Top mid-market software productsG2 Crowd, an online platform hosting more than 100,000 user reviews, has shared its list of top mid-market software products as rated by users of such tools based on how much they like the software and would recommend it to others. While you might be familiar with some of the products on this list, you won’t find much in the way from the highest profile software companies, such as Microsoft and Salesforce.com. “Like the majority of smaller organizations, mid-market companies [51 to 1,000 employees] require software products that are sophisticated but not too pricey, and also easy to use,” says Michael Fauscette, chief research officer at G2 Crowd.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Top mid-market software productsG2 Crowd, an online platform hosting more than 100,000 user reviews, has shared its list of top mid-market software products as rated by users of such tools based on how much they like the software and would recommend it to others. While you might be familiar with some of the products on this list, you won’t find much in the way from the highest profile software companies, such as Microsoft and Salesforce.com. “Like the majority of smaller organizations, mid-market companies [51 to 1,000 employees] require software products that are sophisticated but not too pricey, and also easy to use,” says Michael Fauscette, chief research officer at G2 Crowd.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
File this under: What took you so long, Instagram?I can't tell you the number of times I've attempted to zoom in on one of my crummy Instagram photos, hoping I might see better detail than I usually capture in my faraway shots. Now Instagram has enabled pinching and zooming of not just photos, but videos, for those with iPhones and other iOS devices. And I checked: It works with existing photos and videos, not just ones created from here on."Starting today, you can pinch to zoom on photos and videos in feed, on profiles and on Explore. Dive into an adorable puppy’s smile or into every detail of your friend’s new shirt," Instagram proclaims.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Industry watcher CB Insights earlier this month showed that venture capital funding of internet of things companies is actually on the decline after years of growth. But we've still seen enough fresh funding in the months since we rounded up 10 Internet of Things companies to watch back in April, to justify doing this follow-up with 7 additional firms, most of them startups.As always, we’ve narrowed down our list -- which is not intended to be all-inclusive -- by restricting it to those vendors that have announced venture funding over the past few months and that have an enterprise focus.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Industry watcher CB Insights earlier this month showed that venture capital funding of internet of things companies is actually on the decline after years of growth. But we've still seen enough fresh funding in the months since we rounded up 10 Internet of Things companies to watch back in April, to justify doing this follow-up with 7 additional firms, most of them startups.As always, we’ve narrowed down our list -- which is not intended to be all-inclusive -- by restricting it to those vendors that have announced venture funding over the past few months and that have an enterprise focus.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Apple watchers at Japan's Mac Otokara website affirm based on "reliable sources," that Apple indeed will call its upcoming smartphones the iPhone 7 and 7 Plus, passing on a possible iPhone 7 Pro.
There have been rumors that Apple would deliver three new phones in September, with the iPhone 7 Pro featuring a dual-lens camera. It appears now that Apple will stick with two new phones, including the dual-lens camera in the iPhone 7 Plus.
MORE: Best iPhone 7 Design Concepts of 2016To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
With Apple expected to announce the iPhone 7 as soon as Sept. 7, the last thing the company needs is people pining for more than the company is going to deliver. But when an iPhone 8 design concept goes online, what's a fanboy or fangirl supposed to do?ConceptsiPhone has posted a video on YouTube that mashes together items from the universal iPhone wish list -- items not likely to be found in this year's new iPhones. Conventional wisdom is that Apple wants to make a big splash next year to mark the iPhone's 10th anniversary (I can only imagine how long that press event is going to be, with recent ones clocking in at around 2 hours).To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
With Apple expected to announce the iPhone 7 on Sept. 7, time is running short to squeeze in fresh rumors about the next magical smartphone, which is expected to boast a more powerful processor, more storage, better camera technology and improved water resistance. But have no fear, as such speculation is indeed swirling.Holes in this iPhone 7 story
On Friday, bloggers hopped on a report from France’s Nowhereelse website, which shared a schematic supposedly from an Apple partner in China that shows an iPhone 7 possibly outfitted with a microphone rather than the 3.5mm headphone jack that is rumored to be disappearing. AppleInsider posted the headline: “Alleged ‘iPhone 7’ schematics hint at mic instead of second speaker.”To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Apple’s acquisition this past week of Turi, a Seattle machine learning company that has its roots in the open source GraphLab project, brings to six the number of deals Apple has made this year that have gone public. So while Apple’s $2.5 billion in R&D spending during its recently completed second quarter represented a 25% increase over the year-ago period and indicates that Apple is building plenty of futuristic technology in-house, the company continues to buy startups at roughly the same pace it has for the past three years, during which it has snapped up 9 to 15 businesses annually – at least that we know about.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Apple’s acquisition this past week of Turi, a Seattle machine learning company that has its roots in the open source GraphLab project, brings to six the number of deals Apple has made this year that have gone public. So while Apple’s $2.5 billion in R&D spending during its recently completed second quarter represented a 25% increase over the year-ago period and indicates that Apple is building plenty of futuristic technology in-house, the company continues to buy startups at roughly the same pace it has for the past three years, during which it has snapped up 9 to 15 businesses annually – at least that we know about.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Black Hat & Def Con provided plenty of fodder for our new installment of Bugs & Bugs, as seen in our Facebook Live stream on the latest news about computer bugs and real insects.Network World's Bob Brown and Tim Greene discussed, as you can see in the saved edition of the video below, new research that shows affluent communities tend to attract more different species of insects and other arthropods -- and that's a good thing. We also explored the DARPA Cyber Grand Challenge that took place in Las Vegas on the eve of Def Con and resulted in a $2M first prize for the grand winner of this computer-on-computer Capture the Flag contest.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Black Hat & Def Con provided plenty of fodder for our new installment of Bugs & Bugs, as seen in our Facebook Live stream on the latest news about computer bugs and real insects.Network World's Bob Brown and Tim Greene discussed, as you can see in the saved edition of the video below, new research that shows affluent communities tend to attract more different species of insects and other arthropods -- and that's a good thing. We also explored the DARPA Cyber Grand Challenge that took place in Las Vegas on the eve of Def Con and resulted in a $2M first prize for the grand winner of this computer-on-computer Capture the Flag contest.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
It's for times like this that you really wish Apple would waterproof its iPads (and iPhones). Don't be surprised if a competitor works out something with the video creator here to use this footage of a dolphin snagging a women's iPad at SeaWorld Orlando in a marketing campaign...
