New Mac Pro (2013)

For a long time I thought Apple is not making new Mac Pro anymore but in WWDC 2013 Apple revealed an entirely new Mac Pro with radical cylinder design. It is a big departure from “cheese grater” Mac Pro and much smaller too.

Apple considered all the elements that makes a “pro” computer such as graphics, storage, expansion slots, processing power, memory and so much more.

Small

Only 9.9 inches tall and 6.6 inches wide (diameter). You’ll be surprised that it has a lot of expansions available. It has 802.11ac and bluetooth 4.0  wireless connectivity as well as numerous I/O connections including 6 thunderbolt ports, an HDMI 1.4 port, 4 USB 3 ports and 2 Gigabit Ethernet ports.

Radical

If you remember the “sunflower” iMac with a hemisphere base, this doesn’t look very odd at all. There are varying opinions with the design but you either love it or you hate it. Some people makes fun of its shape — that it looks like a vacuum cleaner.

However, when I first saw it the first thing that came to my mind is R2-D2 and other Star Wars astromech droids.

R2-D2, R5 and R6-series droids, meet your new sibling Mac Pro #WWDC pic.twitter.com/HE4xSQAWSK

— Marck V. (@metallicvapor) June 10, 2013

I’m sure there are several people out there planning to mod this new Mac Pro into R2-D2 already.

Innovative

The new Mac Pro has dual GPUs, PCI Express-based flash storage, Thunderbolt 2, new-gen Intel Xeon processors and 4k video support.

The processor can support up to 12 cores and compared to the old Mac Pro, the new Mac Pro is 2x faster in floating-point performance, delivering up to 40GB/s of PCI-express 3 bandwidth. The memory supports 4-channel DDR3 memory at 1866MHz bus speed and could delivery up to 60 GB/s of memory bandwidth.

Graphics is not neglected in the new Mac Pro as it can deliver up to 7 teraflops of computer power thanks to Dual AMD FirePro workstation-class GPUs with 6GB of dedicated VRAM. With its arsenal of dual GPUs it can power 3 ultra HD (4k) resolution display.

The black aluminum enclosure gives the new Mac Pro an odd shape but for a practical reason. It houses a unified thermal core which enable the unit to use a single piece of extruded aluminum in triangular shape that maximizes the airflow as well as thermal capacity using only a single fan. It looks very neat and is one of a kind.

When looking at the thermal core design, I could not help but notice the resemblance it has with Darth Vader’s mask. I don’t know if Apple is inspired so much to push the boundaries of computing that it is getting design cues from sci-fi movies like Star Wars. I am excited with this new development and I think Apple did a great job here.

May the force be with you!

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As a leader in technology innovation, Apple makes the news when it changes its products. So devoted to the company are its users that even rumors and speculation tend to send the digital media into overdrive. And when Tim Cook, Apple’s CEO, starts hinting of upcoming changes to operating systems and products, the media hype machine kicks into full effect and ears perk straight up.

iOS 7

Apple fans are fully aware that the next generation of iPhones, iPads and other Apple products are likely to feature a new iOS system. Tim Cook remarked in an All Things D interview that the latest iOS system will improve the relationship between hardware, software and customer service, something Apple customers expect. Although the previous generations of the iOS system were innovative, the expectations for the latest software and hardware are much higher than before since the late Steve Jobs stepped down and Cook hinted the next system will have major improvements.

Apple TV Sales

The most interesting aspect of the interview concerned Apple’s plans for television. Apple has sold roughly 13 million Apple TVs since it was originally developed, noted Engadget.com. Since Apple TV is not the primary innovation from the company, the large number of sales and the rapid growth over the last year was surprising.The company did not realize that the hockey-puck sized television attachment would generate a high level of interest.

Due to the growing number of Apple TV sales, it is not surprising that the CEO hinted about big plans for the future. Engadget.com suggested that Apple plans to take part in the changing dynamics of television that companies like Netflix and Amazon are working on now.

