lunes, 17 de diciembre de 2012

From MakeUseOf: Practical Tips To Protect Your Smartphone From Theft


protect smartphone from theftWhere’s your smartphone right now? In your pocket? On your desk, perhaps?
Or did you leave it in your handbag or your car?
Are you even certain that it’s still there…?
Considering the cost of a new smartphone, most of us are extremely casual about how we treat them. I know one lady who has lost or broken three iPhones, and at least one of those was left on a table in a busy London pub before mysteriously vanishing.
But keeping tabs on your smartphone isn’t difficult. Keeping it safe from the possibility of theft is even simpler.
The following practical tips should explain exactly where you have been going wrong. You need never worry about a lost phone again!

Basic Smartphone Safety

Before proceeding, there are a number of basics that you should be aware of.
To begin with, you should install an app that provides a means of finding your phone if stolen. There is the Find My Phone app for iPhone and Android, while Windows Phone 8 comes with the service as part of the OS. These apps can be used to remotely lock and wipe the phone, and can prove useful in tracking the thief.
In addition to this, you should set a lock screen password on your phone that isn’t an obvious PIN (e.g., not 0000, 1234, 8520, 0258, etc.).
You should also consider whether you need insurance. This is an important point – there is a chance that the buffer of insurance might cause you to take unnecessary risks with your smartphone. Be aware, too, that even if your phone is stolen and locked by your network provider it can still be used to browse the web, play games and download apps thanks to a wireless connection. You should, therefore, take steps to cancel the phone or your account with the appropriate app store.
(It’s also worth mentioning that a network-locked phone can still make Skype calls via Wi-Fi.)

Thief Spots Phone: Will He Manage to Steal It?

There are several ways in which a criminal will attempt to steal a phone.
First of all, of course, he or she will need to spot the device. This might be easy, or it might be tough, depending on you.
For instance, if you have just left an Apple store or a popular mobile phone chain carrying branded bag with a box in it, the chances are that you’ve just bought a new smartphone.
A device that is brand new in its box and inactivated is like alchemy to thieves. Your best bet is to place your bag into another (larger and unbranded) or take the phone out of the box and place it in an inside pocket.
protect smartphone from theft
Other ways a thief might spot a smartphone is if you leave phone chargers, headphones or even docks and windscreen mounts visible in your car. You should always take the time to place these items in your glove compartment while not in use.
Finally, consider your headphones. Particular companies such as Apple and Nokia ship their smartphones with distinctive headphones. Meanwhile, even the presence of expensive alternatives can betray the presence of a piece of equipment worth stealing.

Avoiding the Advances of a Thief

Of course, a thief is unlikely to walk straight up to you and steal your phone in most cases (unless you leave it on a “plate” so to speak, such as on the table in a bar or restaurant).
Many street criminals will come up with some sort of rationale for approaching you – before running off with your smartphone.
Keeping your phone out of sight is the first step to avoiding theft. Sadly, it isn’t as simple as that. Once a thief has “clocked” you as someone who owns a smartphone that they might like to steal, they will try and distract you. This can be done in the following ways:
prevent smartphone theft
  • They might ask you for the time: your natural response will be to look away from them, giving them the chance to take your phone. If you take your phone out to check the time, this will give an opportunity for them to steal it. You’ll also be stood still, making yourself an easy target for a thief to mug you. If someone asks for the time, tell them you don’t know, or make it up.
  • You might be approached on a bus or train. Crowded subway trains are a common hunting ground for thieves, where they can easily grab a phone as they disembark – before you get a chance to react, the doors are closed and the thief has made off. Stay aware of your surroundings and situations, don’t hunch up and look down at your phone and – best advice – keep your phone out of sight in such a scenario. You should also avoid using your back pocket to hold your phone – always use an inside breast pocket and keep your coat or jacket fastened. Don’t forget to obscure your smartphone model and design with a case.
  • Finally, be aware of methods used to distract you in the street, and how to deal with them.
    • If a stranger approaches you (from front, side or behind), keep walking, regardless of whether you are wearing headphones or not.
    • Keep looking straight ahead – don’t hang your head or hunch up.
    • Ensure your phone is out of reach.
    • You might also consider ducking into the nearest shop.
protect smartphone from theft

Conclusion: Keep It Safe Out Of Sight!

