Campaign aims to speed up 4G mobile roll-out in UK

Mobile network Everything Everywhere has taken fresh steps to lobby for 4G data services in the UK.

The firm is urging business leaders and consumer champions to join 4GBritain - a campaign calling on the government "to do whatever is necessary to move forward" with the roll-out.
The network operator's chief executive said the UK needed to catch up.

Imagine Cup 2012: Microsoft seeks support from Nokia, Dell

Ahead of 2012 Imagine Cup software students competition slated for Sydney, Australia this July, Microsoft Nigeria has disclosed that it has started discussions with foreign Original Equipment Manufacturers , (OEMs) including Nokia, Dell among others on how best to equip Nigerian software incubators that will fly the country’s flag at the world stage.
This year, for the first time, two rounds of regional finals will be held in Nigeria instead of just one ahead of the national finals in Port Harcourt this Friday to accommodate the anticipated number of entries.
It would be recalled that the Rivers State Government has fully thrown its weight behind 2012 Imagine series as the official kick off of the competition had already been held at the Rivers State House of Assembly Auditorium in Port Harcourt.

Group intensifies call for local content in telecoms

Following the sucsuccessful passage into law, of a bill on the Local Content in the down stream sector of the Nigerian Oil and Gas industry, key stakeholders have continued to call on the concerned authorities to replicate same in the telecoms sector.
This time, by a non governmental, non profit-making organisation known as ‘Youths Arise for Nigeria’, YAN, who accused foreign telecom operators of capital flight and other economic sabotages.
YAN said it has become imperative for the Federal government to replicate the local content policy in the Oil and Gas industry to the telecommunication sector so as to create employment for teeming Nigerian youths and generate revenue for the government.
Speaking at a press conference in Lagos, the National Publicity Secretary of the organisation, Liborous Oshoma noted that the liberalization of telecom sector has opened a new investment frontier for the Nigeria government, the business community in the country and their foreign or technical partners.
According to him, the industry has been of great benefit to both the users, in terms of communication, and the service providers, in terms of return on investment, as research has shown that the revenue generated by the sector alone in 2010 was about $8.6bn which was an increase over that of 2009, even as the revenue is expected to hit $11bn by 2013.
The group’s spokesman expressed regret that the increase in revenue generation by the network providers has not impacted on the life of the average Nigerian, rather, what the country was getting from them is usurpation.
“Since 10 years of telecommunication operation in Nigeria, none of the operators can boast of encouraging local industrialization that will help promote manufacturing and or fabrication of equipments like towers, equipment shelters, even telephones here in Nigeria. They also intentionally refused to invest or encourage local industries that are doing same with the intent of promoting the manufacturing of these products in their home country.”
Oshoma further stressed that in spite of the success of the Nigerian companies at providing quality indirect services to the operators through the middle man arrangement, the operators still intentionally refused to deal directly with the local engineering companies, because of their apathy for the development of the Nigeria local content.
The group however, called for a timely intervention from the concerned authorities to stem the ugly trend in the sector. “A timely intervention is required to arrest this ugly development before it degenerate to a situation where the youth who are unemployed will begin to see every foreigner in Nigeria as a threat to job creation and local empowerment.
“To this end, we appeal to government to set up a body with a mandate of enforcing our local content participation and technological advancement especially in the telecom sector and every aspect of our national lives.”

