text:
Click here to view Figure 1.
A record-setting 91 million Americans expect to purchase a tech gadget or tech accessories during this year's Black Friday Week -- the Monday before Thanksgiving through Cyber Monday -- according to figures from the Consumer Technology Association (CTA).
Among the top items drawing the attention of consumers are video game consoles (the most desired item), televisions, tablets, notebooks, smartphones, headphones, and digital cameras.
"Even a few years out from the next generation of video game consoles, these devices jumped to the top of the Black Friday list in advance of the important shopping period," Shawn DuBravac, chief economist and senior director of research with the CTA, wrote in a November 18 report.
"Many families are still upgrading to the latest generation consoles and it appears they will be using Black Friday and the surrounding shopping period to do so. We are also expecting strong interest in digital toys and smart watches as they rise in popularity and become hot items during the shopping week," DuBravac added.
In total, a record 155 million US consumers plan to shop during Black Friday and the surrounding week. However, Black Friday is expected to remain the most popular day for in-store shopping, with 25% of those surveyed planning to shop the day after Thanksgiving.
[Thinking about a tablet? InformationWeek compares the Surface Pro 4 to the iPad Pro.]
With such an insane flood of products, more shopping options (53% of consumers surveyed said they expect to use a mobile device such as a smartphone or a tablet while shopping), and of course the crush and frenzy of the crowds, InformationWeek has put together a list of some of the hottest tech products this holiday season.
At least this way, if you don't manage to get your hands on one of these items, you'll know exactly which trendy new gadgets you missed out on. Is that the holiday spirit or what?
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Google is in a giving spirit this holiday season, and you can join in its philanthropic efforts by using Android Pay from now through the end of 2015.
The tech giant has pledged to donate $1 towards special needs education projects for every transaction completed on Android Pay. It plans to donate up to $1 million over the holidays.
Its campaign started Nov. 24 and will run through Dec. 31. On Black Friday (Nov. 27) the per-purchase donation will double, giving Android users another reason to join in the holiday shopping kickoff.
[ Holiday shopping at work? This is what your CIO thinks. ]
There are 6.4 million children in the US education system who have special needs, Google officials wrote in a blog post on the project. Teachers spend nearly $500 out of pocket to outfit their special needs classrooms.
To support classrooms across the country, Google.org and Android Pay have teamed up with DonorsChoose.org for their holiday fundraiser.
While a means of raising money for a worthy cause, this project is also intended to broaden the adoption of Android Pay, Google's mobile payments system. Mobile payments are slowly increasing, but it's difficult to get people enthusiastic about the idea when most see no inconvenience in reaching for their wallets at checkout.
Google's latest charitable campaign makes it easy for Android users to participate in a fundraiser while they do their usual holiday shopping. All they need to do is set up the system on their smartphones.
Android Pay is poised to compete with Apple Pay in the growing mobile payments arena. Like its rival, Android Pay enables customers to tap for payment at the point of sale.
Google announced Sept. 10 its plans to roll out Android Pay to nearly 1 million locations across the U.S. The system works with all NFC Android devices running KitKat 4.4 or higher on smartphones from all mobile carriers.
Click here to view Figure 1.
At launch time, Android Pay supported American Express, MasterCard, Visa and Discover. Banks including Citibank and Capital One were on a growing list of financial companies planning to get on board.
This campaign is part of the Google Impact Challenge: Disabilities project. The initiative aims to spark awareness, find solutions, and create new opportunities for disabled people.
Other efforts through the challenge have supported Veterans Day and the Special Olympics. In September 2015, Google hosted the Bay Area Makeathon to bring together people who understand disabilities with designers, technologists, and makers for the purpose of exchanging ideas, designing prototypes and writing code to help address the challenges of disabled people.
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The company formerly known as Hewlett-Packard reported its final quarter of earnings as a single company this week with net earnings of $1.32 billion, up 1% over the same period a year ago, and revenue of $25.7 billion, which represented a decline of 9% from a the same period last year.
The Q4 earnings announcement came on the heels of a historic moment for one of Silicon Valley's oldest tech companies as it splits in two as part of a strategy to remake itself in a new business environment that moves faster and is more focused on cloud and services. HP Inc. (HPQ) is the new company that will focus on PCs, personal systems (client devices), and printers. Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) is the company that will focus on infrastructure, including servers, networking, cloud, and backend software.
Click here to view Figure 1.
HP posted full fiscal year revenue of $103.4 billion, down 7% from the year before, and full fiscal year net earnings of 4.6 billion, down 9% from last year.
"On November 1st we completed the historic separation and became two separate independent public companies, HP, Inc. and Hewlett-Packard Enterprise. I couldn't be prouder of how we executed on the incredibly complex separation," CEO Meg Whitman said during a call with financial analysts following the earnings release. "Throughout the year-long separation process we saw no disruption to our customers and partners, and we continue to drive the business forward. And now both companies are off and running, each company has a clear, well-defined strategy and is well-positioned to win in its respective market."
[Find out more about HPE's new partnership with Microsoft. Read Microsoft, HP Enterprise Partnership Focuses on Windows 10 Cloud and Mobility.]
Just how those strategies are executed and how the market will receive them time will reveal. In addition to the split, HP completed a number of transactions in recent months, selling some businesses, and announcing additional layoffs, all of which added even more complexity to the Q4 earnings announcement and forecasts going forward. However, both HP Inc. and HPE are forecasting positive net earnings per share for upcoming quarters.
Wall Street seemed favorably impressed with HPE out of the gate. The new enterprise company's sales were better than analysts had expected, and the company was rewarded with higher share prices this morning. HPE shares opened at $13.91, up from the closing price yesterday of $13.69. Investors were not as impressed with the personal systems company, which had sales that missed analyst estimates. HP Inc. (which retains the HPQ stock symbol), opened at $13.18 today, down from a closing price yesterday of $14.64 before the earnings announcement.
Whitman told analysts during the earnings call that HPE is executing on a handful of focus areas and has shifted its attention to products and services that deliver stronger profitability including data analytics and private cloud. Among the changes made already was the discontinuation of HPE's public cloud.
"We announced in October that we will double down on our private and managed cloud capabilities and sunset our public cloud offering," Whitman said.
"Going forward Microsoft Azure will become a preferred public cloud partner. HPE will serve as a preferred provider of Microsoft infrastructure and services for its hybrid cloud offerings."
HPE and Microsoft announced a deeper cloud collaboration last week.
The Q4 earnings announcement was the final quarter HP will report as a single company, but it is for the quarter ended Oct. 30. HP Inc. and HPE began their lives as two separate companies on Nov. 1, leaving a single day, Oct. 31, as a sort of fiscal leap day in-between the moments that the fiscal year ended and when the new entities began their separate lives.
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Starting this week, workers will feel the increasing pull to peruse the Internet for killer discounts on holiday gifts. After all, retailers are already touting deals to be found on Thanksgiving Day, Black Friday, Cyber Monday, and Green Monday.
But if you're at work when the shopping bug hits, what are the odds your boss will be cool with this extracurricular activity?
Only a quarter of chief information officers said their companies block access to online shopping sites, according to a Robert Half Technology survey of 2,500 CIOs. Does this mean the other 75% of employers think whipping out the credit card and charging ahead to online shopping sites are fine?
Not really.
Only 25% of CIOs surveyed said their companies allow unrestricted access to shopping sites, while nearly half, 48%, said they allow access, but monitor employees for excessive time spent on the sites.
"Many professionals appreciate the ability to get some quick online shopping done at work during the busy holiday season," said John Reed, senior executive director of Robert Half Technology, in a statement. "But employees should recognize that most companies keep tabs on their online activity. Professionals should follow safe and secure browsing practices, and keep distractions at work to a minimum."
Click here to view Figure 1.
According to a Robert Half Technology survey of more than 1,000 US adult office workers, 24% have been caught shopping online by their boss. Of this group, 15% received a reprimand for shopping instead of working, while a far higher number, 31%, had a favorable outcome of "talking shop" with their manager.
The takeaway from these stats? Holiday cheer beats the Grinch.
Ones co-workers, however, get increased scrutiny. The survey found that 28% of employees said they believed their co-workers weren't pulling their weight when they scanned shopping sites on the company dime. Interestingly, though, a similar percentage of co-workers who shop online while at work, 30%, felt guilty about their activities.
The co-workers who feel other employees aren't carrying their weight when shopping online may have a difficult time swallowing the theory, held by 19% of workers surveyed, that their productively actually goes up when they shop online, because they don't have to leave the office.
These employees will be joining a huge pool of online shoppers sitting at their desktop computers and executing orders on the following four single-day events, which last year generated a total of approximately $6.2 billion in sales, according to comScore:
Although employees and other consumers threw far more money at Cyber Monday sales, its growth rate pales in comparison to Thanksgiving Day and is less impressive than Black Friday.
"Thanksgiving's recent growth is likely occurring because traditionally, it was more of a hassle to go online during the holiday when you're spending time with family," said Adam Lella, senior analyst of comScore's Marketing Insights. "Now, as people are more connected online than ever before due to smartphones and tablets, and as Internet speeds are faster, it's easier to quickly do some online shopping in between or while hanging out with family."
