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2011-10-09 20:05

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noreply@blogger.com (Haytham Ahmed) — Sun, 10 Oct 2010 09:08:00 PDT

Google Is Testing Cars That Drive Themselves

noreply@blogger.com (Haytham Ahmed) — Sun, 10 Oct 2010 05:07:00 PDT

Google announced today that it has developed cars that drive themselves automatically in traffic, and that it has been testing them on the streets of California for months. It might seem like an unusual project for Google, but it could actually have big benefits.

We’re not just talking about cars running Google Android. This is the stuff of science fiction. The only accident that has occurred so far: One of the cars was rear-ended by a driver at a stop light. Human error!

The vehicles have been tested on 140,000 miles of California road, from Silicon Valley to Santa Monica. Each car is manned during the tests. One person sits in the driver’s seat, ready to take control of the vehicle instantly by grabbing the wheel or touch the brake should something go wrong with the system. The person in the passenger’s seat is an engineer who monitors the software operations on a computer.

Google hired engineers who previously participated in competitions and races involving automated cars — important turning points in the development of the technology, which has been coming into its own since around 2005 according to The New York Times.

If your first concern is one of safety, Google would argue that you’re going about it all wrong. Safety is one of the the project’s purposes. Google believes that the technology could nearly half the number of automobile-related deaths because computers are supposedly better at driving than humans in the right circumstances.

There are other hypothetical pluses, too. The vehicles’ instant reaction time and 360-degree awareness would allow them to drive closer together on the highway than humans can, reducing traffic congestion. They could be more careful when operating the gas, reducing fuel consumption.

But the biggest benefit for Google would be the hour or so of daily commute time the car owner would save. Instead of driving, he or she could either be productive or entertained in the vehicle, doing work on a wireless Internet connection or watching television. Google doesn’t say it explicitly, but TechCrunch was quick to notethat this time could be spent using Google products and absorbing Google-run advertising.

The most optimistic projections put this technology at least eight years away from market, though. Legal hassles are among the myriad problems; all of the current traffic laws assume that a human driver is present in the vehicle.

Do you think this technology will eventually be deployed, or is it just a pipe dream for Sergei and Larry? Let us know in the comments.

Q. What Qualities Do Companies Look For in a Social Media Intern?

“When I’ve hired interns to work with brands I strove to find ones that had a passion for the web, especially in the social media arenas.” Jonathan Sexton, CEO, Socialgladiator.com

Good Communication Skills

Kelly Lux, the Online Community & Relationship Manager at Syracuse University & Syracuse University iSchool, puts “good communication skills” at the top of her list of desired qualities in an intern. Being able to communicate well is valuable in many areas, but in the social space it’s essential.

Nicole Ravlin, Partner, at PMG Public Relations echoes the sentiment. “We want to know that their communication skills are sharp,” says Ravin. “So we evaluate the content that they are putting out there”.

Solid Writing Skills

The ability to string a decent sentence together, to get a message across in your writing, or be able to communicate in short-form writing are all important qualities, as well.

Dan Klamm, Outreach & Marketing Coordinator at Syracuse University Career Services looks for “solid writing skills” in a candidate and he’s not alone.

“To me, someone with a good sense of wit and charm in their writing is appealing. Some of the best brands in social media have that combination and it’s attractive to users,” says Sexton.

Top-Notch Social Skills

Although taken for granted by many, it can be argued that social skills can’t easily be taught, so if you’ve got good ones, then make a point of showcasing it, as social panache is attractive in a social media intern.

“I look for social people to begin with, whether that’s internal at the corporate office or from the local campus, I want people who are already socially active in their own spheres,” says Jonathan Sexton.

Klamm agrees. “When I’m hiring a social media intern, I look for someone who has a strong personal network. I place emphasis on ‘a strong personal network,’ because I really want the intern to be able to leverage his/her connections to generate buzz around the messages that I am trying to communicate.”