The Future of the Products

Cook stated that the TV is long overdue for an upgrade and the company has a vision for the future of TV, noted Business Insider. While he did not give specifics about the innovations the company is planning to unveil in the future, he did give enough hints to tantalize Apple customers. The vision for television and the improvements to the iOS system are only a part of the grand scheme that will result in a greater television experience.

DirectTVDeal.com suggests that video streaming has changed the television viewing experience, but Apple’s CEO noted during the interview that it is still possible to make improvements. The current Apple TV provides the opportunity to enjoy iTunes movies and works with video streaming companies like Netflix. According to Apple.com, it also syncs with the iOS systems via AirPlay, so it is possible to enjoy games and apps from an iPhone, iPad or other Apple products on the larger screen of a television.

The future of the television experience is likely to improve on the current AirPlay system and the streaming options. According to USA Today, voice and gestures might be an upcoming feature of the newer system. It is possible that the newer iOS system and Apple TV will work on adjusting the Siri system for better voice control. The publication suggests that gestures might be an option, but it would need reworking the entire system to include sensors, which might make it a little bulky.

Watching television on the Apple TV might be a better experience than using voice commands and gestures to communicate with the system. USA Today suggests Apple TV might incorporate apps into the television viewing experience. Instead of watching cable or flipping through a large number of channels, the system will offer only the channels that viewers are most interested in watching.

Innovation is a key part of Apple’s approach to reaching customers. Although the details are not yet available, hints on the technology are giving a clear image of the possibilities.

image by deerkoski

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Samsung have formally announced and dated their new flagship smartphone, Samsung Galaxy S4, and announced that it will reach American hands on April 30th. It arrives just in time to tempt those who haven’t yet reached for the HTC One and are waiting it out to see what Samsung pulls out of its magician’s top hat, as the company has built a reputation for innovation and quality over the years and has released a string of popular handsets.

Not that other manufacturers haven’t, of course – but you’d have to feel a little stressed knowing you were facing off against this beast of a machine. With two gigabytes of RAM, a 5″ screen (a cheeky wink towards the current 4.7″ trend) and full HD on its display, the Galaxy S4 is a serious contender for being branded the best handset of 2013.

The impressing thing about Samsung’s launch will be its inevitable competition with other handsets as it sets out to demonstrate just what sets the manufacturer apart. Then again, given Samsung manufactures the tech for at least one other major competitor, it’s worth thinking about the level of capability they possess when it comes to building smartphones, tablets and the like.

The initial reviews are starting to come in, although they’re no more than first looks, but the initial impression from critics is that they’re, well, impressed. There’s a lot to compete with here, bearing in mind that the Galaxy S4  follows on from the SII and S3, both extremely popular high-quality phones in their own right, both of them still happily in use by Samsung fans even now, which is unusual for the smartphone market.

The S4 itself has many noticeable improvements, such as facial recognition technology, an improved camera, and a larger and higher-resolution screen. It also comes with an extremely thin layer of glass over the screen itself, which helps keep the form factor of the device down while allowing you to feel like you’re interacting with the screen more directly than on handsets with thicker glass.

There are other little innovative touches, too, such as Smart Look, which pauses video when the phone works out you’re not looking at the screen, Sound and Shot, which records nine seconds of audio with the photo you’ve just taken (not a unique feature but a nice one nonetheless), and of course the quality of the camera itself whether you’re recording video or taking snapshots of the world around you. The S4 indeed has quite the formidable feature set, and when it hits the USA at the end of April it will be interesting to see how the competition reacts to such a desirable phone.

It seems like this year is definitely the year of smartphones that are set to push the bar regardless of which manufacturer they’re from, and as Samsung and HTC step up as rivals to Apple in terms of innovation and quality, it’ll be exciting to see who comes out on top in the end, especially if it drives these companies to produce more impressive handsets in an attempt to beat one another.

Editor’s note: Samsung Galaxy S4 will hit the Philippine market this week and local telcos will have their separate launches in the coming weeks, too, so stay tuned for more information.

About the Author:

Allie Cooper is a writer interested in gadgets, fashion, mobile handsets and social media trends. Aside from blogging she is a fan of playing on computer games and she’s always available on Twitter.