[Read Microsoft Black Friday Deals: Xbox, PC, Surface.]
He added there is no reason to believe that Cyber Monday will lose ground to another single-day sales event in the near future. Since 2009, Cyber Monday has been ranked as the No. 1 online shopping day, having taken the title from the previous top dog Green Monday, according to comScore. Green Monday got its name from being thought of as the best sales day in December. It is typically held on the second Monday of December, which is this year is December 14.
"Cyber Monday built a strong reputation for being one of the heaviest online spending days, which in turn caused retailers to push their biggest promotions on that day, which only then made it the top ranked online spending day," said Lella.
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Microsoft is once again allowing upgrades to Windows 10 through its Media Creation Tool (MCT) after having pulled the disk images of the November upgrade this past weekend.
The MCT allows clean installations and upgrades without the user having to complete individual downloads through the Windows Update mechanism. It is also the path for Windows 7 and Windows 8 users to create a clean install for Windows 10, which can then be activated with a valid Windows 7 or Windows 8 product key.
A cumulative update for Windows 10 has been posted. It supersedes the one that was released on November 18.
While the initial action caused much confusion in the Microsoft community, the reinstatement should calm things down.
A Microsoft spokesman told InformationWeek late on Tuesday, November 24:
"Recently we learned of an issue that could have impacted an extremely small number of people who had already installed Windows 10 and applied the November update. Once these customers installed the November update, a few of their settings preferences may have inadvertently not been retained. For these customers, we will restore their settings over the coming days and we apologize for the inconvenience. We worked to resolve the issue as quickly as possible. It will not impact future installs of the November update, which is available today."
That explanation by Microsoft glosses over a number of things.
Click here to view Figure 1.
When asked to further clarify whether the MCT upgrade path was going to be enabled again, the spokesperson told InformationWeek:
"Yes. The issue has been resolved and we are resuming our roll-out of the November update to Windows 10 customers via Windows Update. While Windows Update continues to be the preferred path for people to receive updates, we have made the November update available via the media creation tool again."
That leaves a pretty big question on the table. Specifically, why was it necessary to take it down in the first place?
What, exactly, were those settings preferences that the spokesperson says were affected? ZDNet writes that there were four: "Let apps use my advertising ID," "Turn on SmartScreen Filter for web content," "Let apps run in the background," and "Sync with devices."
These kinds of settings are supposed to migrate to the new installation, if they were previously set in Windows 10. Evidently, these four settings did not transfer, and ended up being reset to the default values.
[Read how Windows 10 enterprise adoption is set to grow by 2017.]
Here's where it gets interesting. All of these settings fall under "Privacy." One can only imagine how sensitive Microsoft must be about seeming to stealthily change a user's privacy settings during an upgrade.
Redmond's sensitivity to privacy appearances may also explain why information surrounding this entire kerfuffle has been so vexing and confusing.
While initial comments pointed to a major shift in delivering upgrades exclusively through Windows Upgrade, Microsoft's latest action clearly shows this was never going to be the case. It seems obvious now that Microsoft should have been clearer at the outset about what it was doing and how it was going to be doing it.
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After months of speculation, Apple indirectly confirmed the acquisition of the motion capture firm Faceshift, according to a November 24 report in Tech Crunch. The company has gained some fame recently as its technology is used in the latest version of Star Wars.
Apple rolled out its typical response after being contacted by Tech Crunch, noting that it buys smaller technology companies "from time to time" but doesn't discuss its plans in detail.
Tech Crunch wrote that it was able to get a confirmation after finding "sources and conclusive links" to Apple's involvement.
Originally founded in Zurich by academics Thibaut Weise, Brian Amberg, and Sofien Bouaziz, Faceshift is a spinoff from the Computer Graphics and Geometry Laboratory at the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne in Switzerland.
The company also has offices in London and on the West Coast.
Click here to view Figure 1.
Faceshift specializes in motion capture technology, with a focus on visual effects in areas like gaming and film.
The company's software analyzes the facial movements of an actor and describes them as a mixture of basic expressions, head orientation, and eye gaze, a description that is then used to animate virtual characters for use in any situation where facial animation is required.
Some of this will be seen in the new Star Wars movies, according to Apple Insider.
Faceshift studio's animation pipeline is composed of three steps: scanning a set of expressions to train a personalized avatar for tracking; capturing a performance with real-time feedback, and optionally improve the accuracy in a post-processing stage; and animating virtual avatars. The software also has the ability to export the animation to third-party 3D animation software.
The company's technology was also featured in a YouTube video sponsored by Intel, which integrated their RealSense 3D camera with Faceshift's software development kit (SDK).
Apple has been on something of an acquisition hot streak lately. The purchase of Faceshift follows three other acquisitions in the past two months: the companies Perceptio, Mapsense, and Vocal IQ.
Perceptio, which Apple acquired in October, focuses on image-based recognition and deep learning, concepts based on a set of algorithms that attempt to model high-level abstractions in data.
On October 2, Apple bought UK-based startup Vocal IQ, a startup that is attempting to create a more advanced type of virtual assistant, a tool that could enhance Siri, find its way into Apple's automobile project, or assist in Apple CarPlay.
In September, the company quietly acquired location-based mapping and visualization analysis company Mapsense in a deal that is reportedly worth $25 million to $30 million.
[Have you heard about Apple's Project Titan? Here are some rumors you should follow.]
As one of the world's largest and most valuable companies, Apple is no stranger to buying out the competition or plunking down cash for companies it feels would improve its portfolio, especially when it comes to shoring up areas -- like maps or analytics -- where it doesn't already hold a strong competitive advantage.
The Mapsense acquisition isn't Apple's first attempt at adding this kind of technology.
Apple launched its own iOS Maps feature for its iPhone in conjunction with iOS 6 in 2012. It was designed to replace Google Maps on the iPhone, but the app was not quite ready for prime time. It was inaccurate. Among other problems, cities and landmarks were missing or not labeled correctly. CEO Tim Cook published a public apology to customers on the company's website following the release.
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Apache Spark momentum continued this week as IBM's SystemML machine learning engine for Spark won acceptance as a project by the open source Apache Incubator. Separately, Databricks, the company whose founders were the original architects of Spark at the University of California, Berkeley's AMPLab, started showing off a preview of Spark 1.6 in the company's software-as-a-service implementation of the platform.
Spark 1.6 is due for general release in mid-December.
The announcements from these two influential companies in the Spark community built on what's already been fast-growing support for the big data platform. According to a Spark users survey, and information released last month by Databricks about Spark momentum, Spark is the most active open source project in all of big data, with over 600 contributors in the last 12 months, up from 314 in the previous 12 to 24 months. What's driving the widespread support for this year-old platform?
Rob Thomas, IBM Analytics vice president of product, compared Spark's expected utility and ultimate impact to that of the Linux operating system.
"The fact that Spark had a single programming model and the ability to analyze all types of data from all sources of data positioned it to have the impact in the industry that something like Linux did at the turn of the century," Thomas told InformationWeek in an interview. "Linux is an operating system for systems and computers. Spark will be the operating system around analytics and how data will be accessed." That's how big and important IBM thinks Spark will become.
Click here to view Figure 1.
That's also why IBM this week was celebrating the acceptance of its SystemML into the Apache Incubator.
IBM first announced plans to donate SystemML to the Spark ecosystem in June as part of a big commitment the company made to the open source project. IBM developed SystemML to complement Spark's MLlib, a set of libraries or algorithms in Spark that can be used to analyze a set of data. But Thomas has said that Spark's machine learning is the weakest part of the platform. IBM built and then donated SystemML to improve that component of Spark.
"Our contribution of SystemML was about making Spark better," he said. "It made sense for us to go down that route. We've are a huge supporter of Spark to date."
IBM last month added Spark to its BlueMix cloud platform.
[Need more background on Apache Spark? Read Spark Promoter Databricks Should Let Software Shine.]
Separately this week, Databricks began a preview of the newest version of Spark, 1.6.0, that customers can look at on the company's SaaS Spark platform now. The general release of Spark 1.6.0 is expected in mid-December.
The new version improves two things that are hugely important to Spark users -- performance and optimization -- Databricks cofounder Patrick Wendell told InformationWeek in an interview.
"Performance is a major theme of this release," Wendell said. Previous versions offered users a series of recommendations and settings to use to get the best performance out of memory. Such fine tuning for high performance will no longer be necessary.
"For most users, if they upgrade to this release they will experience a huge performance increase," Wendell said. "Users don't need to tune this at all."
The new version also includes a new API called the Dataset API. This is an extension of Spark's DataFrame API that enables developers to write programs much more concisely with far less code, Wendell said.
Another new big feature is optimized state storage in Spark Streaming, Wendell said. That can translate to a "10x performance gain for many workloads," Wendell wrote in a blog post about the new release this week.
Databricks has further details of the new release in the blog post and has scheduled a December 1 webinar to go over the improvements and changes.
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Equinix, the operator of communication hub data centers, says it has added two more Direct Connect locations, Dallas and London, to provide high-speed, private-line access to the Amazon Web Services (AWS) cloud.
