There is no need for spies anymore

Lately, it has emerged that the Smart TVs like the ones from Samsung and game consoles like Microsoft's are recording what we do and transmit this to 3rd parties, no matter whether you are aware of it or not.

You can read this in "clear" in their Terms and Conditions, that you probably already agreed on...

“Please be aware that if your spoken words include personal or other sensitive information, that information will be among the data captured and transmitted to a third party through your use of Voice Recognition”

— Samsung Global Privacy Policy - SmartTV Supplement

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Spies like James Bond, really no longer exists

2400 years ago, Sun Tzu said there are five kinds of spies. 1) The local spy, is a serviceman or employee working in the enemies district. 2) The insider spy, is having a local official working for you. 3) a converted spy, is an enemies spy captured and bribed/threatened to become a double agent. 4) Doomed spies, are basically, bait for the enemy 5) surviving spies, are ones that come back with intelligence.

More and more personal and household devices are connecting to the internet, from your television to your car navigation systems to your light switches, beside your iPad, computer.

97% of the world population has a cellular phone and 67% of these are smartphones with a GPS, camera and a microphone. The majority of the western world is online on Facebook and Twitter - telling everybody were they are and what they do. Most of us pay with credit cards, as well as most cities are monitoring the traffic via number plate recognition software.

“We’ll Spy on You Through Your Dishwasher”

— CIA Director David Petraeus

So of course, governmental agencies are tapping into all this data like CIA Director David Petraeus explains how he cannot wait to spy on you through them, as he said in WIRE's article two years ago!

Apparently, the quantity of data collected is so big that the government spy agencies can't handle it, according to a Independent report described in The Guardian.

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Indeed we have bugged our homes and we are carrying around all necessary equipment to monitor our-self 24/7. But the irony in all this, is that it's us who stand in a line for hours, spending hundreds of dollars of our own money, to finance this!

I guess we are all smart people now, with our smartphones and smart TVs ;)

iOS 8 new feature

Apple announced that, as of iOS8, they will no longer be able to unlock phones for the police and XYZ agencies, even if they have a warrant or court order.

Apple found a slick solution: they lock themselves out! Apple’s new encryption surrenders their access to your phone. This means that when the authorities ask for your data, Apple can just say that no one can access!

The police and XYZ agencies still have sophisticated software's that can get all your data, but that requires a physical connection!

This was probably the last and unique USP Blackberry had until now. iOS 8 will be BB's coup de grace.

Apple's future revenue streams

Soon will a caller dialing another iOS device, not make an SMS or a phone call over the operator's network, but over the internet. Apple is slowly taking over the operator's functionality and money-stream!

A iPhone owners running the new iOS 8 coming this fall can answer a phone calls on their Mac or iPad, and send SMS messages from any of them, as long as your iPhone running iOS 8 is on the same Wi-Fi network.

Incoming calls show the caller’s name, number, and profile picture and its a speakerphone.

iPad and Mac, now answering the call !

Upgraded my MacBook Air to Windows

After using a PC and a Mac for the last year, I finally upgraded, yes upgraded my MacBook Air to Microsoft Windows 8.1 thanks to Apple’s Boot Camp. I works great, I have now the best PC ever, in a slick MacBook Air.

For several years, Apple has included a feature called Boot Camp in OS X that lets you create a bootable Windows partition. You can even set up the Mac to boot into Windows by default, making it a Windows PC on top-notch hardware and with Apple's superior Windows drivers.
Maybe I use Boot Camp to install Windows on a new Mac Pro and see what it's like on the 4K screen, what kind of benchmarks we get with Thunderbolt connected drives… 

That must be the best PC ever, in a smart design.

How green is IT?

You can look at the massive transformation of the Internet now, through the demand of clean energy. The internet is one of the most important things created by humanity. It's like human civilization giving itself a nervous system such as Google, investing substantially in green solutions. By moving the IT department to the cloud one can save up to 87% of IT energy! But since all that internet traffic ends up in the massive data-centers of a few big companies, Greenpeace has released a interest report that shows how companies are creating the green internet...

It's interesting to notice who the bigger winners and losers are

In theory, over time the new more efficient equipment’s energy savings of for example, a cellular base station can repay the energy debt embodied in manufacturing that hardware.  But the odds are high that the new equipment will end up being obsoleted and replaced long before the operational efficiency pays for the manufacturing energy debt.

Estimated 2.5 billion people around the world are now connected to the internet, an internet that has become a foundation of the global economy!

Was iOS 7 created in Microsoft Word?

Apple was presenting today, a new OS, some Macbooks, a pack of iPads... in a distinguish event with powerful industry insiders, as well as media, filling the Yerba Buena Center.

