Daily Archives: August 13, 2017

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Trump Administration to Begin Probe of Alleged Chinese Technology Theft Wall Street Journal (subscription) WASHINGTONThe Trump administration announced plans Saturday to pressure China over alleged intellectual property theft, adding the threat of trade retaliation to an ongoing campaign seeking greater cooperation from Beijing in the North Korean ... Trump Administration to Launch Probe of Alleged Chinese Technology Theft -- UpdateFox Business all 82 news articles »

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Trump Administration to Begin Probe of Alleged Chinese Technology Theft - Wall Street Journal (subscription)

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Victoria wants to explore the world with her imaginary cat. She hopes that she can contribute to the movement of world peace while attaining the meaning of why? When shes not studying (which is most of the time), she can be found singing, cooking edible food, and wondering why she isnt studying.

Victoria is the founder of Cering,a technology company focused on the empowerment and safety of women. Ceringsgoal is to help women all over the world feel safer with wearable technology that is integrated into day-to-day personal accessories for your convenience.

Scott Douglas Jacobsen:How did you become involved in the technology field?

Victoria Teo: I never really planned to become involved with technology, actually! However, its so prevalent in the world today that its inevitable that all of us will get involved with technology in some way or another. I started Cering during a local pitch competition, which I had joined two days before the actual event. I was in theYoung Entrepreneur Leadership Launchpad (YELL) programat the time, so my team endorsed the idea after the pitch competition, and we ended up winning the year-end Dragons Den-style Venture Challenge with Cering. From there, we decided to continue pursuing our business.

Jacobsen: How did you begin to develop a new interest in sustainability?

Teo: I waspart of theMetro Vancouver Sustainability Toolbox (MVST) program, which soughtlike-minded youth leaders who shared a passion for sustainability from all over Metro Vancouver together. Participating in this program connected me to so many amazing youth and community partners within Metro Vancouver, and inspired me to lead theLove Food, Hate Waste Campaign, which included a workshop series, in my school. I am excited to see where my journey in sustainability takes me!

Jacobsen: Theres an unacknowledged form of activism. Some might think of protests, letters, petitions, and community organizing when they think ofactivism. However,there are other types, too. Entrepreneurship geared towards future technologies and sustainability is one. You founded Cering, a wearable technology company. What is the product and vision behind the company?

Teo: We are definitely a company that is focused on our social impact. Cering is founded on the belief that everyone has the right to security and to feel safe. It is a line of jewelry that when activated, alerts the local authorities and the wearers loved ones, and notifies them of the wearers location through the app on their phone. We are prototyping a sleek and discreet bracelet that will be activated with the touch of a button. With Cering, we hope to connect those who believe in our vision of a safer world with no fearwhere dreams can be made reality.

Jacobsen: You named the company after the Roman Goddess, Ceres. She rescues and protects vulnerable women. With the vision of Cering as womens empowerment and safety, how does the company assist in this?

Teo: Cering is creating the Cering Nationa community of people who support and believe in our vision of empowering women to pursue their aspirations and live a life with no fear. We recognize that safety is an alarming and relevant issue in the world today, as statistics show that up to one in three women will experience physical or sexual violence in their lives. Raising awareness and taking a stance for our beliefs is a core value of ours, and through this, we truly believe that Cering will positively impact womens safety and empowerment.

Jacobsen: Being a young entrepreneur, how does your lifestyle differ, e.g. in school, in business, and in extracurriculars, from those who arent currently as involved as you?

Teo: I enjoy a life filled with spontaneity, so its thrilling to be both a student in school and an aspiring professional going out to conferences, events, and coffee with role models that I look up to. Its definitely tough to balance scholarships and university applications, work, school, and all my other extracurriculars, and there are sacrifices to make, but its worth it because I genuinely love and am passionate about the work I do. Its interesting to wear multiple hats throughout a week and it can be exhausting, but its probably more fun than being just a student. I think that getting myself out there gives me this unleashed confidence and assurance in both myself and the future I have in the world outside of high school.

Jacobsen: You are the President of the Indian Umbrella branch in your high school as well. What are some the things you do for activism with them such as youth empowerment and developing country aid?