Equinix operates communications-intensive data centers near major retail and trading cities. Enterprise customers can move data or a workload to an Equinix data center over their private wide area network, then get shunted aboard a 10 Gbps fiber-optic line that carries the workload to AWS.
The connection is considered more secure than the public Internet, and the speed surpasses the 4 Gbps that might typically be achieved through VPN over the Internet. As enterprises adopt more frequent use of the cloud, it's likely they'll rely on private-line connections for sensitive data and workloads.
In addition to Dallas and London, Equinix also has AWS Direct Connect facilities available in three other North American locations (Seattle, Santa Clara, and Washington, D.C.), and others in Frankfurt, Singapore, Sydney, Tokyo, and Osaka.
[Want to learn more about how Amazon established Direct Connect? See Amazon Expands Private Cloud-like Options.]
Adding Dallas to the list of its sites that provide AWS Direct Connect allows the Amazon/Equinix combination to serve a region that it had previously not been well-positioned to reach. The greater the distance to a Direct Connect service, the less likely enterprise customers are to use it, since they must establish their own long distance, private line connection, a built-in expense. If they opt to use the public Internet, that reduces the security value of getting a private line connection at a later stage in their workload's trip.
Likewise, adding London as a site supplying AWS Direct Connect will be a boon to European customers seeking to use Amazon. Users in the UK or across the English Channel could previously reach Amazon's Dublin data center via a "tether," or link, supplied by Equinix in London. But the link fell short of full Direct Connect service, which includes a choice of 1 Gbps or 10 Gbps speeds.
Click here to view Figure 1.
Equinix has been building out auxiliary services to its direct links to Amazon. One is the Direct Connect Converged Infrastructure bundle, or deployment service, that links to a customer's compute and storage systems to help prepare a workload for deployment on Amazon as it passes through the Equinix hub.
Equinix Cloud Exchange assigns an Equinix customer one port through which he may self-provision links to a cloud of choice in addition to, or in place of, Amazon.
Equinix executives said in a November 23 blog post that such direct, private line interconnections between an enterprise and Amazon, or from one enterprise to another, make up a familiar pattern in its current business. The company recently surveyed 1,000 IT decision-makers worldwide for its Enterprise of the Future report and found that 84% of respondents intend to employ direct infrastructure links with other enterprises by 2017.
The Amazon Direct Connect service was first established in 2011 for Equinix's US East Coast data center complex in Ashburn, Va., and it has slowly expanded since that beginning.
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Cyberwar is an ugly word, not only because of what it implies, but because the term is ill-defined. It's suggestive of digital attacks alone. That's simply not the case. It is far more likely that cyberattacks would be only one form of aggression in the otherwise familiar hells of war.
The biggest question of all, for corporations and citizens alike, is: Are we here in the US simply in the midst of informal nation-state aggression, or are we in a full-fledged cyberwar?
The distinction between the two situations may not matter for IT's purposes, since neither poses a serious threat to corporations. Nonetheless, it's important to understand the nature of the threat in order to prepare an effective defense.
To help answer these questions, InformationWeek interviewed 57 experts for this three-part series that explores where we stand today, where we're headed, and what CIOs and other IT leaders need to do to prepare.
"Regrettably, in a way akin to the notion of mutual assured destruction [MAD], we are in the midst of a cyberwar at present that could have severe consequences for major nation-states," said Joe D. Whitley, chairman of law firm Baker Donelson's government enforcement and investigations group, in an interview with InformationWeek. Whitley was the first General Counsel of the US Department of Homeland Security and is former Acting Associate Attorney General for the US Department of Justice.
If we are in the midst of a cyberwar, why hasn't such been publicly declared by the US government and broadcast across all of the news media? The coverage has been piecemeal, at best. This summer, NBC News obtained an exclusive NSA map of cyberattacks reportedly perpetrated by China against US targets. Even so, there's been no formal government declaration of a cyberwar. Why not?
"Cyberwar is a vague concept, and must be viewed within the larger strategic context of relations between [nation] states," said Andrea Little Limbago, principal social scientist at Endgame, in an interview with InformationWeek. Endgame is a cyber-security company with roots in protecting the US government's national security assets.
[When good data intentions go bad. Read 14 Creepy Ways To Use Big Data.]
"The recently released [Department of Defense] Law of War manual outlines the digital activities that may constitute war, largely based on the physical impact of digital operations," Limbago said. "This includes things ranging from cyber-operations that result in a nuclear plant meltdown, to undermining the military's logistic systems, to destroying a dam. It does not include those attacks that have dominated the media lately, such as website defacement or theft of private information."
Federal hacks -- such as those of the Veterans Administration (VA), the White House, the State Department, the US Postal Service (USPS), the Government Publishing Office (formerly the Government Printing Office), and the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) -- may not fit the DoD's criteria of acts that constitute war. But that doesn't mean that American lives and corporate livelihoods aren't in danger.
It also doesn't mean that IT need only worry about data breaches in a business-as-usual state of mind, for there's nothing usual about this situation. For perhaps the first time ever, IT in private companies is, for all practical purposes, the first line of defense for both these organizations and the country.
"Our defenses to a cyberattack in the United States are much weaker than they should be," Whitley said. "The reasons for our vulnerabilities are many, but they have their roots in a free-market society where 85% to 90% of our critical infrastructure in the United States is in private hands. As a consequence, we are much better positioned to launch attacks than to defend against them."
Click here to view Figure 1.
Not only is most of our critical infrastructure in private hands, but IT is already charged with defending against the tactics used to attack it, regardless of whom the attacker is. Whether or not the government labels it as war, and whether or not the aggressor is a terrorist or a nation state, IT is on-point.
Take for example, the tactic used in the OPM hack, wherein an employee's user credentials were stolen and used to access and copy data. The user was an employee of government contractor KeyPoint Government Solutions, which was working on OPM's systems at the time of the theft of credentials, according to KeyPoint CEO Eric Hess's testimony during a House Oversight and Government Reform Committee hearing. The theft happened on IT's watch -- at OPM, or KeyPoint, or both -- and reflects the general and prevailing lack of attention IT is giving to security weaknesses in systems.
In other words, it's not that hackers are smart. It's that IT, as a general rule, is not mounting much of a defense. Even though it's obvious that the risk has grown significantly and far surpasses merely a loss of digital data.
"The significance of the OPM hack is so profound that no matter what is written, it's underreported," said Valerie Plame, the former covert CIA operations officer outed in 2003 by the Bush administration in the lead up to the Iraq war, in an interview with InformationWeek. "From what I understand, NSA and CIA employee data wasn't included in that hack, but I still wouldn't want to be serving overseas now."
Information is power, Plame said, and this much power is deadly to operatives and other key government workers in myriad ways.
"It's all about human relationships. That's what I did [at the CIA] -- I learned about and formed relationships to build trust," said Plame. "It's all about building trust to get what you want, and the OPM hack gives an adversary a huge advantage in that regard. People don't realize how much information was gained from the OPM hack and that it puts family, friends, spouses, previous lovers, college roommates, landlords, neighbors, and previous employers -- everyone that anyone documented in that dataset ever came into contact with or got close to -- at risk."
That information can be acted upon with harmful or deadly effect now, and/or it could be the prelude to something much bigger later.
David J. Venable, CISSP, a former intelligence collector at the NSA and currently director of professional services at Masergy, which owns and operates a global cloud networking platform, says there are three prime categories of vulnerabilities in this country: our utility infrastructure, our government, and our finance sector.
A serious attack on any one of those could prove disastrous, but an attack on all three would be catastrophic. That scenario would go something like this, he says:
In each case, IT is at the head of defense and response. Preventative and fast-response planning should be put in place, tested, and drilled regularly by IT staff members to ensure that defenses are tightened and, should the worst happen, that they regain immediate and unfettered control of systems. This means not only that security must be implemented and prioritized at every level, but also that such efforts must be ongoing, diligent, and increasingly sophisticated.
Further, IT should design and be prepared to deploy robust and resilient recovery tactics that include -- but go far beyond -- data backup and recovery. While this is true across all industries, it is especially so in
Page 2: Are China and Russia the true culprits?
(Continued from page 1)
cyber-physical systems (CPS), where computers control physical things such as electrical grids, dams, and other utilities; IoT systems in manufacturing and elsewhere; and connected car systems.
Business continuity planning is no longer a back-burner nicety but a necessity, since it is the survival plan not only for the organization, but perhaps for the country too.
"This [coordinated attack approach] would require an incredible amount of coordination, sophistication, and luck," Venable told InformationWeek. "But the example makes it easy to see how three attacks that we've seen work already could come together to create a perfect storm of chaos -- and it could be made worse by coordinating it with physical attacks."
It's obvious that any one of the federal hacks previously cited delivers a chilling amount of information to any adversary -- but especially to a well-funded, well-armed, and very motivated state aggressor. Who got the data? Was it China or Russia, as the White House has repeatedly asserted? How can we really know who did it?