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Zoolz Home Free & Premium

Zoolz comes in 3 different editions – Zoolz Home Free, Zoolz Home Premium and Zoolz Business. Both Home Premium and Business editions comes in several pricing packages.  In this review I will focus on Zoolz Home editions, Free and Premium.

Although not as popular as other mainstream cloud backup services, Zoolz is a product of Genie9 that has offered back up services to home and businesses users for a long time already. Other products of Genie9 includes Genie Backup Manager, Genie Timeline and G Cloud Backup for Android.

Zoolz uses only the best cloud storage available so it uses Amazon AWS Glacier for cold storage technology. To make the deal sweeter, Zoolz is offering 100 GB FREE storage for the first 1,000,000 users and whoever gets it will be able to use the free storage for a lifetime.

Enter vexite1 and get 5% off when you upgrade to Zoolz Home Premium 100GB 

Features

All editions of Zoolz come with modern encryption method for both file transfer and storage. I will discuss the security details later on. Take note that for all Home versions, restore time takes 3-5 hours after initiation due to the nature of cold storage technology.

You can refer to the comparison table below to see the difference between Zoolz Business, Home Premium and Home Free.

Home Free version only allows backup interval of 45 minutes but premium allows more frequent scan interval — as frequent as every 5 minutes. It also allows setting scheduled backups and full scan interval, as well as scheduled backup by date. Premium supports file type, file size and date filters.

In Home Premium, you can also throttle upload bandwidth and set when the throttling schedule will apply. Two more modes are added in Premium as well — presentation mode which pauses backup while displaying presentation, playing games or watching movies, and battery saving mode which saves battery when your laptop is running on batteries by reducing the resources required by Zoolz client app to reduce power consumption. It will completely stop and only monitor changes if the battery level is critical. You can also allow Zoolz Home Premium to only upload files when using specific connection. For instance, you can prevent Zoolz from backing up if you are connected to 3G/4G connection.

Business version has all the premium features with additional business features such as file sharing, direct upload to Zoolz website, backup policies, server backup, adding users with bulk upload tool and smart selections. Smart selection is one important features for business users because it offers pre-configured selection of most important items on your computer and it makes backing up important data easier. For example, selecting “email” will ensure that all .pst files are backed up. Selecting “Office Files” will scan all .doc, .docx, .ppt, .pptx, .xls, .xlsx and other recognizable Microsoft Office suite files.

Although not mentioned in the comparison table Zoolz can also back-up external and network drives.

Ease of Use

I find Zoolz surprisingly easy to use. In less than 5 minutes you can download Zoolz installer, install the Windows client, run it and start your back up immediately. Below is a slideshow of the entire sign up process and getting started with Zoolz Home.

Click to view slideshow.

RAW and image preview is supported so Zoolz is also pegged as a back-up solution for photographers. There are very few cloud services that offer RAW support so if you are a photographer and you wish to back-up RAW and be able to preview them as well, Zoolz is one of the best out there.

Working on Zoolz Windows client is very intuitive and it kinds of reminds me the Windows 8 interface. It supports Windows XP SP3 and more recent release of Windows including Windows 8. It also supports Windows servers and both 32-bit and 64-bit platforms. At the moment Mac is not supported but Zoolz will support it in the near future.

Zoolz offers free mobile app called Zoolz Go. According to Zoolz technical support, the mobile app is intended for Zoolz Business only but I am able to use it in my Zoolz Home account. Take note that you can’t do anything with the files if you are only using cold storage which the only option available for Zoolz Home. You could view the files but to fully use the mobile app you need to get instant storage which is only available for Business users.

Web access is not as robust as Dropbox, Box or Skydrive and it does not offer any integration with 3rd party services yet. You can open documents and certain files with Google docs but other than that there are no immediate integration with other cloud backup solutions. Navigating the website could be confusing sometimes because it is easy to forget the tabs for Home and Business is different but once you are logged in, the interface is consistent and easy to understand.