Teo: Indian Umbrellais a youth-founded non-profit organization that empowers Canadian youth to raise awareness and monetary aid for grassroots charities in India. I am passionate about developing country aid and interested in Indian cultures, so I am proud to have this opportunity as my branchs president! Through Indian Umbrella, I am focusing especially on inspiring and educating youth. I believe that it is important for todays youth to understand why they support a certain cause, so I am bringing in multiple guest speakers involved in non-profit workto shed a light on what supporting these causes mean beyond secondary school.

Jacobsen: People can communicate more easily with hardware like cell phones and software like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram and activism requires more rapid communication to organize and coordinate in the electronic era. Does this analysis seem correct to you?

Teo: Yes! It does. I am very lucky to live in an era where communication, organization, and planning is made easy through technology. I utilize all of the above softwares daily, and it is definitely an advantage that can be taken for granted. I do think that these benefits can go down two streets, though. Power must always be used responsibly, and can always be used for good as well asfoul intentions.

Jacobsen: Thank you for your time, Victoria.

Teo: It was a pleasure! Thank you for having me.

By Scott Douglas Jacobsen

* All views expressed in this interviewbelong to the interviewee and dont necessarily reflect the views of CYH.

Original publication on http://www.checkyourhead.org.

Photo Credit: Getty Images

Scott Douglas Jacobsen founded In-Sight Publishing and In-Sight: Independent Interview-Based Journal. He works as an Associate Editor and Contributor for Conatus News, Editor and Contributor to The Good Men Project, a Board Member, Executive International Committee (International Research and Project Management) Member, and as the Chair of Social Media for the Almas Jiwani Foundation, Executive Administrator and Writer for Trusted Clothes, and Councillor in the Athabasca University Students Union. He contributes to the Basic Income Earth Network, The Beam, Canadian Students for Sensible Drug Policy, Check Your Head, Conatus News, Humanist Voices, The Voice Magazine, and Trusted Clothes. If you want to contact Scott: [emailprotected]; website: http://www.in-sightjournal.com; Twitter: https://twitter.com/InSight_Journal.

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Victoria Teo, Technology Field, Sustainability, and the Roman Goddess - The Good Men Project (blog)

Imagining the future of blockchain technology is like trying to imagine Google and Facebook on the day the first web browser came out, said Hadley Stern, senior vice president at Fidelity Labs.

Stern is responsible for running Fidelity's bitcoin, blockchain and digital currency incubator. His research team has been experimenting with bitcoin because he said it is like "digital gold" and that "blockchain technology will change the world."

The corporation announced Wednesday that it started allowing clients to view bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies on its website, making it one of the few established institutions that have warmed up to cryptocurrencies.

"The big story is you can transfer value through software and software alone. This is a huge societal breakthrough," Stern said on CNBC's "Closing Bell."

And regardless of whether bitcoin will survive, it could be like the Napster of blockchain technology, Stern said, where it is the first of its kind but the next products, in this case Spotify and Apple Music, get better and better.

"I do think [cryptocurrencies] will make things, whether it's bitcoin or something else, faster and cheaper and create new products and services that we can't even imagine," Stern said.

While some critics are skeptical of how bitcoin is used, Stern said that banning the cryptocurrency would be like banning the web or open internet protocols.

"Whether governments like it or not, it's here to stay," he said.

Stern did emphasize though that Fidelity's move does not mean their clients can make bitcoin transactions through their corporation, saying "we're not necessarily making a judgment on bitcoin." It is just a way for clients to view their bitcoin balances alongside their accounts.

Bitcoin reached an all-time high of around $3,500 Friday, up more than 20 percent for the week.

Link:

'Blockchain technology will change the world': Fidelity Labs SVP - CNBC

These days, more often than not, typical migration projects mean moving applications or functions from an on-premises system to the cloud in some form or another. Migration has always been tough enough, requiring lots of pre-cutover planning and weekend work, coordinating a bunch of moving parts, as well as a lot of hand-holding for affected employees and executives. (Especially executives!)

Now, the direction of movement in many migrations is in the direction of the cloud, and despite all the talk of how simple and easy cloud makes things, it really doesn't make things any easier for the people overseeing the migration.