Cyber-security experts say that attacks are so complex that it's impossible to say with certitude who the attacker actually is. Yet the President has named a nation-state as the culprit in many cases, and so have others in the government.
There are even specific individuals named on the FBI's Cyber's Most Wanted list, including five members of the People's Liberation Army of the People's Republic of China.
Even so, President Obama walked back his assertion that China was behind the OPM hack.
Which is it? Does the government know that China is behind the OPM and other hacks or not? If it does, how exactly does it know that? Can IT and cybersecurity experts learn to identify attackers by those means as well?
[What's your disaster response plan? Read Crisis Response: 6 Ways Big Data Can Help.]
"There's no doubt nation-states are doing this," Rear Adm. (ret.) Ken Slaght told InformationWeek. The US Navy retired rear admiral was Commander of the Space and Naval Warfare Systems Command, where his duties included delivering and maintaining computer and intelligence systems (C4I). Slaght is currently co-chair and president of the nonprofit San Diego Cyber Center of Excellence (CCOE).
"I'm about 90% sure that the government does know exactly who is behind each of these hacks," he said. "The government has the advantage of all the rest of its intelligence operations to assist in tracking down the aggressors, on top of its abilities in digital tracking and surveillance. People tend to forget that the country has a lot of intelligence to work from."
There's the rub. To prove that China or Russia is behind any given attack in an international court or in the public's eye means revealing exactly how the US knows for certain. Hence the President's careful and public walk-back from blaming China.
Yes, that means the government isn't going to share this information with IT in the private sector. This reticence isn't going to help already strained relations between IT, including its cyber-security brethren, and government agencies. For decades private companies have complained about the federal government's unwillingness to share threat information.
Given IT's increasing defense role in protecting the country, the government's reluctance to share threat details no longer chafes -- it's outright hobbling the defenders.
It's left to IT to assess and understand the danger on its own. The vital question remains: Are we already in the early days of a cyberwar -- or in a cold war of sorts that could one day take us to the brink of a physical war?
"The probability of cyberwar is directly linked to the likelihood of war in general. It must not be viewed as stove-piped and distinct from the geopolitical context," Endgame's Limbago told InformationWeek. "In the near future the likelihood of war between the US and a major power like China is not very high; rather, cyber-operations will continue to focus on espionage campaigns and reconnaissance efforts."
In any case, all 57 experts polled and interviewed for this series agree that, whether the threats come from nation states or terrorists, the threat in the physical world is real and imminent. It is only the timing that's in question.
"At the end of the day, I'm not sure how much difference it makes as to who caused the devastation if we end up addressing it after the fact," says Slaght. "As it is, it doesn't take much sophistication to create considerable damage and chaos. Because of that, we'll probably end up combatting terrorists first, which will then amount to a big part of our future protections from nation states."
Meanwhile …
"Remain calm. We can't turn the clock back, but we must adapt more quickly and better than our adversaries," advises Whitley. "We are at war, but it is a winnable war if we can better coalesce as a society in acknowledging the problems and vulnerabilities we will face today and tomorrow."
For IT, it's time to occupy the battle stations in earnest.
[In part 2 of this series, learn how the private sector is at risk from government cyberattacks.]
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Click here to view Figure 1.
It's easy to imagine that the upcoming holiday weekend is about coping with turkeys (metaphorical or otherwise), cheering a football team, finding the best Black Friday sale, or avoiding giving your family free technical support.
But remember: Thanksgiving is supposed to be a day when we openly appreciate all that we have. Ideally, each of us has plenty of personal joys to celebrate. I hope your own list is a long one.
What's not to like about the idea of dedicating a day wherein the purpose is to remind us to be thankful? That sentiment isn't applicable only to the people (and cats) in our lives. It's about everything that helps us become comfortable, productive (or cheerfully unproductive), and spiritually balanced. Because technology often can improve the quality of life, it's worthwhile to take a few moments to give thanks for some of those technologies, too.
[It's not wasting time if we're having fun. Read 10 Mobile Games To Ease Your Commute.]
Some of these items are so commonplace, you probably use them every day and don't even think twice about how much they've transformed your life. Others might not fall under your definition of "technology," though these products certainly have a significant amount of technology required to make them possible -- and indispensable -- to our everyday lives.
This list is unabashedly personal, but I expect you can relate to several of these items. Add your own favorites in the comments section below, and together we can expand our range of "things to appreciate."]]>
At its Android Developer Summit on Monday, November 23, Google previewed Android Studio 2.0, the next version of its Android integrated development environment (IDE).
Google introduced Android Studio at Google I/O 2013 as an alternative to the open source Eclipse IDE. While Eclipse is still widely used and is suitable for a variety of programming languages, Android Studio offers developers a tool specifically tuned to Android development. For example, it includes a project automation tool called Gradle as an alternative to Apache Ant. Many developers have observed that this makes the application build process more efficient.
Google's interest in developing Android Studio extends beyond delighting developers with better tools. The company also has to consider comparisons between its tools and those offered by rivals. Both Apple's Xcode and Microsoft's Visual Basic are used by millions of developers worldwide, and are considered fairly polished tools for creating apps. Google has to ensure that Android development tools are competitive.
Click here to view Figure 1.
Android Studio 2.0 promises faster builds and deployment, and it adds a feature called Instant Run that allows developers to see the effect of code changes on a connected device or emulator immediately. Such feedback can accelerate the development process considerably.
It also adds a GPU Profiler, a tool that can help identify performance problems related to GPU bottlenecks or inefficient code.
"One of the big problems with graphics-intensive development is you'll see a scene and you get a problem," explained Stephanie Cuthbertson, Google product manager for Android, at the event. "And you're not really sure exactly what caused it. So one of the things you'll find in the GPU Profiler is you're able to record and replay the entire GPU stream frame by frame."
While GPUs traditionally have helped accelerate applications that rely on sophisticated graphics, they've become increasingly important for data-intensive applications, such as cryptography and machine learning.
In addition, Android Studio 2.0 adds support for Google Search deep linking, the process by which developers can make internal app content visible to those using Google Search. Through a feature called Intention Actions, Android Studio 2.0 will suggest placement and configuration for deep link code. It also includes static analysis, to alert developers when deep links have been misconfigured, and real-time testing, to show how Google will index and render app pages.
[Read about Google's efforts to improve its cloud offerings.]
Android Studio 2.0 won't be released until next year, presumably in conjunction with Google I/O 2016, but it's available in Android Studio's canary release channel, so developers can provide feedback prior to the stable release.
Android Studio 1.5 just hit the stable release channel last week.
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Microsoft issued its first major update to Windows 10 (1511) November 12, but then, without giving a clear explanation, stopped allowing users to download the latest version of the OS using the Media Creation Tool (MCT).
The .iso files are still available, but a ZDNet report confirms that when downloaded using MCT, they install upgrades to the original Windows 10 (build 10240) release from July, not the latest 1511 release as they did earlier.
In the availability announcement, Microsoft said that for those already running Windows 10, "you will receive the November update according to your Windows Update settings. If you're running Windows 7 or Windows 8.1, you can take advantage of the free upgrade offer and receive the November update as part of your Windows 10 upgrade."
For most users, the Windows Update settings have been a problem. It depends on Microsoft to offer the software to the user for download, and the company has done so on a staggered and lagging schedule.
Users who had been impatient for the upgrade had turned to downloading the disk image from the Microsoft site and creating their own installers with the MCT. That approach had even been recommended by a Microsoft staffer via Twitter.
Click here to view Figure 1.
The sudden change without explanation caused some great consternation on the Microsoft support forum.
Tero Altorten noted November 21 on Twitter that the Microsoft FAQ page on the update used to contain a link for downloading the .iso disk image, but that the link has been removed.
A Microsoft spokesperson told ZDNet, "The November update was originally available via the MCT tool, but we've decided that future installs should be through Windows Update. People can still download Windows 10 using the MCT tool if they wish. The November update will be delivered via Windows Update."
As mentioned earlier, the Windows 10 that the statement is referring to is the original release of the OS, not the new release.
However, a Microsoft spokesperson told InformationWeek, "Recently we learned of an issue that could have impacted an extremely small number of people who had already installed Windows 10 and applied the November update. Once these customers installed the November update, a few of their settings preferences may have inadvertently not been retained. For these customers, we will restore their settings over the coming days and we apologize for the inconvenience. We worked to resolve the issue as quickly as possible - it will not impact future installs of the November update, which is available today."
Nonetheless, there is other fallout from this action. For example, the multi-edition installer that was available (x86 and x64) is no longer there.
Not only that, Windows 7 or 8.1 users wanting to upgrade to Windows 10 must now go through a two-step process. They first need to download and upgrade to the July 29 version of Windows 10, and then download and upgrade to the just released version.
[Read about the latest updates for Windows 10.]
However, one of the most problematic situations is that, whereas the MCT could create a bootable image on a USB drive or a DVD that could be used on multiple machines needing an upgrade, now each of those machines must go through a separate download and upgrade process. This is a major complication for the administrator of a large number of machines.
But this may be exactly why the MCT option was pulled. By discovering a direct link to every machine that is being upgraded, Microsoft knows all the machines that are using its software. It may be seen as some sort of anti-piracy action in some people's eyes. But it will end up a major bottleneck for most users.