Zoolz Home Free is only limited to 1 user but you can use up to two computers. This an added value if you wish to move or restore an old machine backup to a new computer. You don’t need to transfer the license or worry about extra fee at all. If you need to issue multiple user access you need to upgrade to premium for additional user access.

Security

In terms of reliability, Genie9 is in the backup business for more than 13 years already so you should feel more confident knowing that they have been around even before the cloud bandwagon started.

Zoolz security is using top-notch military grade encryption. I think that some of the security layer is redundant but that is good news for extra paranoid users.

Zoolz website and client software is hardened against hacking attacks. Amazon S3 uses AES-256 server-side encryption and the actual files are encrypted with military grade 256-AES encryption, too. Transfers are secured using SSL  and the only time files are decrypted is only on authorized machines.

Storage Space

Zoolz is very generous in providing free storage space. Take advantage of the free 100 GB storage now and worry about upgrading later. I think it is a good strategy knowing that most users who will outgrow the free 100 GB storage will likely upgrade to paid Zoolz packages.

Cold Storage technology is cheap. While there is an obvious advantage in value but it trades off restore time speed. The actual upload and download of files is as quick as any other services but the duration to prepare restoration is much slower compared to instant cloud storage services.

Pricing

I have plotted the storage to pricing ratio of popular cloud backup services.  Anything above the diagonal line is deemed to have more value per dollar spent. Take note that I did not include services with unlimited back-up storage because it will skew the graph too much even if I set a theoretical limit. In order to compare relative pricing per GB, I used Dropbox Free/Pro, Skydrive, Box Business and Google Drive.

The area of the circles are directly proportional to the number of users per account. The smallest circle is equals to 1 user per account.

Zoolz Home Premium starts at $19.92 per year with 100 GB storage. As you can see, Zoolz Home is able to offer more competitive pricing than any paid services from Google Drive, Skydrive, Dropbox Pro and Box Business.

I already mentioned the restore speed trade off but I doubt many users will be crashing their computers everyday. Therefore, for budget conscious consumers, Zoolz Home gives greater value than most popular cloud storage solution mentioned.

Enter vexite1 and get 5% off when you upgrade to Zoolz Home Premium 100GB

Support

Zoolz seems to be consistent with the support structure of Genie9. You can always contact the sales hotline but there is no 24/7 hotline for technical support. What you get is a well documented and updated help center wiki as well as email forms that  are routed to sales and technical support group. In most situations I can find what I need from the help center. Given that Zoolz is easy of use, there is very little reason to call Zoolz for technical support.  Google Drive, Dropbox Pro and Box do not offer voice support as well but if you compare Zoolz to customer-centric cloud back-up companies you start to wonder why they don’t offer telephone hotline.

I have tested the technical support form and the technical support team is able answer my inquiries in about 30 minutes. I did not test the consistency but I am happy that support is very responsive.

Summary

To wrap this up, Zoolz Home Free is a steal if you are after cost-effective solution for personal computer back-up. You also get the free 100 GB storage if you are one of the first 1 million registered user. Using cold storage technology Zoolz is able to offer cheaper price per GB without sacrificing security and ease of use. Zoolz is using Amazon Glacier for cold storage technology so it is very reliable. Users should not be discouraged with the delayed restoration period if the purpose of the back-up is for archiving only. This is great for artists, photographers and videographers who wish to keep a safe and secured copy of their work in the cloud. It is definitely a must-try service for cloud storage enthusiasts alike.

Use my special coupon vexite2 to get 5% for Zoolz Business with 50 GB instant storage and 100 GB cold storage.

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Buffalo AirStation Pro 802.11n

Two new Buffalo business-class wireless access points are now available locally – Bufallo AirStation Pro 802.11n Gigabit Dual Band PoE Wireless Access Point and AirStation Pro 802.11n Gigabit Concurrent Dual Band PoE Wireless Access Point.

You probably don’t need these in your house unless you live in a mansion. However, if you own a business you should consider getting a business-class wireless Access Point (simply wireless AP).

When you go to malls or big offices and you see boxy devices hanging from the ceiling with antenna, they are most-likely wireless AP.