And working well with others is another quality that will appeal to employers. “We are interested in people who will fit in with the group. We often have students recommend others who they know would be interested, and that they feel would be good team members,” says Lux.

Enthusiasm!

A bit of enthusiasm for the social space can go a long way and it will help show any potential employer that you’re going to be active in your role, rather than need constant chivvying.

“Students who are actively involved on campus and ‘connected’ are very attractive to us,” says Lux.

“We look for those that are incredibly enthusiastic about the space. There are so many new developments each day that we would expect an applicant to do their homework and know what is happening in real-time, that day,” says Danielle Ellis, Digital PR Evangelist at The brpr Group.

“And not so much as ‘do your homework’ as to know what is the latest because you love it,” Ellis explains. “Enthusiasm for the space is #1. The rest can come. Enthusiasm can quickly turn into social media addiction, which we do not frown upon here. We are all addicted to our Twitter handles and ‘checking-in.’ This is what provides us with the stamina to keep up with an industry that changes minute-to-minute.”

Q. What Experience Do Companies Look For in a Social Media Intern?

“Professional experience is not necessary, and not even realistic as this space is so new.” Danielle Ellis, Digital PR Evangelist, The brpr Group

“I want to see that they are already using basic tools on their own (Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, etc.),” says Ravin, who suggests having a personal blog set up is also a good way to convince employers of your good communication skills.

Lux looks for the same thing. “We look for someone who already has a presence in social media, either active on Twitter, blogging, etc.” Although as representatives of the University, her interns also have to project a positive presence. “There are plenty of students who are active on social media but who would not be appropriate as representatives of the University,” reveals Lux.

It’s a point that people are becoming more aware of. By now we’ve all grasped that sprawled-naked-drunk pics aren’t a great idea on social sites, but taking that further, be aware that your past tweets can all be evaluated, so you have to decide a level of sensible self-censorship that won’t make you look unattractive to potential employers.

“If I can see that the applicant has been active on their social media handles, handling themselves professionally, that is a huge plus,” says Ellis.

“Basically I make sure they’ve been on the Internet once or twice,” jokes Sexton. “And obviously I look for their knowledge of social media, especially in their personal networks. I look for that individual who ‘gets it’ or is already branding themselves and they may not even know it.”

Q. What Makes a Good Social Media Intern?

“A good social media intern is going to be much like any other intern, or other staff member — ability to work under [their] own direction. Show initiative, ideas. Ability to execute. Creativity.” Toby Storie-Pugh, Executive Director, Flying Kites Inc

“Someone who is creative, good at coming up with ideas — willing to take an idea and run with it without a lot of micro-managing by me, has tons of enthusiasm for what they are doing and is always looking for what we can do next,” answers Lux.

And of course, says Lux, you have to be prepared and willing “to work hard, at a moment’s notice, at all hours of the day and night.”

“A great social media intern is someone who can think outside-the-box and help brainstorm new ideas,” adds Klamm.

Nicole Ravlin considers a good social media intern as “someone who wants to learn and be part of a team.”

“We work in teams at PMG to build social strategy and then help clients execute. If an intern is truly interested in learning how we approach things and participates in the process it is a win-win. That participation, desire to contribute and being part of the team is key,” says Ravin.

“It is also great for the intern to take what they actually did, turn it into a portfolio piece, and show it (not just talk about it) to a future employer.”

High Tech Roadshow blog: Nokia N8 starts shipping worldwide

noreply@blogger.com (Haytham Ahmed) — Fri, 08 Oct 2010 12:17:00 PDT

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Sony Ericsson Yendo Walkman Mobile

noreply@blogger.com (Haytham Ahmed) — Sat, 22 May 2010 16:43:00 PDT

Sony Ericsson a annoncé son premier téléphone Walkman tactile complète qui est appelée la Yendo qui combine la musique, de réseautage et de communication dans un téléphone coloré. Le téléphone comporte quatre-coin toucher l'interface utilisateur se trouve sur le Xperia X 10 X 10 mini pro et est fourni avec le lecteur Touch Walkman, Touch TrackID et les fonctions de PlayNow.

