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Aurora Nguyen

Does MCM SQL 2008 require knowledge of R2.

Thanks,

Geoff

Source: http://borntolearn.mslearn.net/forums/ac/f/308/p/22135/62083.aspx#62083

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Aurora Nguyen

Just like I predicted earlier this month, Gameloft is offering up another one of their high quality Android games -- Hero of Sparta -- absolutely free. But you gotta act quick, because the giveaway ends in less than 24 hours.

Featuring eight levels to explore in full 3D, Hero of Sparta provides an excellent action/adventure experience on your Android phone. It's not available in the market, so you'll have to hit this page to see if your device is compatible, and begin your free download.

While you're over there, make sure you check out some of their other HD Android titles. Most (possibly all) of their games come with a trial version that can be unlocked for $4.99.

Check out a trailer for Hero of Sparta after the break. [Gameloft]

Gameloft's Hero of Sparta free today posted originally by Android Central

Sponsored by Android Cases and Accessories

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/androidcentral/~3/WbjUX9M80xQ/gamelofts-hero-sparta-free-24-hours

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Aurora Nguyen

A UK teen named Lamar Johnson has recently plead guilty to one count of conspiracy to defraud. His crime? It seems that he and his band (both in a musical sense and in a "Robin Hood" sense) used stolen credit cards to purchase something like $750,000 worth of their own music from both Amazon and the iTunes Store between January 2008 and June 2009. There's no telling how much the group would have earned from royalties, and the name of the band hasn't been disclosed (believe us, we looked), but something tells us that they probably recorded dubstep. Also, something tells us that -- since the royalties would have to be paid out to someone with a bank account -- this was a painfully easy case for prosecutors to crack. While Johnson will find his sentence tacked onto the 5-year jail term he is currently serving for grievous bodily harm, the rest of his 12 member "band" will have to wait until they appear in court in January to discover their fate.

UK teen buys $750,000 of his own music from iTunes using stolen credit cards originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 22 Dec 2010 00:47:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Source: http://www.engadget.com/2010/12/22/uk-teen-buys-750-000-of-his-own-music-from-itunes-using-stolen/

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Aurora Nguyen

Who has actually made money from social networking? I mean the real folding stuff, not the theoretical billions that are now supposed to be in the hands of Mark Zuckerberg.

The MySpace founders walked away with a bit of cash after they sold to News Corporation, but I've just met the couple who have made more from the business of sharing social lives online than anyone else.

Michael and Xochi Birch

In a mansion with views across to the Golden Gate bridge live Michael and Xochi Birch, a lovely couple who are the best proof I know that money really can make you happy. Their social-networking story is all about fabulous timing.

A decade ago they were working in London - Michael is British, Xochi American - for insurance companies. Having decided that was not a lot of fun, they took out loans against their flat and moved to San Francisco to live with Xochi's parents while they worked on some ideas for some web companies.

A few years later one of those ideas paid off in the form of Birthday Alarm, an online greetings card site. "Quite suddenly," Michael explained,"we went from making $10,000 a month from it to $10,000 a day."

That gave them the cash to launch an idea that they'd been working on for a while, a social network. "Friendster had launched," Michael remembers. "A friend e-mailed me a link to it, I spent 30 minutes on it, and thought it was the best thing I'd ever seen."

"It really reminded me of Big Brother on the TV," adds Xochi. "You just couldn't stop watching it."

After starting and quickly selling one network, Ringo, they used the money they were earning from Birthday Alarm to launch a more serious effort. They called it Bebo.

It rapidly became a huge hit - not in the United States where they were based but in Britain and Ireland, and in particular among schoolchildren. In fact, the first story I ever did about social networking was about teachers wanting to ban Bebo from schools over concerns about the way it was being used.

The reason it took off in Britain was all about timing. In 2005 Facebook was still only on campuses and MySpace had yet to make much impact outside the US. "We caught up with MySpace in a matter of months," says Michael."I remember speaking to someone from MySpace who said we were this 'annoying thing' happening to them in the UK. In the US we struggled because we had to get people to migrate away from other networks."

Bebo's fortunes peaked in 2007. "For one month we overtook Google in terms of time spent online in the UK," says Michael. But Xochi says they did not feel secure even then. "It really felt like a race - we felt we were racing MySpace and Facebook in the UK and chasing after Myspace and Facebook in the US."

I met the couple in the UK that year and asked them whether there was any truth in the rumours that they were planning to sell the business. Of course not, they told me, we want to keep growing it ourselves. Michael laughs when I remind him of that, and admits: "We were saying to one another we should probably sell it. But you're never supposed to say you're selling a business."

He concedes that the looming threat from the competition meant they needed to get out while Bebo was still highly valued. In 2008, after negotiations with a number of bidders, they sold to AOL for $850m in cash, of which the Birches netted over half. Again, timing was all.

"It was in the right space at the right time." says Michael Birch. "We sold it and then the whole world economy crashed a few months later. So it turned out to be great timing."

Under AOL, Bebo went into a rapid decline. The Birches believe that was partly due to the neglect of the new owners, but accept that it was always going to be hard to compete with Facebook. Then, earlier this year, AOL sold it on to another company for what Michael describes as "1% of what they paid us for it."

The Birches are now rich enough to just hang out with their children at their lovely home, which even features a "London pub" where Michael can act the landlord at parties. But they are still working, setting up a number of web vehicles and one charity venture.

