Internet-connected eyeglasses and similar technologies will soon be on the market, but their benefits and dangers are little understood. University of Toronto Engineering Professor Steve Mann hopes to change that at a groundbreaking conference at U of T in June 2013.

Mann is a pioneering researcher in the fields of wearable computing and "augmediated reality" (AR). He’s bringing together renowned experts in wearable technology, artificial intelligence, virtual reality and privacy to discuss both the potential and the pitfalls of these technologies. Speakers will include renowned artificial intelligence researcher Marvin Minsky, futurist and inventor Ray Kurzweil, legendary computer scientist Gordon Bell, privacy expert Helen Nissenbaum and American Civil Liberties Union president Susan N. Herman.

The conference, the annual Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers International Symposium on Technology and Society (ISTAS), is called "The Social Implications of...

Digital consumers around the world are starting to tire of their personal data being collected across the Internet, says Ovum (www.ovum.com). The global industry analysts paint a threatening scenario for the Internet economy, as consumers seek out new tools that allow them to remain "invisible" -- untraceable and impossible to target by data means.

Ovum’s latest "Consumer Insights Survey" reveals that 68% of the Internet population across 11 countries would select a "do-not-track" (DNT) feature if it was easily available, suggesting that a data black hole could soon open up under the Internet economy. This hardening of consumer attitudes, coupled with tightening regulation, could diminish personal data supply lines and have a considerable impact on targeted advertising, CRM, big data analytics, and other digital industries.

"Unfortunately, in the gold rush that is big data, taking the supply of 'little data' --...

The analysts at the TechNavio research group (www.technavio.com) forecast that the global m-education (that is, mobile education, which involves devices such as the iPhone and iPad) market will grow at a CAGR [compound annual growth rate] of 32.50% over the period 2012-2016.

One of the key factors contributing to this market growth is the increase in government initiatives. The global m-Education market has also been witnessing an upsurge in mergers and acquisitions. However, the reluctance of educational institutions to frequently update ICT infrastructure could pose a challenge to the growth of this market. 


''The advancement in ICT has resulted in the emergence of virtual classrooms," says TechNavio's IT Services. "Imparting education through virtual classrooms is a new concept that is becoming popular not only in traditional educational institutions, but also in training centers with vocational...

Self-published books have transformed both the reading and writing landscape, with hundreds of thousands of authors now eschewing traditional publishing routes.

Once reserved for distribution to a writer’s close family and friends, these books are now respected as an affordable option with every bit as much potential for becoming best-sellers as those produced by the New York houses.

"Countless books published this way have gone on to become best-sellers, from 'Fifty Shades of Grey' to 'Still Alice' to 'Rich Dad Poor Dad'," says independent publisher Sheryn Hara, founder of the 30-year-old Book Publishers Network (www.bookpublishersnetwork.com) and author of the new how-to, "Self-Publish Successfully."
"But it’s important to note that these don’t look like they were just spit out of the inkjet printer in your bedroom," she says. "You have to have a good product if you want...

The announcement last week from FCC Chairman Genachowski regarding plans to make available up to 195 MHz of additional spectrum for license-exempt use in the United States is terrific news for end users and industry alike, according to the Wi-Fi Alliance (www.wi-fi.org), a global non-profit industry association of hundreds of companies "devoted to seamless connectivity."

Wi-Fi has been an engine of social and economic benefit since 1999, and the proposed spectrum will provide an opportunity for technologies like Wi-Fi to continue to innovate, bringing further social and consumer benefits. With 5 GHz Wi-Fi devices delivering gigabit performance entering the market now, additional contiguous spectrum in 5 GHz means that users will have an even better experience with applications such as video.

Analyst firm ABI Research (www.abiresearch.com)...

By Rick Sutcliffe

Some trivial things that bug the Spy begin with the way the name of this month, and for that matter the name of the fourth day of the week are usually pronounced--as if in the one case there were no "r" and in the other there were no "d."

And there's the way the typical recycled Social Studies or English teacher handles the grade eight math courses he's been assigned while he awaits retirement from a job long redundant. No, a prime number is not "one that is divisible by itself and one" for that definition includes one itself. Second, anyone who uses the term "cross multiply" in a classroom ought to be put out to pasture before they do any more damage. Does "Law of Proportions" really have too many syllables to be properly taught? Third, an exponent on a number does not mean "a number multiplied by itself n times." It counts the number of factors, NOT the number of multiplications. Fourth, the sum of money put to work to earn...

