Hurricane Sandy And The Struggle To Overcome Destruction With Innovation

This week will be remembered for the blustery brutality of a Frankenstorm, the millions of lives impacted, and the huge economic toll on the eastern part of the country. But it will also be remembered for the bravery, ingenuity, and innovative thinking of those at the still-beating heart of the crises.

1. What's Really Happening In Blacked-Out Manhattan
Fast Company
The lights are still out for a quarter of a million people in Lower Manhattan, and things are getting dangerous. But cell phones and social media are enabling an entirely self-organized recovery effort that is showing up where FEMA, the Red Cross, and the city are not.

2. How Seamless Defied Sandy, Kept The Hot Meals Coming, And Inspired Twitter Love
Fast Company
If you think those lo mein noodles that arrived post-hurricane were a miracle, you're not wrong. Here's what Seamless CEO Jonathan Zabusky learned this week about contingency plans and delighting customers amid disaster.

3. A Look Inside New York’s Underwater Subways
Co.Exist
The submerged public transit system is awe-inspiring to look at. But what’s more important is what happens next time--because there will be a next time.

4. Hurricane Sandy, A Drenching Reminder That Tough Times Inspire Remarkable Innovation
Fast Company
Tough environments offer motivations to fix problems in a way that might be inconceivable elsewhere. A look at some inspiring innovations that were necessarily conceived under duress.

5. How To Power Through The Next Sandy
Fast Company
Hurricane Sandy--aka the Frankenstorm--has left millions of people in the dark. Here are three ways to make sure you'll never have to live without power--even when the lights go out.

6. SandyCrashPads: Couchsurfing To Make The Hurricane’s Aftermath More Manageable
Co.Exist
To help people forced out of their homes by the storm, a few intrepid hackers are working on a way to connect evacuated people with spare beds.

7. Why The Internet Is (Mostly) Hurricane-Proof
Fast Company
As the city deals with the Sandy aftermath, data center companies in Manhattan are doing their best to keep servers online. But even if they fail, they're not taking the Internet down with them.

8. In Manhattan, Lines for Food, Water, Gasoline, And... The iPad Mini
Fast Company
Half a million people are still living without electricity in the New York area, but there's a three-blocks-long line at the Apple store.

9. 6 Ways Design Can Help You Weather A Natural Disaster
Co.Design
Folding boats, survival kits, and hurricane drones--Check out these weather-related Co.Design stories, plus info on what you can do to help victims of Sandy...

10. Everybody Walks In NYC. Because Sandy Has Left No Other Transportation Choice
Fast Company
Historic damage to New York City's immense public transit system has left millions of riders out of options. Why is it so hard to find a ride?

11. Sandy Prompts Louder Calls For Free Wi-Fi
Fast Company
The Electronic Frontier Foundation and New America Foundation launched an advocacy effort during Hurricane Sandy, making a plea for homes and businesses to offer free, public Internet access.

12. Post-Sandy, FCC Warns Of Worsening Cell Phone Networks
Fast Company
The FCC has said that cell reception could get even worse and 25% of storm ravaged states are without broadband.

13. The 5 Best Maps And Visualizations Of Frankenstorm Sandy
Co.Design
Stuck inside awaiting Sandy? Check out these beautiful, useful maps and images of the storm that bore down on the East Coast.

14. Recovers Wants To Help Your Community Prepare For The Next Disaster
Co.Exist
People want to help their communities when tragedy strikes, but it’s often impossible to match up eager volunteers with people and tasks that need manpower. This new web platform will get cities and towns ready to do just that.

15. Need To Clean Up After A Storm? A New Material Could “Obsorb” The Mess
Co.Exist
This new kind of sponge doesn’t soak up any water, but it finds oils and solvents delicious. Just add it to some dirty water and watch it work.

16. Airbnb Waives Fees In Sandy-Ravaged Regions. Update: Apple Makes A Bigger Gesture.
Fast Company
Airbnb waives its fees on all rooms affected by the hurricane and encourages those with properties to offer discounts. Apple sets up Red Cross donations page in iTunes.

17. "It's Global Warming, Stupid."
Co.Create
"Now we have weather on steroids."

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Source : fastcompany[dot]com

LinkedIn Updates Tools for Homepage, Profile Editing

LinkedIn use is exploding, and all those millions of new users added over the last two years have some updated features to play with.