Now, the last thing anyone wants is for you to run away from MakeUseOf scared and afraid to set foot outside. It’s not often we give a dose of hard edged reality among the digital fun here, but stolen phones is a massive black market, and network locks and Find My Phone and similar apps don’t put an end to this.
The onus is on you to make sure your phone is kept safe, out of sight of thieves. Don’t give them a clue that you have one, or a chance to take it from you.

jueves, 13 de diciembre de 2012

Extreme Franchising: Bringing RadioShack to Afghanistan


This Week's Top Story - Extreme Franchising: Bringing RadioShack to Afghanistan

Franchising is one of many tools for small business people. 


This week, we have this article from BusinessWeek:



Extreme Franchising: Bringing RadioShack to Afghanistan


By  on December 07, 2012
 
The next time you stroll through downtown Kabul, you might be able to buy batteries from a RadioShack (RSH)outlet, the result of a new effort by the U.S. to shore up Afghanistan’s economy: selling American franchises to Afghan entrepreneurs.
The U.S. has set a 2014 deadline for troops to withdraw from Afghanistan and turn security over to Afghan military and police. That is prompting capital flight, depressing property values, and triggering other economic pain. That’s where franchising might fit—and an initial foray into the country proved promising, U.S. executives say.
“I didn’t have huge expectations going there that we would consummate an agreement, but after being there on the streets and seeing some fairly sophisticated [retail] operators in a very difficult climate, I’ve walked away with the fact that we would do business in Afghanistan,” says Martin Amschler, a RadioShack vice president who joined several American franchise executives to participate in a five-day matchmaking event in Kabul this week.
Organized by the U.S. Department of Commerce, the U.S. Agency for International Development, and the International Franchise Association (IFA), the event gave franchising brass a chance to explore the market and meet with Afghan businessmen and U.S. and Afghan officials. Outside of mostly fast-food chains on bases, there aren’t any American franchises in Afghanistan, says Beth Solomon, a vice president at the IFA who led the trip. “There is a vast culture of young [Afghans] who are very tech savvy, Internet savvy. Everyone’s got the latest Samsung or iPhone,” she says, “and there is disposable income.”
The big idea behind the effort is the “knowledge transfer” of infrastructure-building and business services expertise to locals to help rebuild the country, says Solomon, who recruited participants from RadioShack, Hertz Equipment Rental (HTZ)Tutor Doctor, andAlphaGraphics. “Franchising can be a very useful transitional economic development strategy, because the challenges of security and so forth can be minimized because it’s Afghan business leaders who are going to run these businesses,” says Solomon.
Of course, with more than one-third of Afghanistan’s 30 million people living below the poverty line, according to the CIA’s World Fact Book, much of the population can’t afford to buy an American franchise.
Bill Edwards, a seasoned franchising consultant who specializes in exporting American franchise brands such as Build-A-Bear Workshop (BBW) and Denny’s (DENN), and was on the trip for AlphaGraphics, doesn’t see a lack of Afghan investors. “There’s a lot of money there” willing to invest in American franchises, Edwards says. “There’s a need for Western business. There’s a market, there’s consumers, there’s funding, there’s capital. But there’s all the other challenges, of course.”
Apart from security, the biggest challenge would be vetting prospective buyers, says RadioShack’s Amschler. “But at the end of the day there are private contractors over there today that provide those services … and then, of course, we would have our own list of requirements in terms of net worth and what types of business experience they have,” he says.
Approved Afghan buyers would attend RadioShack University at corporate headquarters in Fort Worth and get “support on the ground” from RadioShack employees for about two weeks when a store opens, plus training visits throughout the year, Amschler says.
Among other efforts to stabilize Afghanistan’s economy, how significant could franchising be? A statement from the Commerce Department’s International Trade Administration about the conference notes “franchising has proven to be an ideal market vehicle for both employment and economic growth.” Edwards says he thinks franchising is “the model” because “it brings a business model that’s proven. It brings training, which is the thing they need; the skill set is just really not good there.”
Education is crucial to Afghanistan, says Rogelio Martinez, vice president of international franchise development at 30-employee Tutor Doctor, a “supplementary education” business that has sold about 400 franchises in 14 countries. “It’s something that everybody was talking about. [Afghan] business owners wanted to develop Afghan employees to take mid-level, senior-level management positions. Families want their kids to learn and attend good universities in Afghanistan or abroad.”
The Van Nuys (Calif.) company, which Martinez says charges franchisees about $57,000 to get started, provides training and an online tool that uses a Skype-like interface for tutors and students to communicate online. He expects to sell about seven franchises in Afghanistan in 2013. “They can’t be importing expats all the time; they need to have the local talent to have a sustainable model,” says Martinez.
David Riker, franchise development director for Hertz, is also optimistic about his company’s prospects in Afghanistan. Unlike fellow participants on the Kabul trip, he already has franchises on two military bases there, renting heavy machinery used in building roads and construction projects. “As the military draws down, Afghanistan is going to have to support more of its infrastructure, so that’s where the opportunity comes in,” Riker says. Depending on what kind of equipment a franchise buyer wants, getting started is “probably in the $3 million range.”
Aiding Afghanistan through franchising certainly won’t be quick, says Edwards. “Let’s not be too Pollyannaish. This is going to be a challenge, but it’s definitely an opportunity.”
Leiber is Small Business editor for Businessweek.com, Entrepreneurs editor for Bloomberg.com, and covers small business for Bloomberg Businessweek.

