By Matthew Hall

Businesses and customers are looking for each other in the wrong way.

Is the traditional call centre finished as a customer service platform now that social media and crowd help are the new fashion?

Strutting the floor at a promotional event for Salesforce.com in New York earlier this year Marc Benioff, the cloud computing company’s founder and chief executive, declared landline call centres antiquated, if not entirely deceased.

Benioff would say that – Salesforce sells products enabled by social and mobile technology. That aside, he also has a point. As communication technology rapidly develops, Benioff said businesses must rethink how they approach servicing customers.

Significant numbers of customers today will turn to online FAQs, email, instant messaging, online forums, and virtual agents rather than pick up a phone.

Research from industry analyst Forrester suggested that while a majority of customers in the US at least still use the telephone for customer service, that number is declining. Forrester’s research indicated Twitter was the least-used but fastest-growing channel for customer service.

“There is so much change, there is so much happening today in the world, that the ability to listen to customers, empathise with them and understand them, is the single most important thing that we can do,” Benioff said.

More than 4.5 billion people are connected on social networks, according to Forrester, and each is connecting through social media with friends and colleagues both at home and at work. That’s not only a big audience for enterprise customer service it is a huge platform for customer relations. The market is also growing – more than 1.7 billion touch devices were shipped in 2012.

Research in Australia, however, suggests that while businesses are trying to use social media for customer service, consumers are slower to use those channels for their own benefit.

A report on Australian customer service trends by Fifth Quadrant found that businesses and customers were looking for each other in the wrong places.

Australian consumers consider Facebook to be their number one choice for customer service engagement, followed by online forums and communities, and YouTube.

Networks like Twitter, LinkedIn and blogs were the least popular options. Tweet this – according to Fifth Quadrant, more than seven in ten consumers claimed they “rarely” or “never” turn to Twitter, LinkedIn, or blogs for customer service.

Yet Twitter is used by more than three quarters of Australian organisations and businesses, perhaps tweeting at themselves rather than customers. Company blogs, websites, and online communities were ahead of Facebook, YouTube, and LinkedIn as preferred tools for businesses.

“Simply creating a new service channel then standing back and waiting for the customers to come won’t work,” said Chris Kirby, Fifth Quadrant’s head of research. “If organisations want to offer customer service through social media, they need to go to the networks that their customers use.”

Anecdotal evidence is inconclusive for the merits of social media over a traditional telephone. For every customer that says an issue was resolved through Twitter, another claims their tweet to a company was ignored.

There may, however, be some firmer evidence that call centres have a short-term future. Reaching out to the Philippines, US and Australia, no call centres or industry organisations, including the ATA (previously known as the Australian Teleservices Association), responded to requests for comment on this story.
Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/it-pro/business-it/pulling-the-plug-on-call-centres-20130508-2j6m6.html#ixzz2T4LCDlUa

By Martin Conboy

Dr. Thomas Frey, a futurist and Executive Director at the DaVinci Institute and Google’s top rated futurist speaker, has a theory around the secret language of the future. His theory is about how the future gets created. He claims that we could influence the future by using social media and other unusual techniques for both understanding and gaining control of our own futures.

Frey puts forward a proposition that in the future, workgroups would come together in much the same way that Hollywood comes together to make a movie and then break up after the project is over. “The future gets created in the minds of everyone around us. Virtually everyone has a hand in it, but not all contributions are equal. As you might imagine, a small group of people armed with powerful ideas can make a disproportionately large impact.”

“But creating the future needs to involve much more than just ideas. The ideas create a starting point but need to be put into a visual context, massaged, enhanced, and somehow made to spring to life.”
Frey speaks about ‘Business Colonies’. Business colonies are an evolving, new kind of organisational structure designed around matching talent with pending work projects. The colonies will revolve around some combination of resident people based in a physical facility and a non-resident virtual workforce. Some will forego the cost of the physical facility completely, opting instead to form around an entirely virtual communications structure.

