Creativity

What does it take to write well? If you are a major in English, the only thing that you could realistically do for a decent paycheck is be a English teacher. But alas if your passion really is writing you should be able to enjoy it no matter the anguish and the blocks. Think of writing as a game and if you are stuck on a level, there are things called cheat codes. One of the techniques to start at the very end or at the very exciting part and work from there. Another way to get rid of the writers block is to bring elements into the story from a completely different genre and see how the characters deal with it. Lastly, one of the best things that you can do is take advantage of any some of communication services or social networks to bounce some ideas off of people. Any other ideas to combat the treacherous void where great words should be written?

GPS on Windshield

The next time when you look at your new car's windshield, you might see a whole view of maps and directions. Personally, I would find that really distracting but Garmin will choose to ignore that opinion and forge ahead with a product that will beam GPS information up on the windshield, as if having the GPS right there has not been enough. They believe that it would help with distractions because in California, potentially a big market for Garmin products, recently ruled that using GPS or mapping functions on a handheld is a moving violation, the same as texting or another communication service. What are your thoughts on the new trend in GPS tech?

Yota Phone

New and innovative smartphones are hard to find considering that most American companies have the market cornered. One of the more interesting phones at the CES is the YotaPhone. The YotaPhone’s main attraction is a 4.3-inch E-Ink display that sits on the phone’s curved backside. The E-Ink screen allows users to keep certain types of information in view, such as the time, notifications or a photo, without draining battery life. Would a secondary screen be that much more useful on a phone. If we are talking about a laptop, more people are using dual screens. One of the advantages that is mentioned in the presentation is that it will keep us away from our phones. If YotaPhone users can get accustomed to leaving their phones on a table or desk, with the E-Ink display facing up, they’ll be able to keep an eye on notifications without having to pick up the phone and fiddle with it. Also users are able to take a screen shot of anything on the main screen and send it to the E-Ink screen. This phone actually opens up the playing arena for mobile application development as well. Although Yota Devices isn’t known as a big smartphone brand, the company wants to launch the YotaPhone all over the world, including the United States.

Bring Your Own Device

BYOD (bring your own device) was one of the biggest trends seen in business during 2012, and its influence on the modern workplace is set to grow this year thanks to the roll out of 4G. This was also helped by the advancements in VoIP systems where the calls could be routed to any device. It also enables the employees to use their computers to make and receive the calls. 4G speeds also make internet phones have better quality meaning that there is no latency and the security can be greatly improved. The speed of 4G will encourage users to access devices more often and make it easier to work remotely. This will ultimately pressure businesses to enable employees to access their corporate desktops from anywhere and thereby hasten adoption of desktop virtualization. Even in software developing companies, more people are using their own devices because of the mobility and it has their own settings and preferences.

VoIP Fraud and Hacking

The prevalence of Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) fraud has been on the rise, with some high-profile cases bringing the subject matter into greater focus for IT decision makers. VoIP fraud often results in thousands of dollars lost for companies dealing with this theft. In fact, a single fraud event can cost VoIP providers between $5,000 and $50,000, and this is usually borne by the provider because customers refuse to pay the charges that come from such theft. And a study by one fraud management company estimated that some telcos are losing upwards of $150 million a year due to VoIP fraud. One of the reasons for the fraud is that the phone service is not secured enough over the internet. Also, since the virtual phones are on the network, the hacker would in theory have the ability to get to the network through the internet phones and get sensitive data. To address these problems, there are some solutions such as the fraud detection module from TransNexus.

Pros and Cons of Virtual Phones

Thanks to virtual phone services, business today has an expanding set of tools for communicating with, and providing services for, business and residential customers. These new tools for enhanced engagement are enabled and augmented by the robust abilities of VoIP. Mobile devices in conjunction with social media are creating new channels for marketing communications. VoIP, traditionally offering more and costing less, is helping fuel the growth in UC (unified communications) spending, as the business market for VoIP and virtual phone solutions rapidly grows. Of course, there are other things to to consider when thinking about going with IP telephony. Some of the risks are that the systems are not completely secure and vulnerable to viruses or hacking. Cloud services also have the propensity to go offline. Case and point, the Amazon cloud on Christmas. On the plus side, there are features such as toll free business phone numbers, VoIP apps, as well as the ability to hold virtual meetings.

Going Mobile With Your Business

Even though this might be the age of mobile devices and mobile application development, there are some questions that you need to consider. While IT cannot fully control how employees use their personal mobile devices, you certainly have control over gets mobility for work-sanctioned activities. The path of least resistance is to do the same for everyone, but this will be unnecessarily expensive and time-consuming to manage. Instead, you should map out the workflows of various roles to determine which types of employees would really benefit. For example, some home-based employees will be more productive this way, but others will not, such as contact center agents. They may work offsite, but chances are that their landline and Web-based tools will be perfectly adequate. This approach will improve the way you run your business and more internet phone providers give you the tools to be able to track how the number is used. You will have full control and be able to manage it better.