If anything, migration failures have seen a dramatic rise over the past few years, in line with the growing shift to cloud applications and services. A survey of 1,598 IT professionals, recently released by Vision Solutions, finds the incidence of "migration failure" rose 42% in the two most recent years the survey was conducted -- rising from from 36% of IT managers reporting failures in 2014, to 44% in 2015 and 51% in 2016.

So what gives? The cloud -- which gives everyone and anyone license to make their own IT messes -- has made things much more complicated, the survey's authors surmise. "Technology professionals are shaping and tiering the data center and want to make deliberate decisions about what software to move to the cloud," they state. "At the same time, business units maneuver around IT to gain more agile cloud-based applications, leaving companies vulnerable. But IT has to figure out the best way to inventory and manage these apps, rather than trying to root them out."

About 25% of professionals seem to be aware that business users run cloud applications outside the control of IT, while 33% admit they just don't know who uses what. Two-thirds of survey respondents now use cloud in one form or another, but managing these environments is still an inexact science. For example, IT professionals lack consensus about who is responsible for protecting data and applications in a public cloud, the survey finds. About 43% believe cloud providers are ultimately responsible, while 39% believe internal IT departments should be in charge.

At the same time, migrations -- cloud or no cloud -- have never, ever been easy. "Migrations often involve different types of hardware and software assets, planning, testing, staffing, and scheduling, so it's no surprise that they can fail," the survey's authors state.

The survey also finds largest companies (1,000 employees or more) were more likely to have experienced a migration failure (60%) versus 44% for all others. "No doubt, large organizations have more complex systems and are migrating many servers and databases, as well as applications," the survey's authors explain.

The biggest issues encountered with migrations include 44% reporting that their staffs had to work overtime (no surprise there!), coupled with system downtime (42%). How much downtime are we talking about here? The survey finds 83% of IT managers report having some degree of downtime due to a migration, and 58% reported migration downtime of an hour or more,.

Migrations often don't happen as planned, either. Two-thirds of the IT managers surveyed report they have had to postpone migrations, mainly due to concerns about downtime. The prospect of working overtime (read: weekends) also did not excite staff members for some strange reason. In fact, the majority of IT professionals worked an extra 25 hours or more during migration.

Of course, there are accompanying pains for the business, especially those still on outdated hardware and software: "performance degradation, operational inefficiencies, data loss, equipment failures or added costs as leases overlap," the survey's authors add.

The pain points cited in the survey include an inability to start applications on the new server in the required timeframe (60%), and a lack of testing resulted in late discovery of issues (39%).

"These findings indicate that the root causes of failed migration are likely poor, unrealistic planning and goal setting, and faulty testing procedures," the report's authors conclude. "While inadequate tools might account for some of these migration failures, it's clear that the human factor - including training and planning - plays a vital role." Organizations successful in their migration efforts "plans better, tests earlier, and has access to a migration tool that enables continuous uptime during migration."

And along with this advice, there's plain common sense: value everyone's feedback at all stages of the process, keep everyone in the loop and informed about what to expect, and commuincate how the new platform is going to improve their lives.

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Technology migrations are more painful, and cloud isn't making them any easier - ZDNet

I'm a sucker for the hopeful retro-futuristic vision for society brought to life in in Disney's 2015 sci-fi fantasy "Tomorrowland" (Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures). The movie is full of wild inventions, but the one I wanted for myself was the pin.

Our hero, teenager Casey Newton, touches a small pin -- a badge with the letter "T" (for Tomorrowland, of course) -- that instantly transports her to the secret society of scientists and inventors. In this world, jetpacks, androids and flying trains are just part of an average day. Only she can see this world when touching the pin, because the pin is programmed to her DNA.

Spoiler alert: She's not actually teleported to another place by touching it. The pin is essentially a perfect form of virtual reality, a pre-recorded advertisement that motivates her to find a real way into the world. It's the ultimate in entertainment: VR with no headset, no wires. No special room (I'm looking at you, Holodeck). You can be completely immersed in the sights and sounds of another world just through touch -- assuming you're cool with giving a company your DNA to program it for you.

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The fictitious movie technology we wish was real - CNET