Billions of people have purchased iPhones, iPads, and iPods to store their digital photos, videos and other important, personal data. Unexpected mishaps that lead to physical damage and/or software or hardware issues are the main causes of data loss on any mobile device.

With Apple devices being more entrenched in many people’s daily lives, it’s no surprise that when a data loss occurs there is a need to recover personal data quickly and securely. DriveSavers Data Recovery (www.drivesavers.com) has seen a 150% increase in inquiries for data recovery services from Apple mobile users over the past two years.

With Apple devices becoming faster, lighter, thinner and more secure, people are taking them everywhere to do everything. However, it is estimated that less than 10 percent of smartphone users actually back up their content on a regular basis -- therefore if data hasn’t been backed up or synched...

Social collaboration is expected to gather momentum over the next few years in Australia, and this trend is complementary to a more collaboration-focused business climate. This was the finding from the newly released "Frost & Sullivan Australian Social Collaboration Market 2012" (www.frost.com).

According to Audrey William, head of research, ICT Practice, Frost & Sullivan ANZ, one of the main factors accelerating the adoption of social collaboration solutions is the growing importance of smart devices in an enterprise environment.

"The proliferation of smart devices is driving a significant change in the way employees access corporate applications," she says. "Additionally we will start seeing more of the Unified Communications solutions incorporate social media and collaboration as part of its solution" she said. The consumerization of IT has brought about a new aspect of communicating in the...

Sentiment surrounding Big Data vendors remained positive last year, despite sceptics’ suggestions that the subject had been ‘over-hyped’, according to Ovum (www.ovum.com). The Big Data buzz word even managed to transcend from the enterprise IT world to become a hot topic for business publications and journals in 2012, with MongoDB claiming considerable mindshare among web developers who traditionally relied on MySQL, according to the research group.

In a research note, Ovum analyses data gathered by DataSift, which ranked Twitter mentions and sentiment of vendors (and open source organizations) associated with the Big Data market in 2012.  The global analysts were surprised to find that while Hadoop garners much of the spotlight as a Big Data platform, the vendor 10gen, which develops MongoDB, came in second in mentions to Apache, which hosts the Hadoop project.

"Given the level of build-up and suggested hype, it...

Americans could save considerable money by incorporating energy efficient producs into their daily lives.

The global energy efficiency (EE) market encompasses product and service markets that enable residential, commercial and industrial energy consumers to use less energy and save money. EE products include EE building goods, EE appliances, EE consumer electronics, smart meters, EE lighting, motor efficiency controllers, power management software and EE vehicles. EE services encompass smart grid, demand response, cloud computing and consulting and auditing services and also include energy service companies (ESCOs).

A number of driving and inhibitory factors are affecting growth in this many-faceted market, some impacting the market as a whole and others only specific market segments. One of the most noteworthy factors influencing the total EE market is an increase in the number and stringency of regulations and other EE requirements around the world. This movement...

The Kindle Fire, which Amazon is widely reported to be sold at cost or below the margin, has been one of the most intensely followed technology product stories over the past year.

A new study from ABI Research (www.abiresearch.com) concludes that the cross-subsidized device model that Amazon uses is a viable strategy. According to senior analyst Aapo Markkanen’s calculations, the firm would need, on average, an incremental profit of about $3 in each month of a tablet’s lifespan to achieve an overall profit margin of 20%.

"Considering the probable margins of app and content sales, our research shows that Kindle Fire is a credible proposition," Markkanen comments. "We expect that there will be a certain level of ‘innovation plateauing’ in mobile hardware taking place over the next five years, and that would certainly work in Amazon’s favor. Its future devices are likely to require less cross-subsidy...

For many entrepreneurs, it is a dream on par with finding the Holy Grail: an initial public stock offering that can turn a startup into the next Google and a 20-something founder into the next mega-millionaire.

Yet, for all that money and drama, do initial public offerings (IPOs) speed up technological innovation?

Not necessarily. An eye-popping new study by Shai Bernstein, an assistant professor of finance at the Stanford Graduate School of Business, finds that innovation slowed down by about 40 percent at tech companies after they went public.

In a meticulous analysis of patent data from nearly 2,000 companies, Bernstein found that newly public companies became noticeably more incremental and less ambitious with their in-house research than comparable firms that stayed private.
And that’s not all.

Top inventors were much more likely to leave if their companies went public, and the ones who stayed behind showed a steep decline in "innovation...