In an increasingly mobile world-where work is outsourced and international partnerships form quickly and easily-workers need to be able to collaborate with colleagues, share information, and access programs just as easily from a distant continent as from the cubicle next door.

Most will be organised around a topical area best suited for the talent base of the core team. As an example, a team of photonics engineers will attract projects best suited for that kind of talent. Likewise, a working group of programmers specialising in computer gaming applications will serve as a magnet for new gaming projects. Its not a leap of faith to think of specialist BPO skills like animation, web development, F&A organized around skills located in a distinct geographical location that will attract projects and on going work.

In some instances, large corporations will launch their own business colonies as a way to expand capability without adding to their headcount. Staffed with a few project managers, the company will use the colony as a proving ground for experimental assignments best performed outside of the cultural bounds of existing workflow.

The future of work will be different, in fact it already is, People are leveraging technology to work in new ways and want the flexibility to work when they want, where they want and with whom they want. There will always be more talent and more ideas outside your organization and this new work ‘hubs’ are springing up in cities all over the world. Individuals can participate in a globally connected local community via online platforms like Yamma. They can collaborate and network and contribute ideas with others who have similar interests, passions or hobbies. In the future work will go to where the skills are and notion of humans going to CBD hubs will seem old fashioned and quaint.

By Dennis K. Berman
Marketplace Editor at Wall Street Journal

This is the key line, which has importance for anyone in business today.

Americans increasingly are becoming their own bank tellers, loan officers, insurance adjusters, checkout clerks, restaurant order takers, citrus-crop inspectors and mall concierges.”

The wonders (or perils) of the modern smartphone app mean that work — from the menial to the substantive — can be distributed without regard to time, location, or any other host of barriers. Remember those days when you would have to have a camera in your car to get a photograph of an accident scene? Well, we all have cameras in our cars now. They’re actually in our pockets.

Simply put: Our perception of what it means to be a customer is changing. It’s not just about being served, in the old-fashioned way of the chirpy, white-capped gas-station attendant, but rather being part of a process, in which company and customer take on tasks together.

Customers care less about structure and titles, and more about results, provided there is some real or perceived benefit in the exchange. Consider it a benign jujitsu, using my customer’s energy for my own benefit.

Here is another line from the WSJ story:

First Financial Credit Union, in Chicago, recently added a feature to its app that lets customers sign loan documents via a phone or tablet’s touch screen, eliminating the need to go into a branch to close a loan. Chief Executive Patrick Bassler said the credit union wrote 287 loans in November, the month the feature was introduced. That was more than double the monthly average, and the bank didn’t have to add a single temporary or permanent employee.”

What a bounty, indeed. Can you imagine the cost savings of reducing, say, 25% of your insurance adjusters or waiters? And what if customers also got more accurate orders, or more timely insurance checks in the bargain?

Of course, it’s never that simple. Perhaps an iPad is not as good at selling the $12 cocktail as the warm and welcoming waiter. And maybe customers make crummy workers when the incentives start to decay — I encourage you to read this Buzzfeed story by John Herrman called ”Welcome To Facebook’s Midlife Crisis.”

But the arc of history teaches us that the company-customer pas de deux has only just begun to change. As it begins, it seems worth thinking about three things:

1. How can I use app technology to make things better for my customers first — and my business second?

2. Can I afford not to play in this game? What expectations are my competitors creating?

3. Am I ready to be in the “technology business” — willing to invest to continually adapt their content and platform? (In the faded days of…six months ago, it was easy to design for the iPad only. That’s rapidly changing as alternatives proliferate.)

Dennis K. Berman
Marketplace Editor at Wall Street Journal

Twitter @dkberman

By Alvis Brigis

What if we were able to monetize the information we put on the Internet? A revolution in which people are paid by the networks they use could herald a new economy for the world’s jobless.