LinkedIn has updated the homepage by adding a larger profile image and redesigning the whole feel of its pages with a more refined look. The power to find new contacts and network effectively is still there — it's just under a less utilitarian design.

Status: Updated

Starting today, LinkedIn members can update their profile via an opt-in sample/invitation. Everyone else will see the updates roll out to their profiles over the next few months, the company said in blog post. Larger profile images, new inline editing and richer insights into people's networks are all part of the update. 

Larger images show off a profile's highlights right at the top of the page.

Additionally, the Activity Stream, People You May Know and Background sections all have a new look, with the people section having the most dramatic change. There's a new graphic stats display for network suggestions that adds some color and useful information on those you may want to connect with. 

For updating background information on your profile, there is a new menu of options that pops up on the right-hand side. 

Suggestions are still made about what updates to make, but now they are a bit more polished.

Simpler Editing

Once updates are made to the background section, each portion gets a new little icon instead of a solid horizontal line to separate them. For example, there's a little hand next to the Volunteer and Causes section, and a little compass above the Skills and Expertise section.

This is also where the inline editing feature comes in. Now, instead of changing those skills using a new edit page, the changes can be made right from the profile — no need to click over to the Edit Profile page. 

Simpler editing makes an already popular activity even easier.

Linkedin CEO Jeff Weiner gave a brief presentation on the updates, and said the company now has over 175 million users, with 50 million of those added in just the last two years. He also pointed out how popular the recent Company Pages release has been and how millions of people are updating their profiles even though they aren't necessarily looking for jobs. 

Tell us in the comments if you are a LinkedIn Pro user or if you are cross-posting things to LinkedIn and Facebook — and how you decide what goes where.

 

 

Source : cmswire[dot]com

The iPad Mini Will Be Bad For Your Kids. Discuss

If Apple's iPad mini bursts onto the scene on Oct. 23 with a low price as expected, it'll end up in the sticky clutches of millions of kids. To some, this is not good.

There's a strong argument to be made, if you follow a certain line of reasoning, that the upcoming iPad mini will be bad for children.

Full-size iPads are already freely used in the home by millions of children, we know. And yet since Apple's tablet PC burst onto the scene three years ago there's been almost continuous worry that engaging with the iPad is damaging to kids' physical and mental health. The iPad mini is set to cost much less than its bigger brother (and it's expected to be announced during Apple's Oct. 23 event), but will come with the same Apple "must have" positive vibe, and will thus find its way into millions more homes--perhaps even one per child. Its portability, combined with its lower cost, will mean it gets taken to places and used more frequently in more widespread social situations. Thus all the worries aimed at the iPad are multiplied many times for the iPad mini.

Let's look at the arguments.

The Kids Love 'Em

Recent analysis by Piper Jaffray put iPad ownership among American teenagers at 31%. That's a heartening statistics for Apple since with 44% of teens owning a "tablet computer," that means the iPad has 72% penetration in this demographic. But in the bigger picture, when you add in the fact some 20% of the nearly 8,000 teens questioned said they were likely to buy a tablet in the next six months, that means up to two-thirds of U.S. teens will have a tablet PC by the middle of 2013.

And that's just teens owning one. A recent Nielsen study found that in homes with a tablet and kids under 12, 70% of those kids use the tablet, 77% of these for gaming, 57% for educational purposes.

We also know that schools across the world are leaping to buy iPads, and one private Australian school recently required all kids between 7 and 10 to have their own.

Basically this means that kids the world over are toying with tablets almost before they can walk. The pace of adoption of these devices is astonishing.

But iPads Are Bad

In a paper published in the Archives of Disease in Childhood journal, and highlighted in the Guardian, psychologist Dr. Aric Sigman mentions concern that screen use among the very young is increasing. Children born now in the U.K. will have amassed an entire year's worth of screen time by age 7, and by 18 they'll have spent three whole years looking at monitors, TVs, and other screens. Inactivity associated with TV and computer watching is connected with developmental issues, mobility issues, and health issues to do with diet, diabetes, and other issues. There are also psychological concerns related to depression, disengagement, poor social skills, and damage to a child's ability to empathize.