Le Yendo doté d'un écran tactile de 2,6 pouces 320 × 240, un 2 mégapixels caméra, Bleuetooth et audio jack de 3,5 mm. Il est préchargé avec les applications facebook, orkut et twitter. Prend en charge le téléphone GSM/EDGE 850/1900 et 900 1800 réseaux. Il sera publié au troisième trimestre en noir, bleu, vert, orange, rose, Purple, Red, Silver, blanc et jaune couleurs.

Samsung Galaxy Beam i8520 projecteur téléphone

Samsung a annoncé son smartphone Android i8520 de Galaxy poutre avec projecteur pico intégré. La poutre de Galaxy est un smartphone exécutant Android OS 2.1 avec l'interface utilisateur de TouchWiz 3.0.

Il comprend un projecteur de pico d'AMOELD tactile et intégré 3,7 pouces 800 × 480 en basé sur la technologie DLP de TI. Il obtient un 8 caméras mégapixels avec mise au point automatique et de flash, appareil photo avant VGA, 16 Go de mémoire interne, usage, Bluetooth et Wi-Fi.

Samsung Galaxy Beam i8520 sera publié le mois prochain.

Par : itechnews

How to Turn Google Reader into the Ultimate SEO Tool

noreply@blogger.com (Haytham Ahmed) — Sat, 22 May 2010 16:26:00 PDT

Sent to you by "هيثم فوكس" via Google Reader:

Most people don't realize that Google Reader can be used as an amazing SEO tool to monitor your industry, competitors, and their backlinks all for FREE. This can be accomplished with a variety of Google Alerts and Yahoo Pipes. The idea is to create insightful RSS feeds and aggregate them into one place, Google Reader.

Here are the main SEO resources we will be monitoring:

Competitor's keywords (brand and product keywords)
New pages on a Competitors site
Industry keywords
Forums (find people asking questions about your industries products / services)
Competitors backlinks (mainly new backlinks)

We will organize all the feeds that we pull into Google Reader and file them under one folder to keep things nice and clean. You may have many clients you would like to perform this exercise for and its a good idea to separate them out to avoid confusion.

Before we begin, you will need a Google Account to use Google Reader, so if you don't have one, sign up. For the sake of this example, lets say I'm in the hot sauce business and Tabasco my number one competitor.

1) Competitors Keywords

Start by adding an alert to Google Alerts for tabasco. Set the type to Everything and Deliver to to feed

Click Create Alert, then view in Google Reader:

This will take you to Google Reader where we will be aggregating our feeds.

Note: sometimes this is a little buggy and you need to manually add the feed to Google reader by clicking the Feed link and copying and pasting the feed url to Google Reader

First thing to do in Google Reader is to create a new folder to keep things organized. Once you have clicked the new feed and are viewing it, click Feed Settings to create a new folder to place this feed and the others in, I named mine, hotsauce.

Now I'm gonna create an alert for a specific product of Tabasco, the Habanero Sauce. I'm purposely not going to include the word Tabasco in this alert because anything with Tabasco will get picked up in my first alert. Create another Google Alert with "Habanero Sauce" (in quotes) as the keyword and the same settings as before. Subscribe to this alert just as you did in step 1 and put it in your new folder in Google Reader.

2) Spying on Your Competitors Site

Second, lets create an alert for new pages on a competitors site. It would be nice to know everything they are doing when its happening, or close to it. This is really simple. Just setup another Google alert with the keyword being site:competitor.com. In my case I'm going to use Tabasco again, so my keyword for the alert would be site:tabasco.com.

Save the feed and subscribe to it. Once in your reader mark all items for this feed as read and any new pages will appear at the top of your reader for this feed.