This week they revealed that they had taken a stake in a social-networking business. It's called Bebo, and they say they believe, that under its new owners Criterion Capital it can find a decent niche. "It's going to be about self-expression," says Xochi. "it's going to be about being on a site where your friends are, not your parents."

The original Bebo lost out to Facebook because its young members felt the new network where their older brothers and sisters hung out was more grown-up and cool. Maybe they are starting to think that Facebook is a place where an older generation is always peering over their shoulders. Or maybe not.

Nobody, least of all the Birches, thinks Facebook is going to lose its dominance any time soon. But perhaps there is enough room in the social networking space for some smaller more specialist players. If that does turn out to be true, then the Birches will have proved again that they have an invaluable business skill - good timing.

On my social-networking trip, I'm asking all my interviewees to give a short answer on how social networking has changed their lives. Here's what the Birches said:

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Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/thereporters/rorycellanjones/2010/12/the_birches_of_bebo_timing_is.html

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Aurora Nguyen

As first reported by Britain’s Guardian newspaper, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has sold his memoirs to two publishing houses, Canongate in Britain and Knopf in the United States. Assange, who has reached worldwide celebrity status for controversy over Wikileaks and recent sex crime charges, describes himself in the following way, “Physically and intellectually pugnacious; pig [...]

[Notice: this is the RSS feed for ALL stories from across The Next Web - that means a lot of stories every day - for just our top stories, subscribe to our Top Stories RSS feed here.]

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/TheNextWeb/~3/rQziw8SytwM/

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Aurora Nguyen

This weekend, Gawker Media had its primary database compromised. In this monstrous breach, not only did 1.5 million users have their privacy breached and email address stolen, but they also had their passwords cracked. In a day and age where the currency of our email address and password -- and thus our identity -- is only superseded by our bank details, it's fair to label the Gawker breach as abominable.

Like all major disasters, though, this hack serves a higher purpose: it's now blatantly clear that you should not trust a website with sensitive details about yourself. There have been other hacks, of course; higher profile hacks (like the TJ Maxx debacle), with millions of credit card and social security numbers vanishing into the ether, causing billions of dollars of damage.

But they pale in comparison to the Gawker hack for one reason: it directly affected a huge swathe of the noisy, foot-stomping and petulant tech blogging minority.

Continue reading News flash: everything on the Internet is hackable

News flash: everything on the Internet is hackable originally appeared on Download Squad on Tue, 14 Dec 2010 17:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Source: http://downloadsquad.switched.com/2010/12/14/news-flash-everything-on-the-internet-is-hackable/

Sra International Spss Spansion Sonus Networks

Aurora Nguyen

Some news I wanted to share from Tru (also known as Truphone)... Tru, (dba Truphone), has expanded its local rates and local number proposition to Australia. Starting today, both business and pre-pay customers of Tru’s GSM service in the UK and US will benefit from paying only local rates instead of roaming rates for all calls and texts to and within Australia, as well as local data rates when roaming within the country.

In an industry first, Tru’s network now offers customers the option to have three local mobile numbers for the UK, US and Australia on one SIM card, allowing friends and business contacts based in those countries to reach them wherever they are without paying the cost of an international call.

Australia is the third country to be added to Tru’s network, and the company plans to roll out an additional 20 countries by 2012.

Tru Pre-Pay local rates in Australia:

Calls within Australia: 25cents/minute versus standard operator rates of $1.69 = savings of 85 percent[1]
Calls back home to the US: 17cents/minute mobile or landline = average savings of 90 percent
Data Usage: 10c/MB US versus $15/MB charge with standard operator rates = over 97 percent savings

Tru has also just launched three Inter continental bundles, allowing its post-pay business customers to purchase standard tariffs, including minutes for the UK, US, Europe and now Australia. For more information please visit http://www.truphone.com/business.

Geraldine Wilson, CEO of Tru, said: “Nearly three quarters of businesses are telling us that they feel roaming charges are unaffordable, and many consumers are telling us that they switch off their phones altogether to avoid getting stung by their operator when they’re abroad. Tru provides the perfect solution. We only charge local rates for incoming and outgoing calls, and data when roaming - without any complex call back system or change to user behaviour. Starting today, customers can make calls in and between Australia, the UK and the US, with average savings of up to 75 percent.”

The service solves the pressure felt by 68 percent of UK business travellers and 78 percent of US business travellers to use their mobile phone less when abroad due to the high cost of both outgoing and incoming calls and data, according to a recent survey by Vanson Bourne for Tru.

With nearly half of employees surveyed in the UK and even more in the US having lost business through not being able to stay in touch with colleagues or clients, Tru For You significantly eases the pain of international roaming charges.

Tru offers customers four key benefits:

Local voice, text and data rates in all Tru countries (currently Australia, the UK and the US)
Local numbers in the three countries all on one SIM: so colleagues, customers, friends and family in those countries can reach you wherever you are without paying the cost of an international call
Incoming calls at local prices in all Tru countries
Low-cost international calls from Tru countries, and great roaming rates in over 220 countries: offering savings of more than 50 percent over standard mobile operator charges

For those countries where Tru does not have operator agreements, Tru offers competitive roaming charges.

Tru is provided by global mobile network operator Truphone (www.truphone.com), which recently unveiled a new look and feel led by a website re-design and updated branding.

Tags: Australia, Mobile phone, Roaming, tru, truphone Related tags: local rates, roaming charges, savings percent, those countries, offers customers, rates