Though this paper doesn't explicitly mention tablets, as a natural evolution of computing and screen technology they are implicitly in the crosshairs for all the same reasons. And perhaps they're worse: They're more portable, and are so multi-purpose they could intrude into more long-established habits, even replacing the old routine of reading a comic under the bedclothes by flashlight.

Similarly Baroness Greenfield, a member of the House Of Lords and a scientist and broadcaster, has been stirring controversy in the U.K. by repeatedly linking kids' use of computers, particularly video gaming and social networking, to all sorts of dire psychological issues, and even linking it to autism. Consider how much Facebooking a super-portable iPad mini could enable.

Ever since the iPad arrived, it seems there's been a debate about whether or not its good to give to kids, from discussions about limiting screen time for the very young, to articles about iPad "addiction" among kids to serious discussions in Psychology Today about whether or not one should give a tablet to a toddler.

The iPad mini would seem to threaten even more of these dangers, presuming it sells like hotcakes and that parents will feel even more comfortable letting their kids play with cutting-edge electronics because it costs so much less than their own "grown-up" iPad.

Unless They Are Good

In softer sciences like psychology there's always the opportunity for research that's in contradiction with the findings of an author's peers, and that's exactly the case with a paper the Guardian has recently highlighted. It points out a strong correlation between mental stimulation at age 4 and enhanced language and cognition skills in the late teenage years. In other words, giving your young child a lot of educational toys at an early age can have a "sleeper effect" educational benefit over a decade later.

One could argue that a tablet PC is a golden opportunity to give kids challenging, imagination-building interactive tasks that are perfect for this sort of purpose. There are, after all, thousands of apps aimed at youngsters that are educational as well as fun. Explained in the right way, even classic casual games like Crayon Physics can have educational messages.

Mizuko Ito, a cultural anthropologist working as an associate researcher at the Humanities Research Institute at the University of California, Irvine is an expert in digital media's influence on our society--how it changes our relationships and even identities. In an email to Fast Company Ito explained her position on the potential of the iPad mini. "This is a somewhat obvious point, but as with all technologies, but particularly highly customizable digital technologies like the iPad, what really matters is how it is used, not the device itself. Because of this, I am always suspicious of studies and fears attached to the negative effects of specific devices or 'screen-time' as a general category, that don't look at specific forms of engagement and use. Like televisions, personal computers, and game machines, portable i-devices offer tremendous opportunities for learning and development. "

It's actually a question of how you use it, Ito argues: "On the positive side of the ledger, these devices are very intuitive to even young children, and can be taken up in diverse social contexts. Rather than turning away from others or sitting side-by-side to face a screen, with iPads you often see multiple people facing each other with the device between them, and this creates new opportunities for sharing and learning." Her argument is that iPads and their ilk can encourage social interaction, perhaps as a 21st century version of baseball cards--instead of a closed interaction with a child playing alone on a games console.

Considered in this light, you can even argue that the greater portability of tablet PCs means kids will rush about while using them, instead of sitting still for unhealthily long periods of time.

Everything In Moderation

Ito did temper her arguments, however. She noted tablets, due to their portability, can show up in social settings where perhaps we had never considered a digital device and, with hindsight, may have chosen not to allow them in.

On balance, she argues that "history has shown us that new devices tend to reproduce the culture, practices, and values that they are introduced to, whether that is the family, or the culture at large." Where families are already orientated toward "more positive learning content, apps, and content" on tablets, Ito expects positive benefits for kids. Perhaps in families that aren't so positively engaged with their kids learning, it's possible tablets will have less positive learning outcomes.

Similarly, as expert and author Lisa Guernsey pointed out, it's not just about using any old apps with your kids. Some 2-D static media may be better for kids than 3-D tabletified digital media because it's better designed. And research into this sort of experience in very young kids is still brand-new. Apple, for its part, is rumored to be pushing iBooks--which has had a hefty educational spin in the past--as part of the mini's launch.

It's all about moderation and carefully planned-out engagement with youngsters. Think about that in a few months when you see a well-used and be-dazzled iPad mini resting on your kids' desk.

[Image: Flickr user Ernst Vikne]

Source : fastcompany[dot]com

EU Issues Cloud Strategy, Aims to Add 2.5 Million New Jobs

The European Commission (EC) has its collective heads in the clouds — and sees millions of new jobs there — thanks to a new strategy designed to help increase the adoption of cloud computing across the continent.

