Google is The Giant

It is obvious that Google is the giant in online world. They would never stay back because and they didn’t by introducing Google Buzz that was a big fail though. However, this year in 2011, they finally decided to give a tough competition to Facebook by introducing Google + project. A lot of people have already registered their accounts on Google + and they are using it. However, the question is; who will win the social media war between Facebook and Google +. This is really a tough question to ask but definitely there must and answer or any analysis to it. Below we will try to determine whether Google + can really beat Facebook in social media market or not?

Do Check: Google Plus Outs New Opportunities for the Business

How to Get Google +

I have been on Google + since its first week. The first time when I got registered on Google +, although I had to get an invitation by a friend of mine because open registration was not allowed at that time, I realized that Google + has really got some spark. The user interface of Google + was superb, neat, clean and awesome, I would say. However, your design doesn’t matter at all when you don’t have traffic on your website. I would not say that there is no traffic on Google + because I added more than 1000 people in my Google + circles in just 2 weeks and that too at such time when open registration was not allowed. Millions of people have already joined Google + but there is a little difference between migration from Orkut to Facebook and migration from Facebook to Google +.

Popularity of Google Plus

When I turned from Orkut to Facebook, I stopped using my Orkut account. It’s been more than a couple of years since I last opened my Orkut profile. However, this is not the case with migration from Facebook to Google +. People that are joining Google + are not actually migrating from Facebook but they are actually joining another social network. If you want to read more information regarding Google Plus Please Check Exclusive Information about Google +1

There was a rumor that Google + has more advanced features that will beat Facebook but recently, Facebook has brought so many improvements in its social network that have surpassed the features provided by Google +. SO, if Google + wants to win the battle of social media then they have to come up with something new and big. Otherwise, there is no way that Google + can beat Facebook at the moment.

Crystal J. Briscoe is from Self Test Engine. Looking for 70-680 exam help? Let’s take advantage of Self Test Engine self paced 70-573 training and pass your IT exams on first try.

What do you think about Google Plus? Please Give your feedback

The New Internet

The Internet is poised to expand by an order of magnitude or two over the next couple of years. In fact, it would be easy to predict that the Internet connected part of the population will exceed the non-internet connected. That is huge. The actual size of the Internet will increase beyond that with the massive demand for media that will be created. The Internet has to get bigger. IPv6 is the change in the structural framework of the Internet that will allow that expansion. Not only will it expand the address range from billions (now), to many trillions (soon), but it will also increase the domain name potentials.

Current IPv4 code allows four segments of its address code limiting the possible address space segmentation. IPv6 will increase that to eight segments. The world of simple “.com” is going away and is being replaced by TLDs like “.EXXON,” “.Detroit,” or “.Microsoft,” for example. Top-level domains will become what domain names used to be, the gateway or starting point for a corporation’s place on the web. Now, the gateway will be that corporation’s private Internet. Corporations will have their own Internet kill switch. In theory, you could have a vast number of possible domain names such as “.kids” or “.shopping,” and for each a major corporation would register its domain name, or face the one that did first. This could be a major expansion of the whole domain business, including squatting.

Rules Are Rules

Rules will be setup to combat the worst of the potential problems; however, those rules can only do so much and go so far. We will see cases of a major company having its primary “.COM” domain name registered as “COMPANY.PORN.” While this would not be good for sales or public relations, it would be good for the squatter that bought the domain. That squatter will gladly sell the domain name back to the corporation for a “small fee,” allowing the company to take it down without too much embarrassment.

This has been and will continue to be a problem, as in this world, everybody has his or her name on the Internet. There could be a new TLD called “.NAME” that would be reserved for personal web sites. Think of the boon to social networking. When you consider the vast growth in cloud computing, this would mean that every human being could have a website, and that is just a huge gain. Imagine all those people, while voiceless now, they are suddenly turned loose with a web server. Imagine an Internet driven by twice the eyeballs as now. Billions of devices, ads, and revenue potential. Yes, this is very big.

Will we see the end of Internet porn? No, we will not. In fact, pornographic numbers may just double in size, like the rest of the Internet. The real implications are found in the social changes. The effect of the Internet on political upheaval in 2011 alone is stark proof of what to expect. The power of voice should never be underestimated. Before your children graduate college, fully two thirds of the human race will be on the Internet, a part of the telecommunications network. That is a new heaven and a new earth.