Even as technology contributes to the everyday quality of our lives, robots and software are eliminating human jobs at an unprecedented rate, leading to a “great decoupling” of output/wages and jobs/income that’s becoming increasingly problematic. Technology-driven unemployment is getting worse at an accelerating rate. Meanwhile, Gallup’s latest World Poll demonstrates a growing demand for “good jobs” that transcends borders, cultures and languages. In a nutshell, the acceleration of automation-driven unemployment is both likely as well as broadly undesirable.

Gallup Chairman/C.E.O. Jim Clifton blames much widespread social unrest, instability and war on the lack of formal, 30 hour a week jobs, arguing: “If you were to ask me, from all the world polling Gallup has done for more than 75 years, what would fix the world–what would suddenly create worldwide peace, global well-being, and the next extraordinary advancements in human development, I would say the immediate appearance of 1.8 billion jobs–formal jobs. Nothing would change the current state of humankind more.”

So, where on Earth can we find the 1.8 billion (and growing) good jobs that would fix the world?

It turns out some likely solutions have been emerging all around us.

The prosumer role is poised to proliferate and scale.

With the release of the globally popular The Third Wave in 1980, futurist Alvin Toffler presciently predicted a massive shift from industrial to information-driven economy and the blurring of traditional economic roles resulting in a new class of participant he labelled the “prosumer” (producer plus consumer).

We’ve clearly been transitioning to an info-driven economy in which knowledge workers are in high demand. Much of this has been catalysed by new classes of systems like social media (Facebook, LinkedIn, G+), social-driven search (Google, Bing, Siri), citizen science (SETI-Live, Cell Slider) and big data that increasingly harness consumer-generated data while returning value to users in the form of organized information, entertainment, and occasionally cash (Google is paying select users up to $25 in Amazon gift cards to monitor Internet activity, Viggle is paying people for their TV viewing data). The result? An emerging prosumer class.

While today’s prosumer jobs pay little and fall into the informal category, there is reason to believe that they could grow in volume and value–rapidly. As accelerating change enables companies to get better at capturing, storing, transferring, processing and valuing user data, the prosumer role is poised to proliferate and scale.

New interfaces (iWatch, Google Glass, BCIs, Face Time, Kinect, Surface, search engines), sensors (FitBit, smartphones, data recorders in cars, reactive billboard cameras, camera-equipped drones), compression technologies, and faster computer processors are accelerating human-driven input. Social media, search, info-warehousing, banking, research companies and universities are collecting and mining vast amounts of this input. These developments are expanding the market for data that can be more easily applied across industries and converted into money, which in turn is increasing the demand for prosumers that can input, sort and output this data.

But what about the 1.8 billion jobs that people need now? In one sense, they’re already here.

Over the next decade, companies appear ready to pay more users more money for real-time and longitudinal life-streaming, driving, brain, health and genetic data; for product reactions, media reactions, geographic scans, species scans, general behavioural data, and so forth. More informational value will be captured on-the-fly as people socialize, consume media, learn, play games, navigate the world, or even sleep. Considering these near-term likelihoods, we can confidently predict that data-driven, prosumer-centric capitalism will steadily augment or even grab market share from the traditional 9-to-5, single-role, industrial economy.

A more extreme version of this scenario is that this transformation of capital flow and economics, something that Toffler explores in detail in Revolutionary Wealth, could become an outright boom. Billions of formally unemployed or underemployed humans could prove necessary for the rapid development of new technologies spanning medicine, entertainment, transportation, farming, warfare, search and artificial intelligence.

My confidence in this trend is bolstered by a macro trend: the observation that the billions of people on Earth have and will continue to find it in their interests to centralize information into an “Everything Map” (which Google is already consciously building), a much needed social tool and critical central component of accelerating change.

But what about the 1.8 billion jobs that people need now? In one sense, they’re already here. Facebook’s 1.1 billion users, YouTube’s 1 billion monthly users, Google’s 1 billion monthly users, all exchange their data for access to structured content. Baidu, Bing, Twitter and Yahoo together boast a formidable prosumer base of 2 to 3 billion. Though these systems currently offer prosumers little in value, Google’s Screenwise initiative, which pays some users up to $25 in Amazon Gift Cards, is an important early signal of a looming shift.