BusinessWeek's Technology Insider: Computers Apple's Cook Says More Macs Will Be Born in the U.S.A.


Apple's Cook Says More Macs Will Be Born in the U.S.A.In his exclusive interview with Bloomberg Businessweek—on newsstands now—Apple Chief Executive Tim Cook announced that starting next year, Apple will be bringing some of the production of its Mac computers back to the U.S. “We’re really proud of it,” he said. “We could have quickly maybe done just assembly, but it’s broader, because we wanted to do something more substantial. So we’ll literally invest over $100 million.”

The sum of $100 million is slightly more than 1100 of the company’s profits last quarter, so the announcement was dismissed in some quarters as a publicity ploy. It’s very possible that’s all it is. On the other hand, the relatively small size of the initial investment doesn’t mean the company isn’t taking the effort seriously. It’s possible that it’s an experiment, a small pilot program exploring whether the company can profitably and reliably make its products in the U.S. And if any tech company could make it work, it’s Apple (AAPL).
Labor costs make up a fairly small sliver of the cost of an Apple product. Still, according to Blake Johnson, a manufacturing and supply chain expert at Stanford University, Apple is not simply going to replace $2.50-an-hour labor in Shenzhen with $15-an-hour American workers. Instead, the plan is most likely to shift to more automated manufacturing, an approach that Johnson points out makes particular sense for Apple. Whereas Dell (DELL) dominated the PC market a decade ago by offering customized computers, Apple grew into the largest company in the world by selling a limited suite of products: iPhones, iPhones, iPods, and Macs. “Apple’s product line is highly standardized, with a very small number of products and very few configurations, and that makes it much easier to do automation,” Johnson says. There’s some precedent for this in the company’s DNA: NeXT, the company Steve Jobs founded after being fired as Apple’s CEO in 1985, built its workstation computers in a robo-factory in Fremont, Calif.
One measure of how serious Apple is about the venture is how the company will define “manufacture.” The final assembly of a Mac is the least complicated part of producing it—it’s largely just plugging things into each other. But in his interview, Cook emphasized that Apple was planning to do “something more substantial” than that. If the company, for example, is going to push to have more of its components made in the U.S., that would be a big deal—and a serious challenge. One of the reasons tech CEOs give for why they don’t do more of their manufacturing here is that, in the years since that work left and went to Asia, the network of American component makers that used to supply the domestic electronics market has dried up. In other words, it’s not just iPads that are made abroad, but all the parts that go into them, too.
There is, however, some historical precedent for rejuvenating such a network. When Japanese car companies started building cars in the U.S., they were leery of using American-built components in their cars, assuming that they wouldn’t meet higher Japanese standards. That attitude has changed over the years—this year the website cars.com declared that the America-built car with the highest proportion of American-made parts was the Toyota (TM) Camry.
Bennett is a staff writer for Bloomberg Businessweek in New York.


