1. Backup and recovery is the responsibility of the cloud services provider.

When a company uses cloud services as a means of backup and recovery for their files, the benefits are many-fold.

For one thing, the user saves money by not having to provide this service “in-house”; that is, having to employ an Information Technology (IT) person or retain one on an on-call basis simply to ensure that files are continuously being backed up in secure, easily accessible programs or files as well as implementing recovery operations (which can be very expensive in their own right) if data is lost.

Cloud services providers do this for a company. Because they provide these services, they are responsible if anything goes wrong with their equipment, whether it occurs through equipment failure or security breaches. For some companies, this can mean additional savings because they are no long liable (to some extent) for circumstances arising from these or other issues.

2. Information is considered “off-site.”

Information that is backed up through Cloud services apps is actually separated from other information. However, the app that is used to separate, back up, and store the information is still compatible with the ISP, programs, and hardware and software your business uses.

You still have access to the backed up information; in fact, you may even have faster access simply because it is separate. This can save you valuable time when you need to retrieve information rapidly, especially if it is necessary because of a loss of data.

3. Privacy is more protected because of “off-site” storage.

The privacy of your backed up and stored information is actually more assured with cloud services, because there is less chance that incidences of “hacking” or industrial espionage or sabotage can occur.

Even if your entire computer system or even the physical property on which your business is located is compromised, the possibility of this having affected backed up files stored in the cloud services apps is reduced, because they were literally in another location. Learn about how contextual help platforms can be leveraged with cloud based applications.

4. “Pay-as-you-go” or “one-price service” means you don’t have to worry about constant price increases.

Many cloud services providers allow you to pick only those apps or features you actually need. Some of them allow you to pay for them individually, and only when they are actually used, while others may offer a number of apps or features for a set price, which includes usage time.

5. Cloud services are constantly being updated with new or improved apps and features to provide quality security and storage capabilities.

This means you don’t have to worry about slow retrieval or increased (if any) risk of compromised security that may occur from outdated or even obsolete equipment or software being used.

If your company has been considering using cloud services, these five reasons can help you make your presentation more powerful, thus opening up the possibility that the decision will be made to utilize this technology.

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Does Facebook Offer Everything?

It seems that Facebook has a lot to offer in every regard. It can be used as a search engine, a way to find jobs, a pleasant pastime and, of course, a substitute for social life. It has its pluses and minuses as it is with everything else. Its popularity is diminishing, slowly but surely – from an increase of 178.38 percent of visits month-on-month in August 2008 to 4.52 percent in July 2010. Profits are still skyrocketing though – 87 percent in 2008, 177 percent in 2009, and 158 percent in 2010.

Connected to the World but Alone

On one hand, we have tendencies toward globalization, a smaller world and a greater connectivity. Facebook is in perfect sync with these tendencies. On the other, you are alone behind a computer screen, as far away from the world as you can possibly be. You read things like, “Jim changed his marital status” and “Jane uploaded new photos” and think that you are really in touch with these people. In a way, the people you know on Facebook become simulacra – representations of something else – to the extent that you don’t know the difference between the original person and the copy, which uploaded new photos from God knows where. This is assuming you do not meet them often in real life.

Facebook and Your True Face

There is no denying that Facebook is a good way to keep in touch with people. If you need to talk to someone, you can just leave them a message. Of course, they might not answer. It’s just like leaving a message after the beep and then waiting and waiting by the phone. Peoples’ profiles surely seem believable – they post comments, list their interests, and have friends they talk to. They seem to be just like they are in real life. If they were real, why all the fuss about Facebook’s lack of privacy settings? Is the profile your true face? Aren’t you showing only what you want to? It’s like the question, “Tell me something interesting about yourself”, to which you reply, “I am a great swimmer” or “I just received an MBA”. You don’t say, “I have been unemployed for two years”, “I almost drowned during a summer camp ten years ago”, or “I am a failure at everything I do”. You would only say that if you were depressed, and as we all know, nobody likes grumpy people. If you feel like a loser, your place is not outside in the sunshine. You should go home and hide. Behind your computer screen.

Melissa writes for Healthy Living Magazine, offering advice on health issues such as liver diseases and liver disease symptoms.

