will be rolled out globally beginning in China in January 2013. The app has an easy-to-use interface and is designed for contracts worth up to $500K, all while the IBM Business Partner seller is on the go. This mobile app is based on IBM Global Financing’s simple Rapid Online Financing tool, designed for non-financing experts, where available, to generate fast approvals for credit applications with a simple click of the mouse. (more…)

Microsoft and APHSA Survey Reveals Status of Health and Human Services IT Modernization Efforts and a Promising Future for Transformation

By Guest PostNovember 14, 2012Technologyaphsa, bipartisan, child welfare, factor, florida, Health, hhs transformation, human services, it system modernization, laura caliguiri, Microsoft, microsoft dynamics crm, survey, Technology, tracy wareing

States in need of best practices and flexible IT solutions that improve access, quality and efficiency in the financing and delivery of health and human services programs.

REDMOND, Wash., and WASHINGTON — Nov. 13, 2012 — The American Public Human Services Association (APHSA), in coordination with Microsoft Corp., today released the results of a new survey of health and human services departments and agencies nationwide. The report, “A Promising Future for HHS Transformation — The Real Impact of IT System Modernization,” includes survey findings that identify the expectations, strategies and practices that health and human services (HHS) agencies use for the planning, acquisition and implementation of their information technology (IT) systems.

APHSA and Microsoft surveyed 67 agency program leaders from 35 states at various stages of modernizing their HHS IT systems, from those who have implemented solutions for eligibility determination and benefit issuance, case management, and online self-service to those who had not yet modernized. The survey focuses on capturing the agencies’ experience with organizational transformation planning efforts, the agencies’ system life-cycle challenges, and the impact and benefits the agencies experienced from IT modernization. The results revealed that with dynamic executive leadership, due diligence and solid program management practices, departments are seeing incremental benefits expected of IT modernization, but a number of challenges remain. With those challenges, a bright path exists to achieve the desired business benefits for transformation through the promise of today’s technology. (more…)

Steve Ballmer Talks Up Windows 8 and Windows Phone in Europe and Israel

By Guest PostNovember 13, 2012Technologyberlin, david cameron, discovery event, era, Europe, Germany, Israel, london, Microsoft, microsoft ceo, modern jago, Paris, prime minister, shoreditch area, smart mice, software, start ups, steve ballmer, tech, tel aviv, uk, wave, windows 8, windows phone, windows rt, xbox

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer was in Europe and Israel last week to showcase Microsoft’s wave of newly updated products, including Windows 8, Windows Phone 8, and Surface with Windows RT. He reinforced to customers, developers, students and others that the company is moving into a new era.

REDMOND, Wash. – Nov. 13, 2012 – World, meet Windows 8, Windows Phone 8, and Surface. Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer last week took Microsoft’s wave of new products on the road, visiting Europe and Israel.

He said the launch of Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8, an upcoming new version Office, and updates to the company’s Xbox platform—all part of the biggest wave of updates in the company’s history—signify that Microsoft has entered a new era. (more…)

Saving Storm-Damaged Photos

By Guest PostNovember 10, 2012General, Science, Technologyart conservation, cellulose acetate, debra hess norris, film negative, heather brown, humidity condition, hurricane sandy, marsh grass, msnbc, news clip, photo album, photograph, photos, phyllis, save my photograph, saving, staten island, storm damaged, superstorm, von stein, wedding gown

UD conservators triage to provide advice, resources

In a news clip on MSNBC, Phyllis, a 62-year-old grandmother from Staten Island, clutches a black-and-white photograph of her mother in her wedding gown. She found the family treasure strewn among the muck and marsh grass where her shattered home ended up in Hurricane Sandy’s wake.

If you have recovered photographs or photo albums that were damaged by the superstorm, don’t throw them out. There is hope for saving storm-damaged photos, according to Debra Hess Norris, professor and chair of the Department of Art Conservation at the University of Delaware. (more…)

IBM Helps Organizations Address Growing Mobile Computing Opportunity

By Guest PostNovember 9, 2012Technologyandroid, apple, blackberry devices, byod, cmos, data, global organizations, growing market, ibm, ios 6, it industry, manfred metz, Microsoft, mobile computing, operating system, phil buckellew, revenue, software, strategy, windows, windows 8

New software and services enable businesses to create and enhance mobile strategies

ARMONK, N.Y. – 09 Nov 2012: IBM today unveiled a suite of new software and services that enables global organizations to build a comprehensive mobile computing strategy – from securing and managing devices, to creating mobile applications and analyzing data. These new offerings are part of a move by IBM to capitalize on the growing market opportunity for mobile that is expected to drive $130B in revenue for the IT industry by 2015, according to a recent study.[i]

As organizations increasingly view mobile computing as the next platform to conduct business, the market is evolving beyond just the device. Business leaders including the chief information officers (CIOs) and increasingly chief marketing officers (CMOs) of global organizations such as airlines, retailers, governments and healthcare providers are among the businesses turning to IBM to ensure mobile services and solutions are readily available to constituents and in full compliance with IT strategies. They need solutions that can be applied across any mobile environment and device — whether a laptop, smartphone or tablet — and can provide an underlying IT infrastructure that is always available, secure, effectively manages data, and integrates both front and back-end systems. (more…)