This report was updated on Nov. 24, 2015 at 6 p.m. ET to include a statement from Microsoft.
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This year Microsoft has tried to prove it's at the forefront of technology, but the company is moving backwards in terms of workplace diversity. Redmond is more male, and slightly more ethnically diverse, than it was in 2014.
At the end of September 2015, women made up 26.8% of the company's global workforce. This marks a 2% drop from September 2014, when 29% of Microsoft's employees were female.
Gwen Houston, Microsoft's general manager of diversity and inclusion, pointed to massive corporate layoffs as the main cause behind the decline in female employee numbers.
[Gartner: Windows 10 adoption to skyrocket by 2017.]
In July 2015, CEO Satya Nadella decided to restructure the phone business so smartphones would play a smaller part in the larger Microsoft ecosystem. The reorganization resulted in 7,800 layoffs, most of which were related to Microsoft's acquisition of Nokia one year prior.
"The workforce reductions resulting from the restructure of our phone hardware business impacted factory and production facilities outside the U.S. that produce handsets and hardware, and a higher percentage of those jobs were held by women," wrote Houston in a blog post.
There may have been more women working in factory and production in the hardware business, but the data shows a decrease in the amount of women in technical, non-technical, retail, and factory roles at Microsoft. In 2014, for example, women held 17.1% of tech positions; in 2015 they held 16.9%.
While the layoffs were part of a "strategic business decision made in the longer-term interests of the company," Houston emphasized Microsoft is "not satisfied" with the current representation of women in its workforce.
Aside from the overall decline, there is some positive news to report. The percentage of women on Microsoft's senior leadership team is at an all-time high of 27%. Pending shareholder approval in December, five of the eleven positions on Microsoft's board of directors will be held by women or ethnic minorities.
Speaking of ethnic diversity, those numbers are slightly better. In the US, Microsoft reports "modest year-over-year increases" in almost all racial and ethnic categories (including employees identified as African-American, Asian, Hispanic, and multi-racial).
On the leadership front, the number of African-American corporate vice presidents (CVPs) jumped from 1.3% to 2.9%. The combined number of African-American and Hispanic executives who were appointed as CVPs increased from 4.5% to 6.4% year-over-year.
Click here to view Figure 1.
Houston explained that current hiring efforts are poised to make a positive difference for Microsoft's diversity in the years to come.
Around the globe, 30.6% of all incoming college graduates are women, an increase from 27.7% in 2014. The number of women being hired in technical and engineering roles from universities is at 26.1%, up from 23.7% the previous year.
Microsoft is also hiring more African-American and Hispanic college graduates into technical roles. The number of African-American hires has increased to 3.3% compared to 2.5% the previous year; the number of Hispanic hires has grown from 4.9% to 5.1%.
It should be noted Microsoft is not the only tech company ramping up its efforts to become more diverse.
Earlier this year, both Apple and Intel shared their diversity data and plans for the future. At the time of the August report, Apple boasted hiring more than 11,000 women in a 12-month time period. Intel is reported surpassing its 2015 diversity goals and diversifying its leadership team.
Despite progress, Apple CEO Tim Cook noted, "There is a lot more work to be done." Intel described more specific plans: The company has implemented a five-year program to shape its employee demographics so that they reflect the US workforce representation by 2020.
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HP has partnered with Titan, the world's fifth-largest watchmaker, to create a smart yet stylish wearable. The partnership expands the Engineered by HP program, and looks to appeal to those interested in high-quality products.
Titan is a behemoth in its home market of India, but has a global presence, with more than 15 million timepieces sold in 32 countries, according to the November 23 announcement. Titan will be behind the design and manufacturing of this new smartwatch, about which the two companies are saying very little. HP indicated the watch will be "productive and responsive, but not intrusive."
Engineered by HP will provide the hardware modules, the software, the user interface, and the cloud services under the hood. HP is also responsible for the application for connecting the watch to smartphones. HP says the unnamed smartwatch will be compatible with both Android and iOS smartphones, but it didn't say which platform the watch will use.
Most likely it will run Google's Android Wear.
The companies suggest consumers won't have to choose between tradition and technology, since the HP wearable will offer both. Many of today's smartwatches are made from plastic materials and have modern designs. HP and Titan believe consumers would prefer smartwatches that carry forward the classic look of analog timepieces.
Click here to view Figure 1.
"As a brand we are known for our design, manufacturing capabilities, innovation and quality," said S. Ravi Kant, CEO of Titan. "Moreover, our endeavor has been to always provide our consumers with something new. Our entry into the smartwatch market is another step in this direction."
Engineered by HP has similar relationships with Movado and Michael Bastian. It said it has more partnerships with designers and fashion brands to be announced in the coming months.
HP and Titan did not say when their wearable is expected to reach the market, but it wouldn't appear the smartwatch will arrive before the holidays.
[Read more about problems with LG's new smartwatch.]
Titan isn't the only traditional watchmaker looking to jump on the smart wearable trend.
Earlier this month, Tag Heuer announced the Connected, an Android Wear smartwatch with an Intel processor inside. Tag is looking to fend off the onslaught of intelligent watches made by the likes of Apple, Huawei, LG, Motorola, Samsung, Sony, and others.
The Tag Heuer Connected costs $1,500 -- five times as much as most other Android Wear watches, which generally retail for about $300.
HP and Titan did not discuss pricing for their wearable. The watches for sale on Titan's website range from $20 to $2,200.
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In any individual math classroom there may be an advanced student, a dyslexic student, and many other students with various levels of proficiency and confidence in the current module of math. How can you customize the educational experience of each of these students to enable the best outcome? McGraw-Hill Education says it believes that small data, which in this case is data generated by how students interact with the curriculum, is the answer.
Stephen Laster joined the company as chief digital officer a little over three years ago to drive its implementation of small data to improve educational outcomes. He's someone who is passionate about education, and someone whose own educational experience was mixed.
"I am very, very dyslexic," he said. "I was in grade school in the 60s and 70s, and it wasn't until I reached 9th grade that I was diagnosed." So although Laster has "a near-perfect visual memory," nobody understood how he learned. Neither was the kind of digital educational experience that McGraw-Hill Education is now offering available.
"I'm super passionate about what we are doing," he said. "This works for all kids of all kinds. It works for advanced students and lets them go at any rate they want. And it works for kids like me who see the world differently."
How does the system do that, and how can it improve educational outcomes for all students? Here's an overview.
Click here to view Figure 1.
When students engage in any course of study, Laster said, they are trying to understand something about a predefined area of knowledge, such as algebra or psychology. In each of these areas there is a set of predefined learning objectives for them to master. Maybe algebra has 400 of these learning objectives. If students become proficient in all 400 objectives, they will have a high level of assurance that they really know the topic, according to Laster.
But mastering each of these 400 objectives will take different forms for each student.
The McGraw-Hill Education system, through its many brands, including Aleks and LearnSmart, takes students through each of these objectives, and then gives them mini-assessments or quizzes along the way. These mini-assessments are designed to measure the student's mastery of the objective. But the assessments also include questions about how confident the students are of the answers they give in those assessments.
[Looking for more CxOs implementing serious data projects? Read AccuWeather Storms Into Enterprise With Predictive Analytics.]
"We instrument it by asking students their level of confidence," Laster said. "We instrument it by understanding where the student is spending their time to acquire the learning. Then we feed this into a set of algorithms and artificial intelligence that helps redefine the map for that particular student and sets them on their way to learn the next most appropriate topic and learning objectives."
The system not only directs a student to the next place to learn, but it also provides insights to the student's teachers about which students may be having issues with what objectives.
"Imagine on a daily basis a teacher being able to walk into a classroom and understanding that these particular five students are having the same problem and just don't get it," he said. "I could pull them out for five to ten minutes of instruction to help clear up their problem. That's the power of small data."
In this case, the small data is information about how the student interacts with the curriculum, whether the student has mastered an objective, and how confident the student is about his or her mastery of the material. But small data can be applied to use-cases across many industries. For instance, a system that tracks inventory at a retail company and sends alerts when stock is low could be considered small data. It only becomes big data when you join it with hundreds of other data streams about marketing, customer preferences, social media sentiments, and more.
Small data is usually defined by the fact that it is not big data. Information is collected for a specific purpose, in this case to improve student outcomes and the curriculum. The information about the student does not include card swipes that track the student across the school campus. It does not include the student's family history, medical records, or retail purchases. It does not include information about all the other websites the student has visited. It only includes data about the student's interaction with the curriculum.
For the student, the process provides a clearer path to mastery.
"Imagine for the student who may have grown up with a fear of mathematics, really being guided to stay on a path of positive progression, so that math becomes not only achievable, but fun, and then that student actually turns into a confident learner," he said.
Beyond that, those students' paths through the curriculum are fed back into the system to drive further improvements into the curriculum.
"That's the beauty of the closed loop," Laster said. "Not only are we able to help evaluate and help students become confident learners. We are also able to get feedback on the learning moment … We have information at a learning-objective level about how things are working that we can use to make things better and more effective."