In case you didn't know, animals have quite a long track record of playing with iPads. This includes everything from penguins...to cats...To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
While some are focused on threats to IT security posed by coming quantum computers, the National Science Foundation is putting $12 million into developing quantum technologies designed to protect data traversing fiber-optic networks.
The NSF will support six interdisciplinary teams consisting of 26 researchers at 15 institutions to perform fundamental research under the Advancing Communication Quantum Information Research in Engineering (ACQUIRE) area within the NSF Directorate for Engineering's Emerging Frontiers in Research and Innovation (EFRI) program. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
While some are focused on threats to IT security posed by coming quantum computers, the National Science Foundation is putting $12 million into developing quantum technologies designed to protect data traversing fiber-optic networks.
The NSF will support six interdisciplinary teams consisting of 26 researchers at 15 institutions to perform fundamental research under the Advancing Communication Quantum Information Research in Engineering (ACQUIRE) area within the NSF Directorate for Engineering's Emerging Frontiers in Research and Innovation (EFRI) program. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Google Chief Education Evangelist Jaime Casap’s oldest daughter scored a full ride to college on a swimming scholarship but she only lasted one semester out of frustration with the lack of technology at the school. She had been used to taking notes on her laptop in high school, for example, but was told she couldn’t bring her device into the college classroom. “I’ve been in education for 10 years and I remember talking to CIOs at universities saying technology is not a differentiator for their schools…that students don’t pick schools based on their technology,” says Casap, an adjunct lecturer in innovation at Arizona State University, where his daughter wound up attending and graduating from. “I can tell you that’s starting to change.”To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
You can find plenty of examples of sustainability on a quick spin around Wellesley College in suburban Boston, where solar panels shimmer above the athletic fields and Wells on Wheels supply water in an effort to dissuade disposable bottled water use. But when Wellesley College CIO Ravi Ravishanker blogged this past week about the "Creative (Re)Uses of Technologies," he focused less on environmental green and more on maximizing the green spent on various technologies.Ravishanker touted, for example, his team's resourcefulness in finding fresh uses for a drone acquired for teaching and learning -- and in fact, it was used by a college research team to film archeological sites in Greece. But since then, the drone has also been employed to map the school's Nehoiden golf course, and plans are to post the data online and maybe even work in some virtual reality technology to let people play a round remotely.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Dallas Cowboys running back Darren McFadden nearly worked his way into our next big list of real life ways people have been hurt using their phones.McFadden broke his elbow over Memorial Day weekend and his coach initially told the media that it happened when the running back attempted to catch a falling iPhone. That fit right in with injuries we came across when digging through a recent batch of U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission data, collected from about 100 hospitals reporting emergency room visits into the National Electronic Injury Surveillance System. We discovered lots of trips and falls, not to mention a few animal bites allegedly caused by ringing phones startling the pets.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
A new video might give a sneak peek at what listening to content on your iPhone 7 will be like if Apple indeed nixes the traditional 3.5mm headphone jack in its next smartphone.Speculation has been rampant this year that Apple is planning to do away with the 3.5mm headphone jack in an effort to slim down its smartphone and perhaps take more control over audio accessories by having its proprietary Lightning connector take over. In fact, a video that surfaced last week features a Lightning-to-3.5mm jack dongle to take the edge off for some users.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
The FCC and TP-Link have agreed to a creative settlement that slaps the home and SMB Wi-Fi router maker with a $200K fine for violating wireless emission rules, but also requires the vendor to work with the open source community and chipset makers to allow modification of TP-Link devices.“The Commission’s equipment rules strike a careful balance of spurring innovation while protecting against harmful interference,” said Travis LeBlanc, Chief of the Enforcement Bureau, in a statement. “While manufacturers of Wi-Fi routers must ensure reasonable safeguards to protect radio parameters, users are otherwise free to customize their routers and we support TP-Link’s commitment to work with the open-source community and Wi-Fi chipset manufacturers to enable third-party firmware on TP-Link routers.”To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Bob Brown