3) Industry Keywords

The next thing I want to do is monitor industry keywords. I really like Soovle to start brainstorming keyword ideas if you don't have any.

As a hot sauce entrepreneur I'm am sure to have lots of recipes and would be interested in other sites with recipes as well (perhaps I can submit my recipes), so I add intitle:submit to my keyword query. So my keyword query looks like: "hot sauce recipes" intext:(submitaddenter).

This will only return pages with the query "hot sauce recipes" as well as pages that say "submit" or "add" or "enter". It's not perfect but should return some good results to monitor.

4) Forums

Answering questions people have in forums is a great way to gain a new customer and also get a little SEO boost. I'm in no way recommending that you go spamming forums that have nothing to do with what you are offering. What I am saying setting up the right channels to monitor when people have questions about your product or the industry, answering them will help win customers and in some cases provide a small boost in your websites authority (with a signature link back to your site).

I recommend finding an industry specific forum that is very active where you can focus your efforts as well as monitoring Yahoo Answers. You will find that a lot of people will end up at your site from reading your answers to questions and some turn into clients (its not all about ranking #1 in Google)

So for Yahoo Answers I did a query with hot sauce as the keyword and selected open questions as the question status. Then you can select the rss feed for the search right below the search refinements on the left panel of the page:

Second, I want to find an industry forum that I can really add value to. Do a quick Google Discussion search for your topic, I did one on hot sauce. Pretty quickly I found Chow.com, a site dedicated to cooking. Setting up a Google Alert specific to this site will allow me to monitor their blog, new recipes, their forum and much more. Even better, it's very web 2.0, so I will have lots of opportunity to comment throughout the entire site.

My Google Alert keyword this time looks like this: site:chow.com "hot sauce". This will limit my results to just the website chow.com (still includes chowhound.chow.com, the main forum, or any other sub domain on chow.com) and search the site for "hot sauce". Subscribe to this alert just as you did the others.

5) Backlinks

One thing Google is really bad at (on purpose) is showing you a websites backlinks. Thankfully Yahoo is great at it. The linkdomain:example.com query in Yahoo will return a search for the sites linking to your site. I'm going to use Tabasco.com as an example: linkdomain:tabasco.com -site:tabasco.com returns all links to tabasco.com but filters out any pages on tabasco.com (we only want external links).

In order to extract the items to an rss feed, I'm gonna use a custom Yahoo Pipe I created that simply runs a search on Yahoo. The nice thing about Yahoo Pipes is that you can export it into rss and many other formats (here is my rss feed for linkdomain:tabasco.com -site:tabasco.com). Its really easy to create a feed for your backlinks, just use my pipe and change the user input to your domain, run the pipe, and select get as rss. Subscribe to the rss feed in your Google Reader account and thats it.

One thing important about being a good SEO is understanding your industry from top to bottom. Skimming through these feeds and others on a everyday basis will help make you an expert in SEO for your field. One thing I find most useful is the loads of new ideas I get each day after digging through my clients feeds.

James Charlesworth is an SEO specialst for an Atlanta interactive marketing agency. You can read more about SEO on his personal site Seoatl.com/seo. You can also share SEO tips and join over 200 guest bloggers here.

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Change Colors Of Forward & Back Buttons In Windows Explorer

noreply@blogger.com (Haytham Ahmed) — Sat, 22 May 2010 16:07:00 PDT

Sent to you by "هيثم فوكس" via Google Reader:

Since Vista has been launched windows explorer has changed a bit it has to the blue colored navigation forward and back buttons on windows explorer shown on the left top of the windows explorer window.

By default in Windows 7 or vista Windows Explorer have blue colored navigation buttons, but you can change the color of these navigation buttons on windows explorer by using a free utlity called Vista/7 Navigation Button Colorizer.

Note: If you use avira antivirus, then it may report this utility as a trojan or virus because it tweaks system files but better ignore that it is not a virus.