E N M I O P I N I O N: Por: Ricardo Tribin Acosta


Cuando la verdad se siente

“Una mentira no tendría ningún sentido a menos que sintiéramos la verdad como algo peligroso”. Esta frase de Alfred Adler me parece un poco atrevida puesto que implica que, al confrontar la veracidad de algo, quizás pueda generar consecuencias negativas para quien así lo hace. Sin embargo esto no se aleja para nada de la realidad. Cuantas veces las personas callan cuando saben algo por temor a que el mundo se les venga encima? O quizás en ciertas situaciones es mejor no expresar todo lo que se ve, precisamente para evitar causar heridas irreparables en la otra parte?.

La verdad se siente cuando se visualiza y da la sensación de que atraganta a quien la tiene guardada. La verdad es cristalina y siempre genera estados de conciencia, aunque en ocasiones toque guardarla o confesarla mejor a otra persona que al mismo implicado en determinada situación. Sin embargo no hay nada más grande que vivir en ella, puesto que la verdad es quizás el componente más importante de la humildad de un ser humano y la que al final primará por encima de la mentira real o piadosa, como algunos la excusan.

http://ricardotribin.blogspot.com

Miami, Diciembre 12 de 2012 

lunes, 10 de diciembre de 2012

America's 50 Best Cities...from Bloomberg BusinessWeek

It's a long story. How math and statistics do not have a proper link with taste and personal preferences. Researchers have done a lot of work making "the perfect diet" with balanced elements, minimum costs and convenience to store. But no one ever liked it. Taste and preferences are unique, coming from the deeper feelings, habits, culture and many other unmeasurable factors, But data is always important because is the only thing we use without controversy... So we bring to you this exercise from Bloomberg BusinessWeek. This is the second time we bring it to our followers, as a tool to compare with our cities... 


The Best Places to Live
It's impossible to say what's "best" for everyone, of course. But where's the fun in not trying? Welcome to Businessweek.com’s second America’s Best Cities ranking. With assistance from Bloomberg Rankings, Businessweek.com evaluated 100 of the country’s largest cities based on leisure attributes (the number of restaurants, bars, libraries, museums, professional sports teams, and park acres by population); educational attributes (public school performance, the number of colleges, and graduate degree holders), economic factors (2011 income and June and July 2012 unemployment), crime, and air quality. Major professional league and minor league teams, as well as U.S.-based teams belonging to international leagues in that city were included. The greatest weighting was placed on leisure amenities, followed by educational metrics and economic metrics, and then crime and air quality. The data come from Onboard Informatics, except for park acreage, which comes from the Trust for Public Land. As the methodology has changed since the 2011 ranking, a city’s rise or fall compared with last year does not suggest that it has gotten “better” or “worse.”