Techno Nigeria

Microsoft launches SQL server 2012 to control data explosion

To help address the challenges of increasing data volumes by rapidly turning data into actionable business insights, the software giant, Microsoft has unveiled the latest version of the world’s most widely deployed data platform, Microsoft SQL Server 2012 in Nigeria.
This was in line with expanding on Microsoft’s commitment to help customers manage any data, regardless of size, both on_premises and in the cloud.
The Solutions Specialist, Microsoft Nigeria, Olufemi George while speaking at the launch,, said, “According to Worldwide Regional Public IT Cloud Services (2011 – 2015) forecast, digital data will grow 44 times over the next decade.  So, whatever the type or size of data, SQL Server 2012 delivers the platform and familiar tools to manage data, generate actionable insights and help drive business impact.”
Similarly, Mr. Femi Oyenuga, Senior Manager, Enterprise Information Management, MTN Nigeria in his own reaction said that, “Microsoft’s data platform has continued to advance and help us keep up with the evolving world of data.”
Meanwhile, reports by Forrester Consulting, a research firm, on the total economic impact and potential return on Investment (ROI), confirmed that organizations might realise that by upgrading to the Microsoft SQL Server 2012, their server can deliver an anticipated ROI of between 149 percent and 189 percent with a projected 12_month payback period.
SQL server 2012: proven capability
SQL Server 2012 has already been deployed for production use by hundreds of global, industry_leading customers, such as Volvo Car Corp., Revlon, the HSN, Sanofi Pasteur, Klout and LG Chemical. Customers choosing SQL Server 2012 enjoy the benefit of a rich hardware and software partner ecosystem that can create solutions for the most unique and demanding data management needs.
Tackling big data
IT research firm Gartner estimates that the volume of global data is growing at a rate of 59 percent per year, with 70 to 85 percent in unstructured form.
Furthering its commitment to connect SQL Server and rich business intelligence tools, such as Microsoft Excel, PowerPivot for Excel 2010 and Power View, with unstructured data, Microsoft announced plans to release an additional limited preview of an Apache Hadoop_based service for Windows Azure in the first half of 2012.
The company also disclosed additional details regarding its plans to release an Apache Hadoop_based service for Windows Azure.
It would be recalled that since the first limited preview released in December, customers such as Webtrends and the University of Dundee are using the Hadoop_based service to glean simple, actionable insights from complex data sets hosted in the cloud.
Continued improvements, new levels of return on investment
To help customers more cost_effectively manage their enterprise_scale workloads, Microsoft will release several new data warehousing solutions in conjunction with the general availability of SQL Server 2012, slated to begin April 1.
This includes a major software update and new half_rack form factors for Microsoft Parallel Data Warehouse appliances, as well as availability of SQL Server Fast Track Data Warehouse reference architectures for SQL Server 2012.
Microsoft and partners also announced that SQL Server 2012 has demonstrated new record_breaking performance benchmarks through partner_ and Microsoft_led testing that underscores SQL Server’s ability to scale across the enterprise.
Those interested can find more information about the announcements or download an evaluation copy of SQL Server 2012 at the SQL Server virtual press kit.
The launch held at the prestigious Civic Centre in Lagos, Nigeria and had in attendance, professionals from diverse sectors of the economy including telecoms, banking, manufacturing and oil & gas.
Highlight of the occasion was a panel sitting with speakers from companies such as Interswitch, Oando, MTN, among others.

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Amazon profits Forecasts

Amazon has posted better-than-expected profits after the world's largest retailer cut costs and boosted sales of its Kindle tablet and digital products.

Amazon shares rose almost 15% in after-hours trading in New York after it said quarterly net income was $130m (£80m).
The firm has been launching new products such as the Kindle Fire, a tablet that competes with Apple's iPad.
There had been nervousness among some investors that new product launches would be a drain on profits.
According to Stifel Nicolaus analyst Jordan Rohan, Amazon, which has been spending heavily on expansion, is starting to get a grip on costs.
The earnings have "something for everyone; growth and margins to satisfy investors", he added.
Amazon said that revenues rose 34% to $13.18bn during the first three months of 2012.
In a conference call, Amazon executives said they were pleased with growth in sales of the digital content that the Kindle and Kindle Fire are designed to accelerate.

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The controversial piracy law, the Digital Economy Act, delayed

The measures, such as letters to suspected illegal downloaders and potential disconnection, will not be enforced until at least 2014.
Since being passed at the end of the Labour administration in 2010, action has stalled due to legal challenges.
The delay was welcomed by the Internet Service Providers' Association (Ispa).
Under the Act, letters sent out to apparent illegal file-sharers would offer advice on how to prevent such illegal activity.
Serious repeat offenders risk facing measures that limit, or even cut off, internet connection.
ISPs have criticised aspects of the Act, suggesting it would unfairly force them to police user behaviour on the internet.
'Effective solution' "The fact it hasn't been implemented is a good thing," an Ispa spokesman said.

"We don't think it's a particularly good piece of legislation."