A Substitute for Live Communication

Let’s start with the obvious aspect of social networking. It may be a good way to communicate, but it is certainly not a natural one. It is no substitute for meeting people live. Social networking cannot replace going hiking with a group of friends or playing a soccer game. You could accuse me of being old-fashioned. You may be right. What IS a fact is that social phobias and problems related to social anxiety have increased exponentially since these sites became so popular. Maybe it is just a coincidence. At any rate, chatting to people on Facebook is not equivalent to real human interaction.

When I was in high school (which was ages ago, obviously, I mean, ICQ was in), I was talking to this girl, and we were laughing and joking, and she gasped and said, “Hahaha LOL” with a little snorting laugh. We had another good laugh at that and decided she was a nerd. Well, the virus has spread.

What You Should Be Worried About

I am not going to make the issue of pedophiles and child molesters stalking your kids online part of this post. First of all, because you have already thought of it. Second of all, the Andrei Chikatilo types lurking at train stations have claimed a much higher body count than any Internet stalker, at least so far.

A more relevant concern involves fraud and identity theft. Since people are obligated to provide certain details like their e-mail and location when signing up, this gives ample opportunities for identity theft and related crimes. Someone could pretend to be someone else, whom your kids may know or believe to know (a friend of a friend of a friend on MySpace…) and trick them out of their cash, be it their petty allowance or more if you have given them access to a credit card. If they have not seen a person face to face, they have no way of knowing who they really are.

Finally, a few words about IAD. The Internet Addiction Disorder is on its way to being ranked up there with substance abuse and gambling addiction. It is a major disorder and has a profoundly negative impact on one’s life. Roughly 5-10% of the world population suffers from IAD according to data of the Computer Addiction Study Center at Harvard University’s McLean Hospital. The majority are teenagers. You will know problematic use when you see it, that is, if your child starts off the day by logging on and goes to bed after logging off.

Melissa Dean writes for Credit Cards Canada a website offering an unbiased perspective on Canadian lending industry.

Chat traffic on many different forums shows users connecting and volunteering their computers for botnets, which are illegal networks of computers that can be controlled by a dominant server and used to multiply an attack.

Although our own personal websites may not be present enough on the world playing field to warrant any type of large-scale attack, we do need to be aware of all the ways that social media makes it easier for hackers to break in to our social profiles, blogs and websites. Not only are hackers able to connect and share information through social networking, they are able to more easily break into our own sites using our social media profile as a window. This type of attack reminds us again of the many reasons we need to try our best to secure our personal information. The rise of social media, however, makes it more and more difficult to do so.

As previously mentioned on NetChunks, social networking sites are some of the most commonly hacked sites in the world. And these sites, potentially, provide the biggest advantages to anyone looking to hack your information. Social media provides personal details such as addresses, phone numbers, commonly used websites, friends and places of business. Most bloggers also link access to their social media profiles through their sites, and vice versa, in order to fuel communication and build relationships with users. As useful a business tool as social media is, getting hacked can do great damage to your online reputation and potentially un-do some of those relationships you have worked hard to build.

There is no way to prevent your blog or site from being hacked. However, you can take steps to make it more difficult for your social media account to be hacked, and limit the amount of access a hacker would have to your information.  Make sure to use a strong password for all your online applications, such as long passwords that include both letters and numbers. Use different passwords for different applications, and don’t make your passwords automatically saved by your browser. Don’t store password information anywhere online.  In case your social profile is hacked, don’t include any personal information on your profile, even if you have the information blocked to most viewers. You can also help protect your site or blog in various ways by using security systems that locate your site’s vulnerabilities or analyze the security of your passwords.

The recent WikiLeaks issue will fuel further debate about the delicate balance between freedom of speech and information and the use of online freedoms with intent to do damage. Regardless of where your opinion lies, there is no better time to secure your online information and protect yourself from becoming a victim when the wide variety of information available on the web falls into the wrong hands.

By-line:

This guest post is contributed by Barbara Jolie, who writes on the topics of online classes.  She welcomes your comments at her email Id: barbara.jolie876@gmail.com.

But, Imagine your blog facing the same. Every Blog/Website tends to have peak time and pale time on context to visitors concern. Its the responsibility of the Admin to find out that time. If the Server is down in the peak stage, then the loss will be heavy, but we are not aware of the exact loss. Inorder to find the Loss of our Downtime regardless whether it is Business or Blog/Website, Downtime Calculator is a Tool that which estimates and provides us the approximate loss that we have faced or we are going to face if the Server is Down at certain time.

