82% of Women Think Social Media Drives the Definition of Beauty

A new study conducted by Dove revealed about 82% of women believe social media is influencing how we define beauty today.
Beauty that was once idolized in glossy magazines of celebrities and models is now having less of an impact on youth, thanks to social platforms such as Facebook and Instagram, according to the study, which was conducted among 1,000 women between the ages of 18 and 64 in the United States. In fact, 63% of women surveyed believe social media has a greater impact on how we define beauty than print media, film and music.

In Depth: How can NFC help SMBs?

It is not yet a widely used technology, but the number of near field communication (NFC) smartphones is growing. The technology, which can transmit over 4cm distances, allows two devices to exchange information.
NFC has been around for years, but it has been held back by a lack of enabled handsets. One of its current uses is in 'contactless payment' bank cards, where customers pay for goods by tapping the terminal, rather than entering a PIN.

NFC used in this way can also give people different access levels, reducing the cost of identity cards. "Equally, this can be used for access to data," Heaphy adds. "And these things can be updated over the air."
The move to NFC is only just beginning, and when it steps up further, the technology could make a huge difference to many firms. It's something that's easy to try out, using the NFC tags from Amazon, before consulting a specialist about expanding out.
Meanwhile, as the area continues to grow, off the shelf services should soon become readily available. "NFC will be here sooner rather than later," Heaphy says.

Social Media Presence Mandatory For Brands In India: Research

According to a new research, social media has become a more-than-important component in the life of a brand manager or advertiser.

Waggener Edstrom Communications (WE), an integrated communications agency recently conducted a survey asking respondents their association with their favorite brand over the social media & the response is overwhelmingly positive. Titled ‘Content Matters: The Impact of Brand Storytelling Online in 2014’, the study spanned across 2200 consumers dispersed across a wide age gap of 15 to 60 years & the agency found a unanimous pattern across the demographic.
What did WE find out?
97% of the Indian respondents enthusiastically follow their favorite brands on social channels. 72% of the Indian consumers surveyed, follow their favorite healthcare brand on social media. This is very high as compared to the global average of just 48%. Interestingly, Indian travel & tourism segment doesn’t have that high a following at just 68%, but nonetheless, companies involved in this line of business too, have benefited from an active presence on the social web.
The phenomenon of actively seeking out brands & their respective pages or accounts is a direct result of the growing prominence of social media portals. But this survey dispels the notion that social media users visit these portals just to interact on a personal level, shared Stephen Tracy, APAC Lead at Waggener Edstrom’s Insight & Analytics (I&A) Practice,
“Across all markets and business sectors, we found that consumers who are exposed to brand content regularly through social channels spend more on products and services than those that don’t. Indian consumers who engage with their favorite healthcare brands online spend 187% more than those that don’t.”
The role played by social media portals in pushing brand popularity cannot be refuted. But the survey clearly shows how deeply enamored, social media users in India are about their favorite bands. No wonder that social media marketing (SMM) has witnessed a surge in the recent times. What do you think?

Google to offer $2.7 million prize at hacking contest

Search engine giant Google will offer $2.7 million to researchers who can hack its browser-based operating system Chrome OS as part of its Pwnium hacking contest to be held in March this year. 

"Security is a core tenet of Chromium, which is why we hold regular competitions to learn from security researchers. Contests like Pwnium help us make Chromium even more secure," Google said in a blogpost. 

This year, Pwnium 4, will be hosted in March at the CanSecWest security conference in Vancouver, Canada. 

"With a total of $2.71828 million in the pot, we'll issue Pwnium rewards for eligible Chrome OS exploits at $110,000 for browser or system-level compromise in guest mode or as a logged-in user, delivered via a web page," it said. 

Google will also pay $150,000 for providing an exploit to be able to persistently compromise an HP or Acer Chromebook, ie hacking the device to retain control even after a reboot. 

The earlier editions of Pwnium competitions focussed on Intel-based Chrome OS devices, but this year Google will allow researchers to also choose from ARM-based Chromebook, the HP Chromebook 11 (Wi-Fi) and the Acer C720 Chromebook (2GB Wi-Fi) based on Intel's Haswell microarchitecture. 

Last year, Google had put $3.14159 million in the pot for Pwnium 3. 