The strategy,  "Unleashing the Potential of Cloud Computing in Europe" aims to create 2.5 million new jobs for the European Union (EU) member nations — through greater adoption of cloud computing technologies. The agency says that the increase could lead to an annual boost of EUR 10 billion, or about 1 percent of the EU GDP, by 2020.

Cloud Partnership

In order to reach that promised land in the sky, the strategy recommends several actions. These include the identification of technical standards that help cut through the current mishmash related to interoperability, data portability and reversibility.

It also calls for EU-wide certification for “trustworthy” cloud providers, development of model “safe and fair” cloud computing contracts with Service Level Agreements and the creation of what it calls a European Cloud Partnership.

The Cloud Partnership would be between EU member countries and leading companies in the industry, and it would use the public sector’s buying power to boost the European cloud market. The strategy notes that 20 percent of all IT spending in the EU runs through the public sector, and recommends that focusing this market power could “boost the chances for European cloud providers to grow to achieve a competitive scale, and deliver cheaper and better eGovernment.”

Cyber Security Next

In a statement accompanying the strategy, EU Vice President Neelie Kroes described cloud computing  as “a game changer for our economy.” Without a concerted action by the EU, she said, “we will stay stuck in national fortresses and miss out on billions in economic gains.”

The cloud strategy is part of a series of efforts by the EU to stimulate the digital economy and create a digital single market for member nations. In January, the EU proposed a comprehensive reform of the 1995 data protection rules, in order to strengthen online privacy rights and decrease the administrative costs of different privacy implementations among the 27 member states.

In the next few months, the EU is expected to propose a European Strategy for Cyber Security. In 2010, the U.S. federal government, in a move to promote cloud computing in the government, issued a “cloud-first” policy that directed its agencies to use cloud-based solutions whenever feasible.

 

 

Source : cmswire[dot]com

iPhone 5 Sells Five Million Over the Opening Weekend

 After the hype and hectic queues on Friday, the weekend proved no less busy for Apple stores and other retailers, as millions around the world flocked to buy the latest model of Apple iPhone. However, there could be plenty of user angst over scuffing of the phone and the iOS 6 Maps app. 

Apple Hits A New High

Somewhere between the prospect of a no-show and huge analyst "estimates", Apple can consider itself to have done pretty darn well out of the opening weekend sales for the iPhone 5.  The company has just announced that it sold over five million units across the 22 territories that it went on-sale.

While some analysts had gone as high as eight million, Apple will be more that delighted with five million, which smashes previous records including the 4 million iPhone 4S devices sold last year. Perhaps the analysts were expecting higher numbers based on the 5 being more of a new phone than the 4S "upgrade." 

Such is the power of those sales that the numbers will have a small but substantial impact on the U.S. and other economies, as well as toward Apple's own stock price and the huge number of supply chain partners. 

iOS 6 Thunders Along

This coming weekend, the iPhone 5 goes on-sale across the rest of Europe, so expect the numbers to keep on rising. The company also has the small matter of the iPad Mini coming in October, plus the launch of the new iTunes and iPod range, which should go even further toward boosting profits. Also on the horizon, and the next big step for Apple, will be the launch of the iPhone 5 into China, the world's biggest phone market. Will the brand continue to hold up over there?

Even better for Apple is the rush to upgrade existing devices to iOS 6. The company said upgrades have now exceeded 100 million devices, which is around one-quarter of all iOS devices out there. Keeping users who can't or won't upgrade yet happy with a new iOS upgrade may help keep them in the Apple camp until the next device rolls along. 

On the Downside

Things aren't quite all plain sailing though, a number of users are reporting scuffed iPhones out of the case, and with phone cases in short supply, looking after your new iPhone could be a challenge. Be prepared for a hell of a recall and inevitable class-action suits if this turns out to be a fault in Apple's design or manufacturing processes. 

As for iOS 6, even though flaws in the Maps app are still causing a fuss, with Apple going into lockdown mode to get the major complaints fixed, and Passbook still need lots more partner apps to go live, the new features in iOS 6.0 seem to be getting a positive reception. 

 

 

Source : cmswire[dot]com