However, he added that there were other measures being discussed which could see a clampdown on piracy.
"There's more than just the Digital Economy Act when it comes to tackling copyright infringement online," he said.
"Ispa continues to believe that the most effective solution to the problem of users accessing unlawful content is for reform of the licensing framework so that legal content can be distributed online in a way that consumers are demanding."
Last month, BT and TalkTalk lost a two-year legal bid to have the Act overturned. They argued it was incompatible with European law.
The repeated delays have led some industry observers to speculate that the Act's measures will never come into force.
"I think I might be waiting for a fairy to arrive and wave her magic wand over the House of Commons saying 'come to your senses, come to your senses'," wrote Trefor Davies, chief technology officer for service provider Timico.
"Maybe that's the point at which I wake up and find that I've been dreaming."


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Matt Richardson developed Descriptive camera

A camera which produces written descriptions of scenes rather than photographs has been invented by a student in the US.

The device uploads pictures to the web which are described within minutes by users on Amazon's Mechanical Turk service.
The short description is then sent back to the camera and printed.
It was developed by Matt Richardson, an Interactive Communications graduate student at New York University.
"I'd been thinking a lot about how cameras capture a lot of metadata when we take a picture: the location where you are, it captures the date, the camera make and model," he told the BBC.
"A lot of information, but most of it's not really useful or has limited use."
Menial tasks The machine uses a BeagleBone, a tiny computer used to power prototypes and other experimental computers.
It links up to Mechanical Turk, a service in which people can perform menial tasks in exchange for small sums of money.

In this case, Mr Richardson paid $1.25 (80p) for each picture to be described.
"I had started off by sending a very low price and it was taking about 15 minutes for a description to come back," he said.
"I wanted to get a response much faster. I incrementally raised the price, and I finally hit this $1.25 mark - which is about the cost of a Polaroid print. At that price, a description would come through in about three to six minutes."
As well as using Mechanical Turk, Mr Richardson also added a setting on the camera which would send the picture to any available online friends to describe for free.
'What if?' Mr Richardson said that while there was no practical technology available to carry out the same task, he hoped such innovations would eventually exist, giving the camera more useful applications.
"I was picturing a time in which cameras could possibly capture more useful information that can then be searched, cross-referenced and sorted," he said.
"While the technology isn't really here yet, I thought it would be interesting to make a camera that would explore that 'what if?'"
He said he noticed that most people adopted an analytical tone to describe pictures rather than offer any human emotion.
"They speak very plainly about it, they're being very subjective. They're not making any value judgements or saying something is pretty or ugly," Mr Richardson said.
"I think perhaps I could coach people and say feel free to throw in your own opinions about it. If something's pretty, say it's pretty."

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Science fiction publisher Tor UK is dropping digital rights management from its e-books

DRM is used as an anti-piracy measure, but limits a user's ability to read a title on different devices.
Tor UK, Tor Books and Forge are divisions of Pan Macmillan, which said it viewed the move as an "experiment".
The firm said it was in discussions with e-book store owners to implement the action within three months.
The business said its authors had been pushing for the action for more than a year.
"We know that this is what many Tor authors passionately want," said Jeremy Trevathan, Pan Macmillan's fiction publisher.
"We also understand that readers in this community feel strongly about this."
Tor's writers include China Mieville, author of fantasy title The City and the City, and Peter F Hamilton, author of the Void trilogy.
Unrestricted access The move means users will not be restricted to using only one firm's technology to read purchased titles.
At present a user who buys a DRM-encoded book via Amazon, for example, can only read it on one of the firm's Kindle e-readers or a device running one of its Kindle apps. They cannot transfer the title to a Sony Reader, Kobo eReader or use it with Apple's iBooks.
A spokeswoman for Tor told the BBC that said she thought ditching DRM would serve as a "precedent" for the wider industry.
It is not the first to take the action. Fellow science fiction publisher Baen Books has long opposed DRM's use. Its late founder, Jim Baen, had said he thought it made it harder for people to read books.
JK Rowling also opted to offer her Harry Potter books DRM-free from her Pottermore store last year, instead adding a digital watermark to discourage users from copying them illegally.
In addition, genre publisher Angry Robots releases its title in the ePub format without DRM.
'Impediment' Apple helped shake up the music industry when its former chief executive Steve Jobs published an open letter in 2007 urging music publishers to drop DRM protection. It is now industry practice to sell tracks without the limitation.
However, many publishers remain unconvinced that they should follow.
"It is fair to say that DRM as a principle is now up for debate within the book trade - I have heard views both for and against it from senior members of the industry within the past few weeks," said Neill Denny, editor-in-chief of the Bookseller magazine.
"Some people think that it is an impediment, and has been cracked anyway so we don't need it. But others say that it continues to restrict piracy.
"The key difference with the music business is that the book trade can see what mistakes the record labels made and avoid them."