Google said it would consider larger bonuses this year to researchers who demonstrated what it called a "particularly impressive or surprising exploit." 

"New this year, we will also consider significant bonuses for demonstrating a particularly impressive or surprising exploit. Potential examples include defeating kASLR, exploiting memory corruption in the 64-bit browser process or exploiting the kernel directly from a renderer process," it said.

7 cutting-edge technologies coming soon

Like every year, even in 2014, phones will get smarter, computers will get faster, cameras will capture more pixels, and screens will display those clearer. We will see newer versions of operating systems. There will be better iterations of devices, and you'll probably ditch your old faithful for a new shiny one.

 

But this feature is not about mere upgrades. Not at all. It is about cutting-edge tech that's only been seen in research labs till now... and some of these are still prototypes. Regardless, all of it is... hot stuff.

As small as a memory card

The Edison is Intel's latest experiment in miniaturization. This Linux-based 'computer' - the size of an SD card - comprises a 400MHz dual- core processor, integrated Wi-Fi, and Bluetooth 4.0. The chipmaker even has an app store designed for the platform, making Edison a highly customizable miniature computer that can be put to myriad uses, including in wearable gadgets.

As a proof of concept, Intel outfitted baby clothing with Edison as well as sensors that could track temperature, breathing, and motion. It also kitted an LED coffee mug with Edison, and wirelessly connected both the micro computers. When the baby was happy, the sensors in its clothing conveyed the data via Edison to the coffee mug (in the parent's hand) to display a happy green smiling face, but when something went wrong, that face turned red... Expect to hear and see more of Edison this year.

Intel plans on getting it out into the market within the next few months. In fact, it has already announced a $1.3 million 'Make It Wearable' competition, including $500,000 that will be awarded to the most innovative developer.

Lots of 'Steam'

A few years ago, Valve -- developers of best-selling titles such as Half Life, Counter Strike, and Team Fortress -- envisioned a future where games could be delivered via the internet straight to computers. That was the beginning of Steam - an online distribution service that brought gamers and content together.

As part of the next step, Valve envisioned consoles - built by different vendors - that would replace PCs. These boxes would be equipped to handle all of Valve's offerings. And the concept of a Steam Box was born. These machines would not be a 'one size fits all'. Each hardware manufacturer could design its own configuration, and at different prices, so long as all those machines are optimized for Steam.

Well, recently, 13 vendors - including Alienware, Gigabyte, Zotac, Falcon Northwest and Digital Storm - unveiled their own versions of this console. And since Steam boasts of a catalogue of over 2,000 games, it is in a unique position to digitally distribute titles at a discount of up to 75% - and this can only mean good things for gamers.

So while Sony and Microsoft slug it out for console supremacy, they just might find Valve creeping up on them. As for us, we're glad Steam Box is no longer plain vapourware.

Dual-boot tablets

If you're out shopping for a tablet, you're forced to choose an operating system, whether Android, iOS or Windows Phone. But guess what? A new set of slates - ready to hit the market as early as February - will support Android (Jelly Bean) as well as Windows 8. This means, you can (at boot-up) choose which OS you want to run.

The first of these devices, interestingly, is Micromax LapTab - a 10-inch slate that's powered by a dual-core 1.4GHz Intel Celeron processor, 2GB RAM and with 32GB storage.

Similarly, Asus has also announced the Transformer Book Duet TD300 - a hybrid laptop-tablet combo that boasts of some killer hardware under its hood, including a 13.3-inch Full HD IPS display, an Intel Core i7 processor, 4GB RAM, and a choice between a 128GB solid state drive (SSD) or a 1TB hard drive.

Now the only thing left to see is whether the strange bedfellows, Google and Microsoft, are okay with the arrangement...

All about the curves

A few years ago, manufacturers glibly convinced us that we really needed flat screen TVs. And we, gullibly, believed them. But now, once we've upgraded, the same chaps are telling us that curves are the new thing.

Last year, Samsung unveiled a simple curved screen prototype. This year, they went a step further. The South Korean giant has built an 85-inch ultra high-definition (UHD) TV that looks like any other flat-panel television. But press a button, and both its vertical edges start moving forward to reveal a bendable screen. The resulting concave display is - supposedly - engineered to recreate a theatrical effect; bringing the edges closer to make the viewing experience more immersive.