Broadband penetration will exceed 650 million households worldwide and nearly 430 million households worldwide will have a data network this year, according to new data from Park Associates (www.parkassociates.com).

"In our research, we are seeing consumers demand a clear value proposition on core functions before they start adding additional features," said Stuart Sikes, president, Parks Associates. "For example, connected cars represent a key area of growth and a hot topic at CES. Approximately one-third of U.S. car owners have in-vehicle connectivity, but our research shows the most popular apps relate to navigation and vehicle performance. To remain competitive, service providers and CE manufacturers must ensure their core offerings remain relevant to the connected consumer."

The research group's data shows that:

° U.S. revenues from IP connected home service bundles will reach US$...

The Internet is becoming more important to our daily lives, but many Americans believe it has also become more risky over the last five years, especially for seniors.

Having felt the pain of an online scam, they want the nation's top Internet companies to take a bigger role in making the Internet safer, according to a new survey by the Digital Citizens (digitalcitizensaction.org), a coalition "focused on educating the public and policy makers about the threats that consumers face on the Internet, and the importance for government and Internet companies to make the Web a safer place."

The survey, conducted by Hart Research Associates, found that 77% of Americans think the Internet has become more risky for seniors. Trend Micro statistics show that there are now over 10 million virus infected Web links and dozens of scams used by cyber criminals attempting to steal information and money from unsuspecting shoppers. These statistics point out that as the Internet becomes...

 Americans are deferring action on energy savings because of confusion about the benefits according to Soluxe Energy Solutions, a Connecticut-based marketing company says.

"Most energy efficiency upgrades produce immediate savings," says Gil Kernan , vice president of contractor relations. "But homeowners continue to believe it will be years before they realize a return on their investment in home improvements," he added.

Kernan cited brochures and web sites that refer to "payback times" of two to 15 years for products such as wall and attic insulation, duct sealing, and rooftop solar panels.

"The whole notion of 'payback time' leads customers to think that it will be years before they see any benefits from investing in energy savings," Kernan says. "Nothing could be further from the truth."

Kernan said that most energy efficiency and renewable energy products yield immediate savings, even if the consumer borrows 100% of the cost of the upgrades. If a...

Small business owners and decision makers are fairly optimistic about revenue projections, with 92.5% expecting their revenue to be flat or up in 2013, according to the latest "Small Business Marketing Forecast" by Ad-ology Research (MarketingForecast.com).

This annual study, now in its fifth year, also reveals that small business decision makers are investing their revenue back into advertising and marketing. 30.5% of SMBs who spend more than $1,000 on advertising plan to spend more in 2013 than they did in 2012.

"For the third consecutive year, more than half of all small businesses are confident that their sales will increase," says C. Lee Smith, president and CEO of Ad-ology Research. "It’s also the third year in a row where more than 90% of small businesses say their advertising budget will remain flat or increase."

Approximately 20.5% of small businesses plan to increase their ad spend on social media networks like Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. Most...

McAfee has released its annual "2013 Threat Predictions" report, highlighting the top threats McAfee Labs foresees for 2013.

Using its proprietary Global Threat Intelligence (GTI), the McAfee Labs team analyzed data on malware, vulnerabilities and online threats in 2012 to predict which trends will increase in 2013. In the coming year, McAfee Labs expects that threats to mobile devices will become even more of a focus of cybercriminals, the influence of the hacktivist group "Anonymous" will decline, and large-scale attacks that attempt to destroy infrastructure will increase.

"Cybercriminals and hacktivists will strengthen and evolve the techniques and tools they use to assault our privacy, bank accounts, mobile devices, businesses, organizations and homes," says said Vincent Weafer, senior vice president of McAfee Labs. "Our 2013 Threat Predictions provides the general public, governments and businesses not only with the top risks in the year to come to be aware of...

By Rick Sutcliffe

The great shift in the computing devices market is well under way, with sales of desktop units tanking, even of laptops flattening out (sic), while those of iPads (there is no tablet market) boom. In this milieu, there are some interesting byplays.

First, sales of Windows machines have been hit far harder than those of Macs, and Windows 8 has not helped either Microsoft or the generic box assemblers. Indeed, uptake appears worse than that of Vista, when it first came out. From a technology market point of view, we are still in the 2008 downturn, and the Spy's predictions on that market when the recovery comes (2014-2015?) remain valid. The large installed base of computers is aging, but corporate replacement decisions have been repeatedly postponed pending economic clarity.