However, Laster is quick to point out that the goal is to improve educational outcomes, not to put students in some dark room with a computer and no social experiences.
"Education is inherently social. But there aren't enough master teachers to go around, and the model doesn't scale."
Laster came to McGraw-Hill Education to make this kind of closed-loop digital education system a reality after spending much of his career in eLearning and digital education. Before joining McGraw-Hill Education, he served as CIO and CTO of Harvard Business School and a member of the school's administrative leadership team overseeing the school's academic research and administrative computing teams.
He also established and led Intelligent Solutions, a consultancy that helps universities and businesses leverage their digital technology and collaborative tools. He has been a teacher at the undergraduate, graduate, and executive and professional level.
A few months after Laster joined McGraw-Hill Education, the McGraw-Hill group of companies announced plans to sell the education division to private equity firm Apollo Global Management in a deal worth $2.4 billion when it was completed in March 2013. In September 2015 McGraw-Hill filed for an initial public offering to raise $100 million for general corporate purposes. Apollo will retain majority ownership of the company.
In its prospectus, McGraw-Hill Education said its two top competitors in the market are Houghton Mifflin and Pearson Plc. The prospectus also said that the company sells educational materials to 13,000 K-12 school districts. Digital learning has represented a growing share of the company's revenues, according to the prospectus.
Efforts like the one Laster has been driving at McGraw-Hill Education are not new, the CDO told InformationWeek. These efforts have been underway at the company for many years. But the recent widespread access to computers at universities and even more recently in the kindergarten through 12th grade environments has made such closed-loop learning systems more practical for wide distribution.
"This is everywhere now. We have millions and millions of learners using this today at virtually every grade level."
Laster said that the use of small data was a deliberate one by McGraw-Hill Education, in a world where many organizations, such as retailers, are choosing big data instead. Laster explained why small data is the right choice for education.
"Education is a purposeful journey against a domain of knowledge that you are trying to impart on the student," he said. "We believe you should enter that domain with purposeful questions that drive outcomes.
"McGraw-Hill Education has a laser focus on outcomes," Laster said. "We just want to collect the minimum amount of data to get the job done, and that's why we like our approach."
That further drives the McGraw-Hill Education mission.
"We have an obligation to give every child the education they need to make the most of themselves," Laster said.
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With sales of drones set to soar this holiday season, a US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) drone task force is offering a set of recommendations that will require pilots to register with the agency.
The announcement came on November 21, just ahead of the holiday shopping season.
The task force recommends registration for pilots -- not individual drones -- and if the FAA accepts the task force recommendations, registration will be mandatory prior to the operation of any unmanned aircraft system (UAS) weighing more than half a pound.
The recommendations also suggest that there be no fee for registering and that the registration should be Web-based.
The requirement will apply to any UAS less than 55 pounds. Owners must be at least 13 years of age, although a parent or guardian can register for anyone younger than that.
The objective of the task force was to develop recommendations for the creation of a registration process, which ultimately would contribute to an enforceable rule imposed by the FAA.
The FAA stated that the intent of establishing this registration framework was to promote a culture of accountability, while also achieving a maximum level of compliance.
The task force also sought to define a category of UAS that should be excluded from the registration requirement because these objects do not present a significant level of risk to the non-flying public and to users of the National Airspace System (NAS).
Click here to view Figure 1.
"Although the FAA does not currently enforce the requirement for UAS used for hobby or recreational purposes to be registered, the rapid proliferation of these aircraft in the national airspace has caused the FAA to reevaluate this policy in the interests of public safety and the safety of the NAS," the report stated.
According to the report, "The FAA may incorporate all, some, or none of the recommendations provided in any rulemaking activity, as well as take any future steps deemed necessary by the agency to ensure compliance with the registration requirement."
The task force was announced in October by US Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx and FAA Administrator Michael Huerta. The two officials said that they have formed a task force to develop recommendations for drone registration, and that the task force would be scheduled to make those recommendations by November.
The recommendations were published on the FAA's website and are available to read along with the organization's one-page visual do's and don'ts guide for piloting drones.
[Check out Google's plans for drones.]
Other government agencies have in the past had licensing requirements for consumer-grade devices. One of the more notable was the FCC's requirement of operator licenses for GMRS (General Mobile Radio Service) handheld radios. In this case, those who bought these "walkie-talkies," which often shared frequencies with the unlicensed FRS (Family Radio Service) frequencies, were required to complete a postcard form and register for a five-year license at a cost of $90.
The licensing was simple and straightforward, with no requirement to show any operating skill or technical knowledge. The licensing ultimately failed, though, due to the fact that most radio purchasers ignored the requirement.
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Amazon Web Services has announced that it will build a wind farm in rural Paulding County, Ohio, to generate 320,000 megawatt hours of electricity a year, starting in May 2017, to power its cloud data centers.
It's building three data centers in Hilliard, Dublin, and New Albany, Ohio, and building two fulfillment centers in Etna and Obetz, Ohio, all suburbs of Ohio's capital, Columbus. The fulfillment and data centers will receive power only indirectly from the wind farm, which is hundreds of miles away.
The electricity generated will be plugged into the Ohio grid, offsetting the state's energy suppliers' need to generate that amount of power through their predominantly coal-fired generators. Paulding County is in northwest Ohio, the county seat, Paulding, is a village of 3,544. The Paulding wind farm, dubbed Amazon US Central, will be constructed by EDP Renewables.
Click here to view Figure 1.
The wind farm, announced November 19, is another step for Amazon toward keeping its pledge to generate renewable energy for use in all its cloud data centers. AWS also has a long-term power-purchase agreement with what will be the Amazon Fowler Ridge wind farm that the Pattern Energy Group is constructing across the border in Benton County, Indiana. The Indiana farm is expected to start generating 500,000 megawatt hours a year in January of 2016.
[Want to learn more about data center energy consumption? See Data Centers Slash Energy Usage.]
In June, Amazon announced Amazon Solar Farm US East in Virginia, scheduled to generate 170,000 megawatt hours of power annually. It operates its largest data center complex in Ashburn, Va. It followed up that move in July by announcing Amazon Wind Farm US East in North Carolina, which is expected to generate 670,000 megawatts of power annually.
It's already declared that its US West region in Oregon, which is different from its US West region in Northern California, is receiving renewable energy, although it didn't specify what type. It's close to the Columbia River basin's hydroelectric power. AWS GovCloud, also based in data centers in Oregon, is "carbon-neutral," as is its Frankfurt, Germany, facility.
But AWS acknowledges that it still has a way to go. "As of April 2015, approximately 25% of the power consumed by our global infrastructure comes from renewable energy sources. By the end of 2016, we intend to reach 40%," Amazon said in a statement on its sustainable-energy policy.
Amazon's is one of several data center builders that's trying to stay in step with Facebook and Apple, which have pledged to base their cloud operations on renewable energy sources. Google and Microsoft have also taken the pledge.
Google said in a statement earlier this year, "We're currently using renewable energy to power 37% of our operations and expect this to increase significantly in the next two years. In fact, we commit to tripling our purchases of renewable energy by 2025." It also said it will try to buy green power near its data centers.
Click here to view Figure 2.
Amazon said a large-scale cloud provider can achieve a server utilization rate of 64% compared to 15% for the typical on-premises server, "which means when companies move to the cloud, they typically provision fewer than one-fourth of the servers than they would on-premises."
It estimates that its modern data centers are at least 29% more efficient in the amount of power they need for the same amount of work than an enterprise data center.
Still, some have questioned the impact of cloud computing on energy consumption. For example, in 2012, Greenpeace International in the Netherlands published a report titled "How Green Is Your Cloud?"
More recently, shortly after Amazon announced its new Ohio data centers in May, critics questioned whether Amazon was anywhere near its goal to run its cloud data centers with renewable energy. "Given that Ohio's electricity grid is powered predominantly by coal, current and potential customers of AWS have to wonder how the Ohio growth fits into AWS's commitment to power the data centers with 100% renewable energy," wrote David Pomerantz for CleanTechnica, a website devoted to making technology use non-polluting, on June 25.
In a related move, as of June 1 Amazon has been collecting sales tax from its customers in Ohio, which it still doesn't do in 24 states. AWS has resisted sales tax collection in many states, but agrees to the collect taxes in states where it builds data centers, renewable power generation plants, and distribution facilities. Washington State, California, Virginia, and New York were among the first to persuade Amazon to collect the tax, a boon for state receipts.
Ohio is the 26th state to join Amazon's tax collection ranks. Next in 2016 will be South Carolina, where Amazon is building distribution facilities, according to the Wall Street Journal.
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Artificial intelligence (AI) is already widely used in software and online services and it is becoming more common, thanks to ongoing progress in machine learning algorithms and a variety of related technologies. But popular depictions of the technology as software-based sentience -- artificial consciousness -- obscure what AI is and how it's actually deployed.
Earlier this month, Andrew Moore, dean of Carnegie Mellon's School of Computer Science, spoke with InformationWeek about AI and the growing role it is playing in people's lives. Moore sees a bright future for artificial intelligence, along with a number of challenges. Here are 10 insights from our conversation.