Going back to Bufallo AirStation Pro, the only real difference between the two Buffalo AirStation Pro 802.11n AP models is that the first one has selectable Dual band support which means you can select either 5 GHz or 2.4 GHz frequencies at 300 MBbps max. The other one has a concurrent dual band technology, or in other terms MIMO, that creates  two separate wireless network on 5 Ghz and 2.4 Ghz frequencies at 300 MBbps max each.

These Buffalo AirStation wireless AP also feature plenum-rated chassis which means you can place these wireless AP inside a plenum (air vents or just about any place up the ceiling where air circulates). That also means they are extra though. They also support Power over Ethernet (PoE) so you can power these devices with Ethernet cables where power  cables can’t reach.

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Having done many projects from WordPress blogs to complex enterprise software implementations, I tend to ask these questions when a website/software will be redesigned or upgraded. Consider these as fundamental questions that should be addressed from the beginning or early inception of the idea. Here are some of the questions at the top of my mind now that I’ll use to review the new Triberr:

• What is the main objective of the upgrade/redesign?
• What is working; what is not working now?
• What are the features (requirements) needed by stakeholders
• How will it benefit the business
• How will it impact the customer
• What are the risks that could potentially stall progress
• How will you evaluate the success of the project

What is the main objective of the upgrade/redesign?

From a customer perspective, I believe that Dino and co.  hits the jackpot when he discussed in a blog posts that the old Triberr’s usability leaves much to desired. The upgrade is supposed to bring complete design overhaul that will offer an awesome user interface.

Looking at the new Triberr you can definitely see the vast improvement in design. While this definitely gives Triberr the “eye candy”, UX is much more than aesthetics. Later on I’ll discuss some small annoyances with the new Triberr.

What is working; what is not working?

This is based in my experience alone.

What is working : the idea about tribes, tribe invite system, freemium business model, blocking/muting, posts distribution through Twitter and other social networks

What is not working well: Triberr comment system (there’s a huge room for improvement here), laborious manual post approval (workflow could be tedious when you have hundreds of tribe-mates , pagination is sometimes hit or miss, post filtering sometimes does not work and statistics not accurate.

What are the features (requirements) needed by stakeholders?

I could only speculate that most of the top requested features are the inspiration for the redesign but I believe there are more pressing issues that must be addressed within Triberr soon. Things like Triberr plugin to be available not just for WordPress but also in other blogging platforms. Not sure why Triberr can’t just have universal JavaScript code that lets you import posts using RESTful API or something similar. Then there are requests for granular scheduling controls so that you can only permit certain time for sharing posts. Ultimately these will make Triberr more useful but it is not available yet.

How will it benefit the business ?

The way I see it — with the redesign, more users will take Triberr more seriously, consider it within the same league as Twitter and Facebook, and include Triberr in their social media strategy. More power users = more prime members = better cash flow.

How will it impact the customer?

My first reaction after the new Triberr rolled out was this:

After a while it turned to something like this:

It seems that Triberr is back to beta status. I seriously don’t feel bad or disappointed because what Dan, Dino and company created is tremendously helpful to blogging community so I am not complaining. I’m just concerned to prime members and how new comers perceive Triberr as a service or a platform. While paying members get to preview the latest version of Triberr before regular (non-paying) members get to see it, some major bugs are still in the wild after the new Triberr is released to the public.

The transition from old (legacy) version to the new version is also not seamless. Some users still love to use the old version but having to two versions only confuses some. For example some posts appear only in the legacy version forcing me to switch back and forth the old and new versions to approve certain post. I’m not sure why this is even happening. The infinite-scroll feature also lags when loading more posts and this frustrates both new and old Triberr users. I know it is still work in progress but isn’t better UX the primary goal of the redesign? It should have been the top priority.

The no-click approval feature truly saves time and prevent clicking fatigue and in my opinion, one of the best features introduced — but it doesn’t mean it is flawless. Some users reported that it is not working as expected.