Los Angeles
Rank: 50
Population: 3,811,518

Anchorage, Alaska
Rank: 49
Population: 297,018

Omaha

Rank: 48
Population: 416,855

St. Louis

Rank: 47
Population: 304,219

Cleveland

Rank: 46
Population: 396,441

Chesapeake, Virginia

Rank: 45
Population: 223,454

Phoenix

Rank: 44
Population: 1,418,687

Scottsdale, Arizona

Rank: 43
Population: 214,770

Reno, Nevada

Rank: 42
Population: 225,561

Dallas

Rank: 41
Population: 1,199,739

Virginia Beach

Rank: 40
Population: 438,243

Charlotte

Rank: 39
Population: 745,596

Tulsa

Rank: 38
Population: 395,176

Indianapolis

Rank: 37
Population: 831,943

Colorado Springs

Rank: 36
Population: 421,350

Tampa

Rank: 34 (tie)
Population: 340,509

Lincoln, Nebraska

Rank: 34 (tie)
Population: 259,06

San Jose

Rank: 33
Population: 956,368

Rochester, New York

Rank: 32
Population: 213,178

Oakland, California

Rank: 31
Population: 401,036

San Antonio

Rank: 30
Population: 1,365,256

Baltimore

Rank: 29
Population: 612,701

Chicago

Rank: 28
Population: 2,679,998

Arlington, Virginia

Rank: 27
Population: 208,143

Milwaukee

Rank: 26
Population: 593,545

Lexington, Kentucky

Rank: 25
Population: 299,520

Philadelphia

Rank: 24
Population: 1,522,648

Oklahoma City

Rank: 23
Population: 588,053

Houston

Rank: 22
Population: 2,131,940

Cincinnati

Rank: 21
Population: 292,050

Columbus, Ohio

Rank: 20
Population: 796,520

Honolulu

Rank: 19
Population: 399,124

Raleigh, North Carolina

Rank: 18
Population: 405,462

Madison

Rank: 17
Population: 231,999

Atlanta

Rank: 16
Population: 410,60

Kansas City, Missouri

Rank: 15
Population: 458,064

New Orleans

Rank: 14
Population: 349,773

Nashville

Rank: 13
Population: 603,394

Minneapolis

Rank: 12
Population: 388,229

Pittsburgh

Rank: 11
Population: 308,090

St. Paul, Minnesota

Rank: 10
Population: 288,263

San Diego, California

Rank: 9
Population: 1,319,558

Austin

Rank: 8
Population: 797,215

New York

Rank: 7
Population: 8,110,206

Denver

Rank: 6
Population: 597,466

Portland, Oregon

Rank: 5
Population: 598,205

Boston

Rank: 4
Population: 615,462

Washington, D.C.

Rank: 3
Population: 607,731

Seattle

Rank: 2
Population: 624,070

San Francisco

Rank: 1
Population: 808,854



jueves, 6 de diciembre de 2012

E N M I O P I N I O N: Por: Ricardo Tribin Acosta


" Cuando Estás Arriba"

“Amigo cuanto tienes cuanto vales, principio de la actual filosofía”, es el aparte de una bella canción colombiana llamada “Oropel“ que tanto hemos oído los amantes de tan bella música y que, al estrellarse con la realidad, dice muchísimo de cierto. Es una realidad viviente aunque a veces la negación no nos la deje ver en su verdadera magnitud, tal y como se pueden mirar las líneas en la Geometría Descriptiva.

Alguien comentaba lo siguiente: “Cuándo estás arriba, tus amigos saben quién eres tú. Cuando estás abajo, tú te enterarás quiénes son ellos”, lo cual corrobora aquello de que los sinceros amigos tan solo pueden contarse con los dedos de la mano y a veces ni dedos hay para ello, puesto que más de uno se lleva la sorpresa de que muchos de los que los rodean y “aprecian”, lo hacen más que todo, no tanto a la persona en sí misma, sino a lo que a su entorno posee.

De lo anterior diríamos que lo mejor a concluir es el no esperar nada de nadie, mucho menos en los terrenos de la amistad, ya que cuando esta es necesitada surgirá libremente, sin necesidad de invocarla, e incluso proveniente de personas que ni nos imaginamos puedan ser amigos de verdad.

http://ricardotribin.blogspot.com

Miami, Diciembre 4 de 2012.