And then there is Panasonic that can't quite decide whether screens should be concave or convex. It has built a prototype that curves in as well as out.

Well, we're not sure if bendable UHD screens are immersive or not. But yes, in the next couple of years, expect almost every TV maker to throw curved displays at you. And you can expect them to cost much more than the sedan in your parking lot!

Modular PCs

 

Tech Mahindra bullish on hiring; headcount to cross 1-lakh soon

With a bullish outlook on the Indian IT story and its own hiring plans, Mahindra group's technology venture Tech Mahindra says its headcount will cross the 1-lakh level in about a year, from close to 85,000 at present.

"I don't think there has been any stagnation in hiring activities in the Indian IT space. Seven years ago, we were six-seven thousand people and today we are 85,000," Tech Mahindra Vice Chairman Vineet Nayyar said here.

Asked when Tech Mahindra would reach the 1-lakh mark, he said: "Its a matter of a year or so. I don't see it as a very big deal."

Nayyar, who was here for the World Economic Forum ( WEF) Annual Meeting, told PTI in an interview that India's IT story is not over, but its nature would evolve depending on the changing needs.

"The fact is that skills are in India and those skills are needed. There would be drafting of new needs, which would be overlaid by the new technology that would evolve and those needs are not going to go away.

"So, as far as I can see, the Indian technology story is not over and in fact it will strengthen further because increasingly India is becoming an epicentre for its evolution and growth," he said.

When asked about hiring trends in the IT sector, Nayyar said he does not think there has been any slowdown in hiring and every passing year all firms have been hiring more people.

"I am sure that IT will create huge employment going forward too and then you should understand that for each job in IT, you create at least three additional jobs and most people say it is an under-statement. So, net-net on employment side, I am fairly bullish," he added.

Talking about the emergence of new markets for Indian IT companies, Nayyar said the technological needs are going to increase globally, because technology has become so pervasive in everyone's life -- from a child of 2-3 years to all of us.

"When needs arise, the responses would come and capabilities would evolve and it so happens that there is a huge abundance of young and bright people in India and all these people make a unique talent base, which I don't think is replicated elsewhere," he said.

On the trends seen in the clients' IT spending budget, Nayyar said, "They have no choice because need for technology is growing and it pervades the entire company now from the top to the bottom.

"People have no choice but to increase their technology budget, specially if they want to compete, if they want to control costs and if they want to be competitive," he said.

Asked about the spate of leadership changes among Indian IT companies, Nayyar said there was nothing to worry about.

"We are all professional people and hopefully each leader who has gone has created enough leadership skills at lower levels," he added.

How to Block Unwanted Calls on Android

How to Block Unwanted Calls on Android is a post by Cory Gunther from Gotta Be Mobile.
Smartphones are wonderful tools that are invaluable to our daily lives, but nothing frustrates me more than getting spam phone calls on my personal cell phone. Not the throw away home phone, but my actual cell phone.
Chatting with friends, family, and co workers is extremely easy thanks to smartphones, but sadly there’s those moments where we get spam calls from people we don’t know or want calling. Someone speaking another language or trying to sell some odd piece of a land timeshare and if you’re like me, you get mad, swear a few times, and hang up. Thankfully call blocking is a standard feature on most Android devices.

Blocking unwanted calls, telemarketers, or that clingy X isn’t as easy as it should be but at least we have options. Almost all Android smartphones take advantage of this feature, although most have their own unique way of doing it. Since I use the Nexus 5 and Galaxy S4 Google Play edition daily, I have stock Android and will start with that, but the general idea is the same for all devices.
Sadly we can’t just add random numbers to a do-not-answer list or automatic call blocking list, and you’ll actually have to make the number a contact first, then get rid of it. Stock Android has an “All calls to voicemail” feature where you’ll never hear or get the call and it goes right to voicemail. That’s our only stock option, but it’s really easy to enable.

Simply make a new contact with the number you wish to never hear from again, or if it’s someone you already have in your phone, just go to the contact. Tap the little avatar person shaped contact edit button shown below, tap settings, and check the send to voicemail button. It’s that easy. It’s just a bummer we have to actually make the number a contact and save it first.