So far the experience is so-so. Half the time you’ll read accolades, then half the time you’ll read complains about certain feature that doesn’t work really well.

What are the risks that could potentially stall progress?

Regular Triberr users have witnessed the long downtime last week and it shows that even a well planned event could go wrong. It also showed how many Triberr supporters are out there willing to understand the tough situation that puts Dino, Dan and Andres sleepless for several days.

With the amount of transparency and accessibility from last weeks trials, I wonder why the new Triberr doesn’t feel as polished as I expected it to be. How do Triberr team prioritize and resolve bug fixes is beyond the scope of my review but Triberr could learn more from the difficulty last week so that they could cut the risks involved in bug fixing and day to day operations.

How will you evaluate the success of Triberr Redesign?

Only Triberr can answer this but if I were to measure the success of the redesign, I would use measurable data such as prime membership sales, post shared in all social networks, total engagements, new sign-ups and more quantitative information.

Summary

Over all it feels like the new Triberr needs more time to fully materialize. While the basic features work there are bugs all over the place. To add insult to injury, the database corruption one week before the public release of the new Triberr  made it a difficult experience to everyone not just to Triberr team.  In the end, the focus for better user experience seems to be overshadowed by unpolished features.

I certainly look forward to progressive improvements and rolling updates that will eventually solve the issues I have discussed here. More power to Triberr!

Update: The tribe has spoken! See the comments below. Team Triberr will have bug fixing marathon over the weekends. Stay tuned!

@arkarthick @mikejny @metallicvapor we’re spending a whole day today killing bugs, so new Triberr should be lot less buggies my tomorrow.

— Dino Dogan (@dinodogan) March 21, 2013

The post New Triberr Review – Better than Old (Legacy) Triberr? appeared first on MV.Tech.Blog - pinoy tech blog on web apps, web 2.0, social media, blogging and IT buzz Follow me in Twtter: http://www.twitter.com/metallicvapor

TweetDeck for Android, iOS and Air

When Twitter abandoned TweetDeck for Android and iOS last week to focus on the web version of the popular Twitter client, I was not surprised. If you look at the frequency of updates since Twitter acquired TweetDeck, the mobile apps were last updated on 4th quarter of 2011 but the HTML 5 and Chrome app managed to get regular updates. It seems they have neglected Android and iOS clients completely from the beginning. So for Twitter to say that “over the past few years, we’ve seen a steady trend towards people using TweetDeck on their computers and Twitter on their mobile devices,” is a well-coordinated plan. More users would have used TweetDeck on mobile if only Twitter exerted enough effort on its development. Obviously the priority is still on Twitters’ very own client.

The Air version was upgraded to HTML 5 (basically the same as Chrome) when Twitter acquired TweetDeck. It is not the old TweetDeck Air that we used to love or hate. Version 0.38.2 is the last Adobe Air version.

I didn’t miss the Adobe Air version too much because I stopped using it years ago. I don’t know why some people can’t move on. The only feature that I miss in  TweetDeck Air, which is still useful today, is the “Include @replies from friends to others” feature that enables you to see all conversation even if you are not following the friend of your friends. If you want to stalk your friend or monitor all conversation happening on Twitter then you’ll need it but why meddle in between conversations when it doesn’t concern you? I don’t have a strong opinion on why you should bother so I am fine without it.

TweetDeck HTML 5 and TweetDeck for Chrome is the best Twitter client for desktop because it doesn’t hog your computer resources and most of the features of the original TweetDeck Air is still there with additional innovations like the combined timeline columns for multiple accounts.

TweetDeck Replacement for Android

I consider myself a Twitter power user. I have several accounts and I seldom use the main timeline as my source of updates. Since I use lists to segment the people I am following it is  also the main reason why I don’t use Twitter for Android as my main Twitter client. It seems that Twitter does not highlight the importance of lists anymore but it is one of the most useful feature Twitter ever has. I rely too much on lists that I consider apps without an option to remove the “home” timeline, to replace with other lists, inferior compared to those apps supporting this feature. TweetDeck doesn’t have the option to remove the main timeline but at least there is an option to stop it from updating. I think the only reason I keep on using TweetDeck is due to its individual column refresh interval and alert settings. The HTML 5 and Chrome app inherited this feature but for me, it is much more useful in the mobile app.