Those decisions will now be made in a vastly different technological and economic landscape than were the original purchases. Then,...

Paragon Software Group (www.penreader.com), a developer of multi-platform dictionary and reference applications for mobiles and computers, has identified the most important mobile reference applications trends for 2013 based on sales and customer feedback for 2012. The company says trends in mobile dictionary and reference apps include:
 
° In the mobile dictionary market, publishers are no longer competing with each other. Instead, everyone is competing against Google and other free translation sources.
 
° Users prefer customizable dictionary content based on their language level, skills and needs. The "My View" feature provided by most dictionary apps allows users to decide what type of information is shown on the screen. For example, users can select a particular pronunciation (eg, British or American), different grammar levels, etymology, synonyms and practically any other type of...

EMC Corp. (www.EMC.com), which enables businesses and service providers to transform their operations and deliver IT as a service, has announced results of the EMC-sponsored IDC Digital Universe study, "Big Data, Bigger Digital Shadows, and Biggest Growth in the Far East." It found that despite the unprecedented expansion of the digital universe due to the massive amounts of data being generated daily by people and machines, IDC estimates that only 0.5% of the world's data is being analyzed. 

The proliferation of devices such as computers and smartphones worldwide, increased Internet access within emerging markets and the boost in data from machines such as surveillance cameras or smart meters has contributed to the doubling of the digital universe within the past two years alone -- to a mammoth 2.8ZB. IDC projects that the digital universe will reach 40 ZB by 2020, an amount that exceeds previous forecasts by 14%.

The global multi-factor authentication (MFA) market -- which includes different types of authentication and applications -- is expected to reach US$5.45 billion by 2017 at an estimated CAGR [compound annual growth rate] of 17.3% from 2012 to 2017, according to Research and Markets (www.researchandmarkets.com).

Two-factor authentication is most widely used MFA model in the world with smartcard with PIN and one time password (OTP) are the most popular technique. Biometric-based MFA models are growing at a fast rate. North America and Europe covers most of the market, whereas APAC has the fastest growing region.

Some of the key developments in the authentication industry include Microsoft buying PhoneFactor in October 2012. In July 2012, Apple bought AuthenTec . L1 Identity, a biometric technology company was bought by Sagem Morpho (France). Several other acquisitions, mergers, new...

TeamViewer (www.teamviewer.com), a provider of remote control and online meetings software, has announced the findings of its survey of 500 American adults ages 18 and older who work from home either full time or part time, conducted online by uSamp in October.

The survey, which was drafted based on TeamViewer’s experience in office communication, found that fully half (50%) of telecommuters feel that they are more productive working from home, with 23% even saying that they are much more productive.

The survey also found that 45% of Americans believe the average telecommuter saves themselves from traveling 21-50 miles per day. This statistic becomes even more interesting given that the survey revealed 80% of Americans say that saving money on gas and having no daily commute are among the biggest benefits of working from home. The survey also showed further benefits Americans see when telecommuting...

Nasuni (www.nasuni.com), a provider of enterprise storage to large, distributed organizations, has released its "Special Report on Shadow IT in the Workplace," which reveals that large numbers of employees use Dropbox and other consumer file sharing services for sensitive work-related data, even if they know that their employer has a specific policy banning the use of such services.

Nearly one-half of employees who know company doesn't allow use of file sharing services use them anyway. According to the folks at Nasuni, businesses rely on corporate IT teams to manage secure protection and controlled access to critical data. When employees use consumer-grade file sharing services for work files, they override the systems in place and usurp the responsibility of IT. As the flood of consumer mobile devices entering the workplace rises, the risk of data loss and exposure is growing.

Nasuni surveyed more than 1,300...

If Apple is indeed planning its own HDTV (the rumored "iTV") the time may be ripe. Over 220 million Smart TV sets will be sold worldwide in 2017, up from the 54 million that will be sold in 2012, according to Informa Telecoms & Media’s (www.informatandm.com) latest Smart TV device forecasts.

The research group says that 31% of households worldwide will own at least one Smart TV in five years time, according to Informa, with household penetration much higher in North America (63%) and Western Europe (64%). However, while Smart TV connection rates are rising, they will continue to lag the connection rates of games consoles and media streaming devices (such as Apple TV and Roku).  
 
With their long lifecycles, TVs are simply not the right device to be the hub of the digital home. Instead devices that are regularly replaced, including smartphones, tablets, set-top boxes, media streamers and...