Disruptive innovators are everywhere. Are you one of them?
It takes technology to spread good ideas and make innovating easy. For ideas on how to get started, take a look at my latest contribution over at the American Express OPEN Forum, "Make a Date to Innovate."
If you want to be a fast innovator, don’t wait for it to happen, make it happen by making a date with innovation. That way, you can drive growth within your organization and continue inventing the future.TechTip2U Powered by: Verio
There are over 2 billion literate, mobile phone subscribers in the developing world, many living on less than $5 a day.
Corporations pay people to accomplish billions of image, audio and text-based tasks.
Guess who enables these tasks to be completed via the mobile phone by people around the globe?
Find out here.
In case you are pressed for time:
txteagle is a service that enables mobile phone subscribers to earn money and accumulate savings by completing simple micro-tasks for large corporate clients. Originally conceived as a mechanism to compensate rural Kenyan nurses, txteagle is now on track to becoming one of Africa's largest employers.TechTip2U Powered by: Verio
This week at the Game Developers Conference in San Francisco, Sony (worth a look!) unveiled a motion controller for the PlayStation 3 (pictured), offering gamers its answer to the Nintendo Wii. It's called the Move and is a rectangular device curved on the sides to fit comfortably in the hand. It also has a glowing ball at the end that contains technology used in tracking a player's motions.
Interesting what all the major players are doing in this industry:
Nintendo's success with the Wii, released in November 2006 as the first console to offer motion-sensing technology, has brought the gaming technology to the mainstream.Read more at here.Microsoft is expected to join the trend in offering a motion-sensing device for the Xbox 360 in time for this year's holiday shopping season.Unveiled in June 2009 as "Project Natal," the Xbox system relies on sensors that track players' body movements to allow them to interactively play sports and other games without having to hold any hardware.
Here are seven (7) amazing ways to filter (leverage) Twitter (a technology platform) to the hilt.
Sometimes you have to take time out to ... well ... mix your own granola!
Design your custom made organic, all natural cereal mix from over 75 healthy ingredients and enhancers. You can even add a custom picture to the mix!
Technology takes you where you want to go -- and that can be across the globe.
Learn more at MixMyGranola.
TechTip2U Powered by: Verio
How mobile are you? What kind of global tech user are you?
Is Facebook your window to your social world? Is your mobile device the last thing you put aside before shutting the light out at night? Or does the deluge of digital information leave you flat and the ring of your cell phone leave you cranky?Find out what kind of user you are at Pew Internet by taking a quick quiz here. The range is:
According to The Altimeter, like demographics or psychographics, companies must now understand socialgraphics, which answers five key questions:
1. Where are your customers online?What is socialgraphics?
2. What are your customers’ social behaviors online?
3. What social information or people do your customers rely on?
4. What is your customers’ social influence?
5. How do customers use social technologies to learn, make decisions, and support your products and services?
Socialgraphics is how to measure how customers use social technologies, where they are online, and how it influences them in the context of the customer life cycle.Learn more here. This piece might be helpful as well.
As the global economy mends, business spending on technology goods and services is returning -- at least that is what Ben Worthen and Don Clark claim in "Tech Spending Bounces Back as Profits Rise," published in the Wall Street Journal.
The tech world according to Cisco:
The economy has entered a new "phase of the recovery," said John Chambers, Cisco's chief executive, in a call with analysts, adding that he planned to hire up to 3,000 workers in coming quarters. "This is one of the most robust positive turnarounds I've seen in my career," he added.The tech world according to Google:
Before he (Google CEO Eric Schmidt) got into the nitty-gritty of this year’s outlook, Google announced that revenue was up 17 percent in Q4 2009 ($6.7 billion) and up $23.65 billion for all of 2009 (for a net income of $6.5 billion).The tech world according to NetSuite:
Having had a dreadful start to 2009, NetSuite announced record earning for the fourth quarter and year ended 31st December, 2009. From the release:“Total revenue for the year was $166.5 million, a year-over-year increase of 9%. Total revenue for the fourth quarter was $43.0 million. Revenue from the Americas for the fourth quarter of 2009 was $35.0 million, while revenue from international regions was $8.0 million. NetSuite added approximately 295 new customers in the fourth quarter.
The tech world according to IBM:
Moreover, IBM's full-year 2009 earnings of $10.01 per share were up 13% year over year, and net income of $13.4 billion rose 9% from fiscal year 2008. Earnings for the year were a record, despite the worldwide recession. Full-year earnings surpassed the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $9.88 per share, as well as the company's own guidance of $9.85 per share.
The company's spectacular amount of new services contract signings and a pick up in corporate IT spending figured into the improved guidance for fiscal 2010. Historically, IBM has raised its guidance for almost every quarter in the last two years. For fiscal year 2010, the company again raised its EPS guidance to $11 per share, up from a previously expected $10-$11 per share range last month.
The tech world according to Microsoft:
Microsoft posted a bigger-than-expected 60 percent increase in quarterly profit on Thursday, helped by strong sales of Windows 7, and said it expected business technology spending to recover this year.
The company said net profit came to $6.7 billion, or 74 cents a share, up from $4.2 billion, or 47 cents a share, a year earlier.
The tech world according to Apple:
TechTip2U Powered by: VerioFor the three-month period ending Dec. 29, 2009, Apple posted earnings of $3.4 billion, on a revenue of $15.7. Compared to the year-ago figures of $11.9 billion, that amounts to $2.3 billion in net quarterly profit.
Apple shipped 8.7 million iPhones — more than double compared to the year-ago quarter — and 3.4 million Macintosh computers, up 33% from a year earlier.
With cloud computing, an on demand access to virtualized IT resources that are provided as a service over the Internet, you can reduce risk and gain control. This is not new. It has been taking place in some form or fashion for years. Just a new name has been coined to define it. For example, if you have an email account with a Web-based e-mail service like Gmail, Yahoo or Earthlink, then you've had some experience with cloud computing.
Cloud computing 101: "How Cloud Computing Works"
Wikipedia definition: Cloud computing
Whatis.com definition:
Cloud computing is a general term for anything that involves delivering hosted services over the Internet. These services are broadly divided into three categories: Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS), Platform-as-a-Service (According to InfoWorld: What cloud computing really meansPaaS ) and Software-as-a-Service (SaaS ). The name cloud computing was inspired by the cloud symbol that's often used to represent the Internet inflow chart s and diagrams.
Tip No. 5: SMBs use the cloud to avoid infrastructure problems faced by offering their services in different countries around the globe. The cloud will act as an equalizer in this manner and allow SMBs large and small to compete internationally.In line with above, cloud computing has changed how companies market, sell, provision and deploy new services on a global basis.
Who wouldn’t want to sell to more than 1.7 billion people? According to Internet World Stats, that’s the current number of Internet users worldwide, up 200,000 since December! How can you prepare to capture this astounding audience and do business with the world? Above all else, you need customers, but before we cover that, here are other factors to consider.
Read more here.
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Separately, Happy Australia Day!
According to contributing writer Carol Tice at Inc., one-half of all small businesses do not have a website. Yes, you read that right.
Think about how many small businesses that might be if you polled the planet!
Half of Small Businesses Don't Have a Website
The actual study can be found here.
Customers.
What are you waiting for?
Working with Verio -- one of the best global hosts on the face of the earth -- as an independent global SMB consultant and they just launched the first edition of an SMB newsletter: ACCESS - SMBs Guide to Success.
One of the feature articles is "Global SMB: How the Mighty Succeed, Despite Harsh Economic Times." Check it out here.
Let me know what you think of the resource and definitely email your small business questions to me -- thanks -- have a great weekend!