How To Use

Once you run this portable tool with its executable, you can move the horizontal slider and then select the color for the navigation buttons in windows explorer and then click the button apply colour – once you click apply colour, windows explorer will restart so that the changes can take place and color of navigation button could change. But if the color of these navigation buttons does not change then you may need to restart your computer also.

Download Vista/7 Navigation Button Colorizer

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6 Tips to Improve Results of Press Releases

noreply@blogger.com (Haytham Ahmed) — Thu, 20 May 2010 15:31:00 PDT

Benefits Available Through Press Releases

Knowing how to properly write a press release can make the difference between publishing a mildly informative document and getting solid branding with several benefits, including:

Distribution – Reach areas of your market that you would otherwise never be able to get in contact with.
Reputation/Credibility – When your information and quotes are seen in the news, you often gain large amounts of respect. This can improve your reputation in many people's eyes.
Branding/Expertise – You'll often be seen as more of an expert in the market you speak on, especially if some of your achievements can be touched on in your releases.
SEO Benefits – Online press releases, when done right, can be posted on several web sites on publication. These sites are usually news sites which have a much better reputation to search engines than average, and are crawled more often. The number of links and quality of links make online PR a valuable tool for SEO.

Just putting together a press release is not enough. Putting together a good press release will make the difference between being viewed as an expert or as a joke.

Here are 6 tips on how to make sure your press releases are quality ones.

1) Keep your story "news friendly"

Be careful to not write on any random topic you want published. Talking about how great the product you're trying to sell is is not good press release material. Find a topic that a news publication would want to publish. It's a story of some kind that people will want to read about. Keep that in mind and you're already a step ahead.

2) Do proper quality checking

Review your press release for any possible spelling or grammar errors. Either of these will not do well to improve readers' opinions of your level of professionalism. In addition to this, be sure that the facts you state in your story are true. Any false information in a news publication is a big no-no.

A good way to check your story is to pass it on to a friend or colleague and ask them to judge your whole story, as well as checking it for errors. If they find it interesting, that's a good sign.

3) Put links in place appropriately

The SEO benefits of online press releases are great. Just make sure you use your links properly. Do not put more than one link for every 100 words in your release. When you use paid press release services you can choose to put links with the anchor text of your choice.

Make sure that your keywords fit seamlessly into your copy. Putting a link with anchor text mentioning a local service does not fit so well in a press release about a national issue, unless you can tie it well to a person you are quoting or a specific example for the story that is in that local area. Keep it relevant.

4) More is not better

Anyone who is thinking of putting a press release into publication will not want a long story. For reporters, they'll want to be able to analyze the story and hook as quickly as possible. Shorter stories are easier to digest.

In addition to that, don't put out several similar press releases in quick succession. There is no reason any publications will want to put out similar stories rapidly.

5) Aim for proper timing

Timing your press release on a specific day can make a big difference in the effectiveness and impact of it. Most press releases are slated for Monday publications. In some cases the weekend is the best bet for your market. Research your particular market, see when most news stories are published. More readers will look for stories during those times, so you'd benefit more from timing your release during these days.

Also be careful about putting out your release at the same time as another story in your market that is bigger than your story. Putting a release out about the growth of your cell phone store will likely not do as well if you timed it to release the same day the as the official iPad release.

6) Choose the right press release service

There are many choices on how to do press releases. If you only want local coverage and don't care so much about the SEO benefits, then you can often go to local newspapers with your story and submit it directly for little or no cost. You can also go with a paid service like PRWeb to distribute widely and with SEO benefits.

There are several services available, it's best to find one that has all the benefits you are interested in that have a cost you can afford. Free press release services will not have the same benefits as paid ones but still will produce results.

Putting a press release together well by following these tips can make a large difference in how effective your release works for your company and site. Put press releases together with care and spend time to keep the quality up and you will see the benefits.

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