Artificial intelligence should not be confused with human intelligence. Moore said that when he explains AI to students, he points out that the world artificial is in there for a reason. "We are trying to make a system which at first sight looks like it might be behaving in some manner that we might ascribe to intelligence," said Moore. "Everything, however, with 'artificial' in the label is actually just a really, really, really fancy calculator, all the way from chess programs to software in cars, to credit-scoring systems, to systems that are monitoring pharmaceutical sales for signs of an outbreak."
The first, said Moore, is autonomy. "This is about the science of making systems that can survive without humans in the loop, and can be useful even without getting instructions from the people who created them," said Moore. The second has to do with augmenting human capabilities, through services like Apple's Siri. "The idea is that we all currently have, and are going to have much, much more of, the notion of a concierge-type system that's whispering in our ears to help us make better decisions in our lives," said Moore.
Skynet, the malevolent artificial intelligence that threatens humanity in the Terminator movies, isn't a realistic fear at the moment, despite the concerns voiced by a few tech luminaries. Moore said he believes we overestimate our potential to create artificial entities capable of self-directed action. "The idea of building a robot or a software system which, like a human, has got a real notion of its goals being to just generally survive and maybe reproduce, no one has any idea how to do that," he said. "It's real science fiction. It's like asking researchers to start designing a time machine."
[Read Toyota Creates $1 Billion AI, Robotics Institute in US.]
Extrapolating current optimization algorithms and statistical reasoning into the future does not lead to artificial, self-directed agents, he said. Moore acknowledged the possibility that those conducting research on simulating living brains could achieve some breakthrough. But he estimated that 98% of AI researchers are focused on engineering systems that can help people make better decisions.
In the US alone, said Moore, there are more than a billion search engine queries every day, and perhaps 5% of them come from people who are puzzled, uncertain, or worried about their health. "They're asking for advice about some drug or advice about some symptom or these kinds of things," said Moore. "And people are making bad decisions, which are costing huge numbers of lives every year, by not going to physicians under some circumstances or not letting a doctor know about something important or mismanaging their medications.
"And the kind of simple artificial intelligence which just processes information and makes sure that you're getting relevant information about your current situation is going to save a lot of lives. Just the fact that the whole population will start to act like it's surrounded by very smart advisors in healthcare, law, and education, that could be a wonderful thing for how our lives will be in the future."
"Although we could get there much sooner, there will be huge regulatory issues and technology issues before it happens," said Moore, adding that it makes sense to be skeptical about such predictions because many technical obstacles have yet to be overcome. "Driving on a busy city street, where there are pedestrians and double-parked vehicles, is an unsolved problem, no matter what anyone might tell you."
"Some of our professors are now in active conversations with senior leaders at insurance companies, just because the whole question of what insurance means in the future going to be very different," said Moore.
Click here to view Figure 1.
"In robotics, we have done a fantastic job engineering eyes and ears, and even noses for robots, and we're done a fantastic job of making them mobile," said Moore. "We still suck at manipulation." At CMU, and other institutions conducting robotics research, there's considerable effort directed at bridging this gap.
As an example, Moore pointed to the work of CMU assistant professor Abhinav Gupta, who has been trying to train a robot called Baxter to manipulate objects by handling them over and over and over. "It's really cool, and it's kind of ghostly to see this robot that's doomed forever to be picking things up, shaking them, moving them, to build up more data about what physical things are like to interact with," said Moore.
At CMU, there are seven or eight faculty members pursuing privacy-related research, Moore estimated. Fifteen years ago, he said, that number would probably be zero, or close to it. "That's not only because it's right [to be concerned about privacy], but because the large companies that will eventually be deploying these kinds of things -- companies like Google, Microsoft, and Amazon -- they would never agree to any technology on a large scale if it damaged privacy," said Moore.
People have a hard time understanding privacy policies, but software can provide clarity and verification, particularly through automated auditing and compliance systems. Moore pointed to the work of CMU associate professor Jason Hong, who created Privacygrade.org, a website that contains data on how over 1 million Android apps handle privacy, based on an analysis of the APIs used within the apps.
He also highlighted the work of associate professor Anupam Datta, who has used code to prove that Microsoft's Bing search engine does not leak data. "If you look around all the universities at what areas they're hiring in, you're going to see that privacy protection, especially something called disclosure limitation, is the number one area," said Moore.
Moore said he believes that online education will lead to a few hundred superstar professors who excel at imparting information to students in a way that's entertaining and effective. "The ones who do the best job will be the ones who get used by millions of students," he said. "But there's still a need for personal interaction, for actually working with the students ... So I think these professors [who aren't superstar lecturers] will not actually be sleeping under bridges."
**New deadline of Dec. 18, 2015** Be a part of the prestigious InformationWeek Elite 100! Time is running out to submit your company's application by Dec. 18, 2015. Go to our 2016 registration page: InformationWeek's Elite 100 list for 2016.]]>
Click here to view Figure 1.
From the Wednesday before Thanksgiving through early January, the holidays are a blur of planes, trains, and automobiles.
We're not far away from the busiest travel days of the season, and it is time to get ready. Traveling is fun but stressful, and the hectic holiday season adds some extra challenges to the process.
You likely have a weather app to check on the forecast and a few productivity apps to get some work done on the road. But do you have an app to minimize the burden of holiday travel? Whether you're visiting family a few hours away or vacationing abroad, there are several services to make your travel easier.
[10 ways to protect your data from insider threats.]
The travel app market is booming with services to help you with booking cheap flights, compiling detailed packing lists, finding gas stations mid-road trip, and accessing WiFi in an unfamiliar city. Need a pet sitter for your week away? There's an app for that.
Choosing the right travel apps can be overwhelming; our smartphones only have so much storage. That's why we built this list of travel apps to help with different stages of your journey.
Whether you're traveling for business or pleasure this holiday season, one or more of these apps will make your trip less stressful. Do you have a favorite travel app you'd add to this list? We'd love to hear more recommendations.
**New deadline of Dec. 18, 2015** Be a part of the prestigious InformationWeek Elite 100! Time is running out to submit your company's application by Dec. 18, 2015. Go to our 2016 registration page: InformationWeek's Elite 100 list for 2016.]]>
A new skirmish has broken out in the ad-blocking wars, this time with Yahoo and its ubiquitous Yahoo Mail offering.
On Thursday, November 19, Yahoo started blocking some US users' email views in different browsers -- Chrome, Firefox, and Safari -- if AdBlock Plus, one of the most popular ad blockers, was enabled.
There's no way to say for sure if this is the first time users' email has been held hostage because of a site's ad-blocking policy, but another example doesn't come to mind quickly.
This action by Yahoo was first reported in a thread on Adblock Plus's message board.
It appears that Yahoo thinks access to its dwindling base of users' email will be more important than having to see ads. In 2013, Yahoo had about 96 million email users in the US. However, by August of this year that number was about 71 million, according to comScore numbers quoted by the Wall Street Journal.
Click here to view Figure 1.
In turn, the move has been met with derision on social media.
One Twitter message that can be printed went like this:
So @YahooMail has blocked my inbox for using an ad blocker. It was a good run, I guess. Goodbye! Hello Apple Mail, as much as I hate it. -- Andrei Herasimchuk (@Trenti) November 19, 2015.
It should be noted that Herasimchuk is Yahoo's former senior director of product design and was involved in redesigning Yahoo Mail, which makes the irony palpable.
Most other tweets invoked profane suggestions as to what Yahoo could do with its mail service, as well as multiple threats to find another email service.
Yahoo representatives have issued this response to the matter:
At Yahoo, we are continually developing and testing new product experiences. This is a test we're running for a small number of Yahoo Mail users in the U.S.
Yahoo representatives did not return InformationWeek's multiple requests for comment.
While dedicated mail clients like Apple Mail or Thunderbird do not seem to be affected, it is unclear at this point the exact "small number" of Yahoo mail users being blocked.
The blockade message can be invoked regardless of whether the ad blocker is enabled by appending "reason=ADBLK_TRAP" to the end of a mail message's URL.
Alternatively, changing the Viewing Mail choice in Settings from Full Featured to Basic can also defeat the mailbox block, according to users on the AdBlock Plus message board.
Not all of the Yahoo hosting activities are affected by this move. The "att.yahoo.com" mail service is unaffected, for example.
Click here to view Figure 2.
Yahoo is not alone in trying to come to grips with the rise of ad blocking. The Washington Post is experimenting with several approaches to create an anti-ad blocker. It's not clear yet whether it's working, or how readers at large feel about the approach.
[Read how Apple is dealing with ad-blocking software.]
The Washington Post is not the only publication trying to find a way around the blocking. City AM, a London financial newspaper, has been blocking the text of stories on Firefox browsers with ad blocking enabled since October.
Ad-blocking software can do more than just prevent an ad from showing on a page. It can prevent tracking scripts that are embedded in the ad. Malware has also been served up in some ads, as happened to Yahoo. This is where the rubber meets the road: Protecting users on one hand, and allowing users to employ the technology they want on the other.