As a back-up plan I have been using other great TweetDeck alternatives since last year.

These are my top three:

• Boid
• Ubersocial
• Plume

These three are very easy to customize and they have lots of features perfect for meticulous Twitter users like me.

Boid has a default Holo dark theme which is my preferred theme in all my Android apps Ubersocial and Plume can be customized to have dark themes similar to Holo. I would like to include Hootsuite in my preferred Twitter client for Android but the Android version is unstable in my experience; it pales in comparison to the iOS version.

TweetDeck Replacement for iOS

Speaking of iPhone, I am not a heavy user of Twitter in iPhone or iPad partly because there is no free Twitter app that is good enough for me in iPhone or iPad and partly because I can do so much more in Android twitter clients that there is no need for me to use any Twitter on iOS. However if I would choose a free Twitter client that would be Hootsuite and for the paid client I’ll choose Tweetbot.

How about you? What will be your primary Twitter client for mobile?

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App.net Free Account

At first I was surprised that you can already register an App.net free account when its goal from the beginning is to offer an ad-free service. It was made possible by offering premium paid-only service, at least initially.

Freemium model usually offset the cost of operations by displaying ads to non-paying users or by selling the data generated from the service to other business. There are many ways to carry out a freemium model so it does not mean App.net will start doing one of those things I mentioned.

So how does an ad-free network where users already pay $36 yearly or $5 monthly to use the service benefit with the new App.net freemium model?

Freemium is the way to go

To understand the switch from premium to freemium model you have to go back and read this article from The Verge where it details how App.net expanded its current paid offerings by offering cloud storage on top of its social network. All paid packages now offers 10 Gb of cloud storage  since late January this year.

Even when you look back at the first project announcement App.net is heavily inspired by services with freemium model namely Github and Evernote.

How to register free App.net account?

In order to get the App.net free tier account you must have an invite first. Free tier account users are similar to paid accounts but limited to following 40 users, file storage is much smaller – 500 MB,  and the max upload file size is only 10 MB.

While some paid user may think of downgrading to free account this could make App.net more popular because now even paid users can lure more of their friends and family inside the social network without any obligation.

This will also benefit the community because only the trusted people will be invited greatly reducing the risk of spam. Also with the limitation of free account, spamming or nonsense rambling seems futile. As free users hit the limitation there is a likelihood someone will upgrade just like how Evernote and Dropbox users upgrade to paid plans.

I am not an App.net user yet but I am interested on the service since last year. This might be the best time to try it out. Who knows, I might get an invitation sooner or later. If you are in App.net already and have a free invite to spare, please contact me directly here.

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If you search my blog, I have written enough topics about security wishing that it will help normal (non-geeky) people be more aware of simple exploits on their browsers and WordPress blogs. Hopefully it leads them to heed my advise and be more careful online.

I think I am paranoid enough that I worry how other people access the files that I share with them and I also mind where my files are going. In times when cloud is becoming the new norm in hosting files, trust has become a sensitive topic to me when choosing providers.

Everyone gets hacked one way or another

Unless you don’t have any digital footprint or you live inside a cave, you probably have been hacked in one way or another.

Even the biggest social network companies get hacked. LinkedIn had several million user passwords leaked. Many famous Twitter accounts get hacked everyday. Even Facebook gets hacked and they don’t even know what hit them. So what keeps hackers from hacking your website or blog?

After installing all the recommended WordPress security plugins, how sure are you that you’ll be safe from exploits or zero-day attacks?

You can never be 100% sure. Even if your host has the most advanced firewall it could still be vulnerable. That’s the thing about security. No matter how hard you try in securing something, there will always be someone trying to break inside.

Don’t overlook security warnings and updates

If you know that there are security holes on your software, don’t wait too long. Act immediately and patch things up.