So, by using the Downtime Calculator we can estimate the Downtime loss of our Business and this will help us to improve our business. The Downtime Calculator is one such an ultimate tool that is also available for our iPhones, Android Mobiles and iPod Touch as well. So that you can asses and monitor your Business 24/7 with your PDA’s.

The Downtime Calculator is a tool Developed by StoragePipe. StoragePipe is one of the best world-class corporate data protection solution, with few Online services like Online Backup, recovery, electornic archiving and also Business continuity.

The Facebook Mail system will be different from Gmail in the sense that the users will be able to communicate in whatever way they choose: email, text or Facebook message.

Features of Facebook Email:

• Include email by activating your optional Facebook email address.
• Control who can send you messages through your privacy settings.
• No need for subject lines or other formalities
• Easily leave large conversations that no longer interest you
• Messages from unknown senders and bulk email go into the Other folder
• Spam is hidden from view automatically

In order to get an invite for this service you will need to visit this link and click on the ‘Request Invite’ Button.

After you click on ‘Request Now’, you will be notified that “You will receive an Invite soon”. We really do not know how soon we will get this invite but we are certainly sure that it is going to take a good amount of time since a lot of people have been awaiting this service from Facebook ever since the rumor had spread.

This company currently offers  software that is used to setup a domain registrar and also currently offers .cz.cc free domain names themselves at nic.cz.cc.

I am pretty much sure that if .Free is approved by ICANN it is certainly going to be a great help for webmasters who are just starting up in the Internet. Even though there are a lot of free domain providers out there in the Internet like nic.cz.cc and co.cc but these kind of domains are just sub domains and not top level domains so people are really afraid of using them since these kind of sub domains do not rank properly in Search Engines.

Many people who are just starting up blogging or web-mastering cannot really afford to buy a domain so when they are getting a top level domain for free, it will certainly be a treat for them.

What is the Catch?

DotFree intends to hold tens (or hundreds) of thousands of “premium” strings for auction or paid-for registrations so that means you may not be able to register dictionary word domains.

Also the registrants are subject to various up-sell services including WHOIS privacy, SSL certificates and something called “Domain Lock.”

The above are the only catch that I can find in the .Free domains

What is the Current State of .Free Domains?

Currently the proposal of the dotFree group is still under review by the ICANN but the dotFree group have already started accepting pre-registration for .Free domains in their website.

DomainIncite reports 15,000 unofficial .Free pre-registrations have been claimed in the past two days by 2,787 people.

All though this is just the pre-registration phase but still you could go and register yourself a pretty good domain. The .Free TLD plans to launch after ICANN approval sometime in the 3rd or 4th quarter 2011 . A long wait indeed.

You should know that One person can register only one domain so choose wisely. You can sign-up to pre-register a .Free domain now at DotFree.com

I personally think that .Free domain can have a lot of potential and if managed properly could might as well turn out as a great domain extension to own.

Let us know what you think about .Free domains in your comments

Indeed there are many people who have not made the switch from Blogspot to Self Hosted WordPress since many of them fear to touch the code. Well, I think it is good enough for a newbie blogger who does not know much about web hosting, domain names, installing WordPress. customizing and editing it etc,to stay with Blogger.com till they do not learn all this things. But if they are ready then they should take the leap.

Never the less, if you still have not decided to move to Self hosted Wordress then Blogger.com is good enough for you.After all now they are providing you even more features.

This New Feature Blogger Template Editor Will Help you to design and edit your Blogger template by using it’s special WYSIWYG editor yourself.

Features of Blogger Template Designer

1) Templates:

You can choose one of the default template so that you can start customizing

2) Background

After you choose the default theme, you can now start doing the editing, You can change the background theme combination by going to this tab.

3) Layout

This section allows you to customize your blog’s layout. You can make it 2-column, 3 columned, etc according to your liking. Also you can change the footer layout, you can add up to 3 spaces for widgets in the footer. You can also adjust the width of the blog and the sidebar.

4) Advanced

The advanced Feature allows you to Customize the text and background color of each and every part of the theme which includes Page Text, Backgrounds, Links and more. You can choose the fonts as well as the colors you want to use. You can also add custom CSS.

You can check out the Blogger Template Designer at your very own Blogger.com Dashboard

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