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Facebook's laucnch free Anti-virus Marketplace targets malware

Facebook has launched Anti-Virus Marketplace - a new portal to protect the social network's users.

Members are being encouraged to download anti-malware programs which they can use at no cost for six months.
The firm's flotation filing had previously flagged the issue, saying: "As a result of spamming activities, our users may use Facebook less or stop using our products altogether."
The firm is expected to raise $5bn through the share sale before July.
The move comes three months after security firm Sophos described the site as "a fertile breeding ground for hoaxes, spam and chain letters", adding that Facebook needed to "work harder than ever to reduce the havoc criminals are wreaking".
Sophos is one of the five firms with which Facebook has partnered. The others are McAfee, Microsoft, Symantec and Trend Micro.
Users are limited to installing software from one of the companies as part of the promotion.
The social network also states that it has expanded its web address blacklist to include dangerous sites identified by the security companies.
"This means that whenever you click a link on our site, you benefit not just from Facebook's existing protections, but the ongoing vigilance of the world's leading corporations involved in computer security," it said.

According to Facebook, spam makes up less than 4% of the content shared on its pages. It says it hopes that the project will help reduce this further.

Malicious links "Now that Facebook is a primary platform for communication, whether you're nine or 99, it's only become a bigger target for cybercriminals," said Trend Micro.
"This partnership will better enable us to protect the people who use our service, no matter where they are in the web."
Sophos added: "Because content is typically posted by a trusted source - a friend - many users incorrectly assume links are safe.
"Scammers often take advantage of the trust relationship to fool users into clicking malicious links.
"Our partnership... will educate users to make more informed decisions regarding what they click on and will help reduce the spread of malicious links."


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O2 mobile wallet app launches text message payments

Mobile network O2 has launched a smartphone app that allows users to transfer up to £500 via text message.

It also allows customers to "digitise" their debit and credit cards to speed up purchases from online stores.
The firm also intends to allow users of phones with near-field communication (NFC) chips to make contactless payments in high street shops.
It is the latest of several firms to charge retailers a transaction fee for making it easier to shop.
The service will be free to consumers at first, but O2 said that it would charge 15p for each money message sent by text at a later date.
The network provider said that more than 100 retailers had agreed to accept payments from the service. They include Debenhams, Comet, Sainsbury's Direct and Tesco Direct.
Users can also benefit from a search facility that compares how much goods cost, the ability to load money onto the app from their debit cards and a "transaction history" that keeps track of what they have spent.
The firm said it had held off introducing contactless payments as only a handful of retailers had installed the necessary systems.

It added that it was also in discussions with a rail operator to add a button to buy train tickets.

Security risks James Le Brocq, managing director at O2 Money said: "We believe it will transform the way people manage their finances and spend money."
One of the biggest stumbling blocks for uptake of such technology is fears about security. He noted that all personal details, pin codes, passwords and other financial data were held on remote central servers rather than on the mobile device.
"O2 wallet has been trialled internally for months and has undergone extensive 'stress-testing' with security experts," he added.
"This is, we believe, the safest and most secure way to deliver mobile payment services."
Project Oscar Eden Zoller, analyst at Ovum, said the service was part of a wider plan.
O2 and its rivals Vodafone and EverythingEverywhere are working on a national mobile payments service - dubbed Project Oscar. They had hoped to have it up and running in time for the London Olympics.
But the project is held up in Brussels, subject to an anti-competitive investigation.
"For O2 if this project is in danger of being stalled or even derailed it make sense to move ahead with a solo initiative," said Ms Zoller.

The app can also scan barcodes and search for cheaper products

It is not the first time O2 has experimented with mobile wallets. In 2009 it tested using mobiles as an Oyster card replacement to pay for travel on London's Underground network.
Last summer saw the launch of the UK's first mobile payment service with Orange and Barclaycard teaming up to offer contactless payments in a range of stores, including Pret a Manger, Little Chef and the National Trust.
Juniper Research estimates that one in six mobile devices will be NFC-enabled by 2014.
O2 currently has 200,000 customers with NFC-enabled phones in the UK.


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