The beauty with open source software like WordPress is that you get to receive upgrades almost immediately after a security report had been reported, or at least in a regular interval. Of course, it is equally ugly too because anyone who has knowledge about the problematic code can exploit the reported issue quickly too. It doesn’t make closed software safer because there will be a limited number of developers working on a patch unlike open source — there are potentially hundreds or even thousands of contributors willing to fix the security hole immediately. But here is a catch — as an end-user, you have an obligation to update your own installation.

If you are lazy to update or you don’t have the courage to mess around with codes or manually patch files, forget open-source and get a hosted service instead or hire a pro or someone who understands it more than you do. (Hire me?)

Commonly ignored part

The weakest link in security hardening is often the user. If you don’t change your thinking about your blog security, you’ll end up regretting it.

WordPress security tools are there to remind you that you cannot bullet-proof security. Even the WordPress plugin “Bulletproof security” is not so bullet-proof. It gets update from time to time because it has security flaws too. You always have to check the security status regularly and act quickly to prevent disaster from happening.

Remember: Security is not set-it-and-forget-it.

Server and Network-Level Security

This is not commonly discussed in WordPress blog security but as you add more layer of security, there is a bigger chance that you’ll survive or prevent an attack.

Take CloudFlare as example. It is a free service that could remedy several security problems with websites and blogs on a network level; however, it is not a one-fits all solution.

You still have to update your operating system! Yes, many people have switched to the cloud but even if you are hosted in the cloud there are still components that needs to be updated because you cannot run a website without an operating system such as Linux and Windows.

Recovery

WordPress has a long list of FAQ when your WordPress blog get compromised. It is not only applicable for WordPress blogs only. Most of the tips there are also good for other online software that was hacked.

Stay calm.

You have to stay calm to be able to deal with this situation. The first step before you respond to any security incident is to calm yourself down to make sure you do not commit any mistakes. We are serious about it.

For me, the most important tip listed in the list is to keep your calm. Panicking usually results to more disastrous result. If you back-up regularly and you keep your back-up files safe you can recover almost instantly. Hopefully you learn a lesson or two from the bad experience and do not repeat the same mistake again.

Photo credit to ndanger

The post How Safe is Your Blog from Hacking? appeared first on MV.Tech.Blog - pinoy tech blog on web apps, web 2.0, social media, blogging and IT buzz Follow me in Twtter: http://www.twitter.com/metallicvapor

I got an email from Kred two weeks ago and I was amused to know that I am in the Top Kred 5% Influencer (Global). I’m not even trying to collect Kred but someone must be noticing.

PeopleBrowsr published details here on how they compute the scores. The beauty of the system is that every points count. Everything is transparent. You can check how your scores added up and how your actions influenced others.

Take note that Kred uses a double logarithmic scale so if you got a 10%, 5% or 1 % Top Influential Badge, it means that you really are somewhere at the top of the scale.

So what good is it to be top Kred influencer anyway?

Unlike Klout where I get international Klout Perks from time to time, I have not experienced any Kred rewards yet.

I’m not disappointed. After all, I didn’t join these services to get a prize. Both Klout and Kred can be used for certain metrics and how you use those numbers depend entirely on you.

For someone based in the Philippines, Kred only gives me a bragging right and an arbitrary number to post in my blog profile. It is cool because it looks like a gold trophy. It doesn’t deter me from engaging  my community. Actually, it inspires me to engage more with my community because I know that I am sharing something with value.

Again, who knows? I might get a Top Kred 1% Influencer badge next time and that might become my stepping stone on becoming the next big thing in online brand endorsement  (even product management) here in the Philippines.

Not trying to be sarcastic here but if I’m in top 5% Global influencer according to @kred — Philippine brands what are you waiting for? :D

— Marck V. (@metallicvapor) February 8, 2013

Check my Kred profile here and don’t forget to send a +Kred.

The post I’m in Top 5% Influencers According to Kred. Now What? appeared first on MV.Tech.Blog - pinoy tech blog on web apps, web 2.0, social media, blogging and IT buzz Follow me in Twtter: http://www.twitter.com/metallicvapor