Apple uses the same badges, same retail-store like demo set-up and similar background music. It gives away the same iTunes gift cards, and the voice that tells the audience to silence their mobile phones is the same every year, too. The videos, slides and personalities on stage reappear in a familiar cadence...

But the big question among the journalists was; Did Apple created iOS 7 with Microsoft Word? Look for yourself ;)

Enjoy, this guy has amazing skills.

As for now, the lesson I'm taking with me from this webcast is not about the products but about to ensure the financial markets that Apple is leading. Like so many other tech companies since ever. After a certain time, it's not innovations but the stock price that runs the show.

Apple Inc. and You

If you got an iPhone then you are aware that Apple knows alot about you. You can run, but you can't hide!

Your identity

Apple knows your age, name, gender, date of birth, marital status, email address, telephone number, zip code, city, state, country and home address as soon as you register for an Apple account.

Your credit card information

Apple has your credit card information since you buy applications, music and movies from iTunes and the App Store.

Your outdoor location

Apple uses the GPS, Cell Tower Triangulation and WiFi access points in your iOS device to know your current and frequent locations.

Your indoor location

Apple uses iBeacon or Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) for micro-location geofencing, a highly accurate monitoring system for locating you inside buildings and malls at least in the US.

Your behaviour

Your purchases allow Apple to understand you and your behaviours as well as when you buy, how much you buy, what triggers your buying behaviors, just look at what the Genius recommendation service does.

Your movement

Apple’s new M7 movement coprocessor uses your device’s accelerometer, compass and gyroscope to keep track of your motion. It knows when you’re running, walking, driving and even sleeping.

Your health

Several apps monitor your heartbeat and how you sleep, as well as your blood sugar level and more depending on your apps.

Your face

Apple knows how you look since the pictures that are taken with your iOS device are stored on their iCloud servers. Apple can run these images through facial recognition algorithms and recognize you.

Your family & friends

Apple knows your family and friends since you are connected with your iOS device are stored on facebook, google+, LinkedIn...

Your voice

Apple stores your questions, messages and stern commands which you whisper to Siri for up to two years.

Your fingerprint

Apple stores your fingerprint in order for you to unlock your device and for prompt payments on iTunes and the App store.

...and FYI Apple join US government’s PRISM data mining program.

rotten apples

Apple's greed is obvious lately, especially when you look at their their exchange rates. 

You can also notice their greed in some updates of the latest iOS operating systems, more features that used to be separate applications are incorporated into the core of what a smartphone does.

Weather prediction, photo, calendars, contact management and call-CTRL all used to be separate applications made by separate vendors. Slowly, they were built into the smartphone operating system and the applications quickly fell out of use. 

Apple's exchange rates are somehow different from the global foreign exchange markets, or? The official exchange rate the same day was $0,99 equal 6.73 Kr, and not 9.- Kr! Or is it just a convenient bug in their systems.

Here is the same app for sale, in SEK and USD the same day, in the US and Swedish Appstore:

April 12, 1987 Texaco files for brankruptcy

Texaco`s troubles began in February, 1984, when Pennzoil sued, accusing Texaco of obstructing its plans to buy Getty Oil Co. Texaco later declared the 8th largest bankruptcies in the U.S. history - $67.6 billion by total assets in 2010 dollars.

In November, 1985, a Houston jury awarded Pennzoil $7.53 billion in damages and $3 billion in punitive damages, rather than appeal the decision to the Supreme Court, allowing it to begin planning for its emergence from Chapter 11. Texaco was an independent company until it merged into Chevron Corporation in 2001.

In 87’ was Texaco the eighth-largest industrial company in the United States and was founded in 1902. It had 55,000 employees and operated in 140 countries. For many years was Texaco the only company selling gasoline in all 50 states.

Could we experience a similar battle today between Google, Microsoft, Apple or Amazon as we recently saw in the financial industry also?

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Microsoft’s Office suite on iPad

Microsoft’s decision to keep Office suite away from iPad may be a good way to protect sales of Windows tablets and especially Microsoft’s Surface Pro and RT, but the company is losing potential revenues. Some recent research from Morgan Stanley analyst Adam Holt showing that Microsoft is leaving $2.5 billion on the table every year by not making the Office suite available to Apple’s tablets. Corresponding to a lite bit more than 10% of Microsoft's Business Division annual revenue of $22 billion, which is home to Office suite.

Another problem is the current app model as supported by Apple. Microsoft is used to produce a new version of Office every few years, having it replace by the older version. But this is not how the ecosystem works for apps, Apple’s iPad consumers expect to receive a continuous updates over time for free. A solution to this could be the cloud version of the Office suite, you subscribe to your Office 365 including an iOS client!

But let’s see what the new version of the Office 365 apps for businesses has on its release on 27 February.

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