Call Rejection

Samsung smartphones have a call rejection feature and a rejection list, which is better than the stock system Google uses in regular Android. Here you can block numbers from calling you multiple ways, and even add a new contact directly to the rejection list all in one process.

Alternatively users can go into any contact they’ve already added, hit menu and tap settings, and select the “add to rejection list” option to instantly kill that number from ever pestering you again. Going into the settings shown above you can manage, add, and even remove numbers if someone gets back on your good graces.

Read: 25 Hidden Galaxy Note 3 Features

Lastly Samsung also has blocking mode as shown in our hidden features post above, which will block certain numbers from calling or even texting during certain hours. So you can limit just friends and family during the night, etc.

Call Barring

HTC and Sony devices all feature Call Barring that works in a very similar way as Samsung’s rejection list, and can be setup using roughly the same few steps as outlined above. The regular settings menu, or the Call Settings menu (in the phone app hit menu > settings) which is where you’ll setup barring certain numbers.

Here you can block any incoming or even outgoing calls in tons of different situations. On the HTC One simply go into the Phone app and tap menu or settings, and in the settings menu select “Blocked contacts”. Just like with Samsung above you can add a number right to your contacts and instantly block it, or add any already saved numbers to the blocked list. In a matter of seconds all those telemarketers will never be able to bother you again.

Read: How to Cut, Copy & Paste on Android

Sadly these are the only options readily available for Android, and stock devices only redirect these calls to voicemail, which could be a bad thing when you get a 3 minute voicemail from some automated junk. So, since we want to cover all the bases, you can head to the Google Play Store for 3rd party solutions. There’s an app for that!

3rd Party Blocking Apps

There’s tons of different apps readily available from the Google Play Store to block calls. My personal favorite is called Mr. Number to block calls or texts, but that’s just one of many. Mr. Number even will let you choose to hang-up, send to voicemail, or add an exception if you’d like specific instructions.

Advanced Call Blocker & Tools is another awesome app that is essentially a swiss army knife of calling apps. Lets you block calls, make fake calls with names and even fake numbers, hide your call log and much much more. This does it all, and blocks any number with ease.
Or the simple Call Blocker app that’s top rated on the Play Store is another option. It even lets you back up contacts, and the blocked list with ease if you’re switching to a new phone and don’t want to recreate your blocked list all over again.
Next time you have some random number pestering you, like the Spanish telemarketer I’ve experienced this week, use one of the many steps detailed above to rest at ease.

Bangalore: India's first city to get free public Wi-Fi

Tech-savvy Karnataka government is offering free Wi-Fi (wireless fidelity) to citizens of the state capital to access internet and stay connected with their near and dear ones on social media.

Touted to be the first of its kind in the country, the facility - Namma Wi-Fi (802.11N) will allow citizens to use smartphones, tablets, netbooks, laptops and other mobile devices to connect to internet seamlessly when they are around MG Road and Brigade Road in downtown or at Shantinagar or Yeshwantpur bus terminals and at upscale Indiranagar in the city's eastern suburb.

 

 "The facility is a first step to make Bangalore a smart and connected city," internet and Wi-Fi service provider D-VoiS Broadband Ltd managing director Ramesh Satya told IANS here.

Initiated by the state IT department and the state government's ICT (information and communications technologies) group, the facility will be extended to 10 other hotspots across the city later this year.

To use the service, a user will need to have an authentication password, which will be sent to his or her mobile number after he registers on the network.

"When a mobile user is present in any of the five hotspots, he will be able to connect by configuring his device to our ION service and access internet after registering and getting the password," Satya said.

As the facility is being offered at the state's initiative, all government services such as Sakala, a time-bound service delivery are available on the home page.

"With a speed of up to 512 Kbps (kilo bytes per second), a user will have connectivity within the coverage area. Usage, however, will be limited to three hours a day or up to 50 MB data," Satya clarified.

The facility is expected to benefit thousands of people visiting the five hotspots located in commercial areas.

Why Samsung quietly cheers when Apple sells an iPhone

In the marketplace,  Samsung  Electronics and Apple battle for customers. In the courts, they fight over patents. Yet every time Apple sells an iPhone, Samsung quietly cheers, too.