**New deadline of Dec. 18, 2015** Be a part of the prestigious InformationWeek Elite 100! Time is running out to submit your company's application by Dec. 18, 2015. Go to our 2016 registration page: InformationWeek's Elite 100 list for 2016.]]>


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I'm full of random movie quotes and lyrics. I'm quick witted and love to make people laugh! My co workers say I should be a stand up comedian, but I like the natural environment for jokes. a stage seems to formal and too much pressure on both my audience and me.
I respect and stand behind equal rights for everyone reguardless of sexual identity or orientation! I don't like cultural standards of gender either...it never works out when you try and lump people into two categories!
I'm just looking for some great connections with new people. Nothing to serious and I'm open to poly relationships. If something develops thats cool too, I'd be down for monogomy if I found someone that was worth it.
I like to experience new things and go on adventures around the NW. I'd like to find someone to dance with even though I'm not very good. I still enjoy it and someday I'll get the moonwalk right!
I'm a chef, so my availability is late nights during the week and my weekend is monday and tuesday, which makes it hard to coordinate adventures because everyone I know has weekends off. Kinda sucks.

subset: commoncrawl


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Husqvarana LC153S Mower
Husqvarna GX560 Lawnmower
Husqvarna LC146S Petrol Lawnmower Husqvarna's rear wheel drive LC146S is a self-propelled lawnmower ideal for small to medium size gardens. Offering three different cutting options with its TrioClip capability, this machine is not only very versatile but also easy to use, even for less experienced users, and comfortable to operate.The three cutting options offered by this mower are cut and collection, mulching and rear discharge. For the collection function, the mower is equipped with a large 55 litre capacity fabric grass collector, its size meaning that you won't need to stop and empty it very often, saving you time and effort. The mulching option, meanwhile, offers a handy way of recycling your grass clippings by cutting them up inside the machine and then redistributing them back onto the ground, pushing them down into the soil so that they can act as a natural fertilizer and promote the growth of a healthy green lawn. Finally, the discharge option is useful when the grass you are mowing is longer and overgrown, ejecting the clippings and preventing the blade from becoming clogged up. Flexibility is also offered in terms of the height of cut; a single lever allows you to quickly adjust all of the lawnmower's wheels simultaneously, offering selection of one of seven heights between 30mm and 75mm.Propulsion is provided by a powerful and easy-starting 140cc Briggs & Stratton 550e engine, giving a ground speed of 4km/h, while double ball bearing wheels ensure smooth operation, longevity and durability. The robust pressed steel cutting deck, featuring a cutting width of 46cm, is similarly designed to guarantee a long service life, as well as optimal cutting performance. Comfort for the user is assured by the adjustable comfort grip handlebar, which allows you to find the best height for you and avoid straining your back. Finally, when you are finished mowing the handlebar folds away to assist with storage, and a hose connection allows you to easily rinse out the cutting deck to prevent it becoming blocked up with leftover grass cuttings. Weight: 35kg more details ...
The Husqvarna LB 553S Pro Mower is a reliable, robust BioClip® machine, designed for tough, professional use. The design has focussed on achieving the best possible ergonomic conditions for the operator, and good cutting results, even in wet weather. The handle and the steering mechanism are effectively vibration dampened and the central cutting height adjustment is spring loaded to make adjustment as easy as possible. The M 53S Pro is self propelling, with front-wheel drive for optimal handling. Light-weight wheels of aluminium, with double ball bearings and rubber tyres. Has an easy-start 5.5 hp Honda OHC engine and the cutting width is 53 cm.
This new lawnmower combines comfort with perfect results and features a unique 3-in-1 cutting system which offers collection, BioClip® (mulching) and rear ejection. It is built on a robust zinc-plated steel chassis for optimum sturdiness and durability. With the variable drive speed function it is possible to adjust the ground speed according to the user's needs and the condition of the lawn. Equipped with an easy-to-handle collector and foldable handle for simplified storage and transportation. This model also features a new electric start system for extra effortless starting.
Husqvarna R 152SVH MowerPowerful, versatile mower with large cutting capacity. Equipped with a wide, robust steel cutting deck. Powered by a strong, easy-start engine from Honda. Further features include an efficient TrioClip system and robust ball-bearing wheels. This model also features variable drive speed for maximum driving comfort and cutting efficiency.
The Husqvarna WB 48S E Mower is a solid and rugged walk-mower for daily professional use. The model is self propelling, with improved front-wheel drive for optimal handling and has a reliable and powerful easy-start Honda GCV-engine. Cast aluminium cutting deck in silumin alloy for greatest durability and strength for impacts and wear. WB 48S e is also equipped with an ergonomic and side adjustable handle included an effective Anti-Vibration System, which help the model fulfil A(8) EN836.
more details ...
Husqvarana LC153V Mower
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MISSING IOWA COUSINS: Dan Morrissey and his wife Misty Cook-Morrissey hold a brief press conference at Meyers Lake to answer questions about the ongoing search for their daughter Lyric Cook-Morrissey, 10, and Elizabeth Collins, 8, her cousin, who were last seen about 12:15 p.m. Friday, July. 13 by their grandmother as the girls left on a bike ride.The girls haven't been seen since. Their bikes were found about 4 p.m. Friday at Meyers Lake in Evansdale, Iowa.(David Purdy/The Des Moines Register) / David Purdy/ The Register
Authorities searching for two Iowa cousins missing for more than a week are receiving improved cooperation from the girls families, a Black Hawk County deputy sheriff said Monday.
Last week, some family members of one of the missing girls said they were not going to cooperate with law enforcement officials any longer.
On Monday, Misty Cook-Morrissey, mother of one of the missing girls, said she passed a polygraph test that proves she had nothing to do with the disappearance of the cousins. A state agent quizzed her on whether she had anything to do with the abduction of her daughter and niece, Cook-Morrissey said.
Lyric Cook-Morrissey, 10, and Elizabeth Collins, 8, disappeared on July 13. The girls bicycles were found on a recreation trail just south of Meyers Lake in Evansdale. FBI spokeswoman Sandy Breault over the weekend said officials thought the girls had been abducted but were alive.
On Monday, Chief Deputy Rick Abben of the Black Hawk County sheriffs office declined to say why authorities think the girls are alive.
We certainly would like to think that, he said during a news briefing. We have nothing to indicate that they are not. We want to keep hopes up and for the family to keep the hope up, but theres nothing to indicate that theres anything other than that.
Abben would neither confirm nor deny that a polygraph test had been administered to Misty Cook-Morrissey. However, he said the relationship between some family members and law enforcement had improved. The cooperation is better than it was, he said. Were getting what we asked for.
Also Monday, investigators sought to interview a person who was paddle- boating on Meyers Lake. The boater is not a suspect, but authorities would like to interview all those who were at Meyers Lake on the afternoon of July 13, regardless of whether they saw the girls.
Agents believe the boater was on the lake between noon and 1 p.m. Authorities did not know if the paddle boat was rented or privately owned or what type of paddle boat it was.
Authorities also put out a call for anyone in the area with home or business video surveillance equipment to contact authorities. The video might prove useful in the investigation.
Abben said some evidence had been taken to the Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation lab for processing, but he declined to elaborate on it.
There are no suspects at this time, Abben said.
Tips continued to flow in. The tip line is 319-232-6682.
This report includes information from the Associated Press.
Missing Iowa cousins: More photos, videos and coverage


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Vudu Adds Fox TV Shows to its VOD Lineup, Kicks off HD Downloading
Starting today in beta, Vudu owners can pay $1.99 a piece for episodes of 24, Family Guy, Firefly and other Fox-produced shows in standard-def video. Today also marks the availability of the Bourne Ultimatum for purchase in high-def. Though the $399 Vudu's signature attribute is immediate viewing of movies, we're told… »


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Of the American Idol Top 5, who put on the best performance on 4/30/14?
Which member of the American Idol Top 5 put on the best performance?
Please stop having contestants "recreate and sound like" another star. Each one of these current contestants has their own unique style, voice and demeanor. Keith Urban has his style -and he does not sound or want to sound like not George Straits, J Lo has her own, not sounding like a Mariah Carey, Harry has his own style, not trying to be another Michael Buble. Let these contestants sing their own song because that is who they are and who they will be on the charts!!! Otherwise, you are losing great musicians because of NOT SOUNDing like other artists.
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- American Idol
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- American Idol Polls
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- Hilton Hater
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4 Steps To Making Money Online – Last Night's Be The Change Team Hangout
If you got on last nights hangout with the "Be The Change Team" you will have got some badass awesome information about the 4 steps to making money online.
Most people over complicate the whole process and really there is only 4 steps.
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So sit back, grab a note pad and get a coffee as you are going to want to pay close attention to everything that has been said.
You will also get Amy's secret trick to breaking through $10K/month and beyond.
Are You Ready To Learn How To Make Money Online?
If you want to know what the 4 steps are then watch the video below.
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This Was The Way I Used Try And To Make Money Online But Not Any More
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Don't forget you can get on any of our hangouts and watch the recording anytime by clicking here and hitting play on the video. Book mark that page for future reference.
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