In addition to being one of Apple's main competitors, Samsung is one of its top suppliers. Samsung provides the application processor in the iPhone 5S - the brains of Apple's flagship handset, and one of its most expensive components.

Because Samsung is not only the biggest maker of smartphones, but also a leading provider of parts to Apple and other gadget makers, company executives say they are confident that the electronics giant can work its way through a difficult period. On Friday, Samsung confirmed that it had sustained a sharp slowdown in sales growth and earnings in the fourth quarter of 2013 and warned that business conditions would remain challenging in the first half of this year. Apple's sales have risen, and those gains have shored up Samsung by lifting the performance of its chipmaking business.

Samsung said that one-time factors were largely responsible for the fourth-quarter weakness. These included a special bonus totaling 800 billion won, or $740 million, that Samsung paid out to employees on the 20th anniversary of a management initiative to improve quality, as well as the effects of a surge in the strength of the South Korean currency, which Samsung pegged at 700 billion won.

"This kind of adjustment is normal for a high-growth industry," said CW Chung, an analyst at Nomura, though he added that Samsung's earnings could be "flattish" for the next two years.

Sales in the company's mobile division fell 9% in the fourth quarter compared with the third quarter, it said, acknowledging that sales of high-end smartphones had been weaker than expected. The premium segment, in which Samsung offers handsets like the Galaxy S4 and the Note 3, is the most lucrative part of the business, but analysts say it is increasingly saturated.

Samsung faces a renewed challenge from Apple, which introduced two new handsets - the iPhone 5S and a less expensive model, the 5C - in the second half of last year. Apple also recently reached agreements to distribute its phones via the largest mobile carriers in Japan and China.

While analysts said iPhone sales grew strongly after the latest models were introduced, with Apple regaining market share, Samsung's chipmaking business shared the spoils. That unit posted a 7% quarter-on-quarter increase in sales, helped by "increased AP shipments for a competitor's new product," said Jee-Ho Baek, Samsung's vice president of memory marketing, in a conference call with analysts. He was referring to application processors, and while he did not mention Apple by name, the allusion was clear.

Samsung's mobile division provides about two-thirds of the company's operating profit, but analysts expect that portion to decline in the coming years as the smartphone business matures. The chipmaking unit is expected to pick up some of the slack. That trend was already apparent in the fourth quarter, when the semiconductor division provided 24% of operating profit, up from 16% a year earlier.

Overall, Samsung posted net income of 7.3 trillion won, or $6.7 billion, up from 7.04 trillion won a year earlier but down from 8.24 trillion in the third quarter of 2013. Fourth-quarter sales of 59.28 trillion won were up from 56.06 trillion won a year earlier but flat compared with the third quarter of 2013. Operating profit, at 8.31 trillion won, was in line with a forecast issued two weeks ago.

The company said it expected weakness to persist in the first half of 2014, though it insisted that this was because of the "seasonality" of the technology industry, in which purchases are often deferred until later in the year.

While Samsung makes a wide range of consumer products other than phones, including televisions and home appliances, many of these have sluggish sales and low profit margins. Sales and earnings fell sharply in the display panel business.

Tablet computers are one area of promise, with sales and market share growing. Samsung executives said in the conference call that they were optimistic that new devices with larger screens would expand the tablet business further. The company also sees so-called wearable technology as a promising trend, though an early example, the Galaxy Gear smart watch, has gotten off to a slow start.

For now, that has left Samsung's chipmaking arm to pick up most of the slack from the new softness in smartphones. Memory chips, which are recovering from a long price slump, are outperforming more complicated semiconductor devices like application processors. Samsung said memory chip sales had been bolstered in the fourth quarter by the introduction of new video game consoles like Sony's PS4 and Microsoft's Xbox One.

10 Facebook-Coined Terms That Changed the English Language

With Facebook's 10th anniversary approaching, you'll likely hear a lot about how the social network has changed the way we live. However, one aspect that many will overlook is its lasting effect on English vocabulary.
There's no doubt that plenty of social networks have introduced words and phrases into the vernacular, and none more so than the 1.19 billion-strong Facebook, whose various slang terms have crossed digital borders and found their way into every day life. We're still not sure whether to thank them or hate them forever for it.