We could see an all-out war for prosumers in which more and more value is returned to users.

A Google user is estimated to bring the company about $43 in annual revenue per user (ARPU), a small but steadily growing figure. As Google and other prosumer-based companies increase both total revenue and ARPU, it will make business sense to attract and retain users by paying them a cut, thus keeping participants happy and establishing a sort of Prosumer Equilibrium.

Prosumers and their content will go “where [they] are wanted and stay where [they] are well treated”, as banking master Walter Wriston observed about various forms of capital. The result could be an all-out war for prosumers in which more and more value is returned to users.

At first the money shared with prosumers will be a trickle. I can imagine $100 per prosumer per network by 2018. But as extraordinary, revolutionary wealth is generated, as convergent accelerating change suggests, those numbers could grow quickly, perhaps exponentially. In 10 years, the relentless expansion of info-driven networks could provide billions of prosumers access to a variety of income flows that, when cobbled together, could equate to the formal jobs Jim Clifton says the world needs now. It’s a scenario worth contemplating.

In the meantime, tech-driven unemployment, inflation, and population growth are likely to exacerbate our present-day problems before the same technology comes to the rescue. The world will have to negotiate ongoing instability, conflict and economic shocks as it waits for prosumer pay flows to manifest and grow. We may well be on the cusp of one of the most stressful, and most transformative, decades in human history. One thing we can be absolutely sure of: there will be growing pains.

ALVIS BRIGIS

Alvis Brigis is a media specialist and futurist residing in Los Angeles.

By Kate Hagan, Bridie Smith, Peter Barrett, Clare Kermond, Lucy Beaumont and Felicity Lewis

They might be a long way off, but groundwork for some amazing breakthroughs is being laid right here in Australia and right now. Below, we list the Melbourne research that could change your future.

They might be a long way off, but groundwork for some amazing breakthroughs is being laid right here in Australia and right now. Below, we list the Melbourne research that could change your future.

… by 2033

* Architects print out your new house on a 3D printer and robots build it.

What are they? Houses designed with algorithms, printed out in carbon-fibre form from a three-dimensional printer and built by robots. Advances in computer programming, 3D printing and robotics have opened the door to exciting new architectural forms made from lightweight composite materials such as carbon fibre, fibreglass and Kevlar. The spin-offs include less waste (there are few, if any, off-cuts from a 3D printer), improved energy savings and efficient lightweight structures (using algorithms from natural systems) that can be built where it wasn’t previously feasible (sheer cliffs, floating structures on the ocean).

Who is doing it? Roland Snooks, architect and lecturer at RMIT’s school of architecture and design. Snooks, a Fulbright scholar who spent seven years in the US, is back in Melbourne writing his own computer programs, which he uses to orchestrate futuristic architectural designs. “I think we are on the verge of a revolution in architectural design and construction,” he says. “The relationship between new ways of designing in conjunction with advances in materials and robotic fabrication techniques have the potential to make a radically new architecture.”

Will it work? Yes. A printer that spits out 25-centimetre-cubed objects now costs less than $2000 and the race is on to build the first 3D printed house, which could happen in the next year, says Snooks. With more architects interested in writing computer programs, algorithmic design’s future is bright, even if it’s unlikely to dominate architecture in 20 years. Meanwhile, RMIT has bought two industrial robots (the kind you see on car manufacturing lines) and experiments are underway to adapt them for building construction. What the neighbours may think of the radical designs is another matter.

See sial.rmit.edu.au and kokkugia.com

* Your brain waves can be manipulated to jog memory or scratch bad recollections.

What is it? A brain stimulator to eliminate painful memories or retrieve lost ones. Transcranial magnetic stimulation is used to stimulate nerve cells in areas of the brain that are underactive or overactive, such as in depression and schizophrenia. Dr Jee Hyun Kim says the same technique could be used to manipulate memory. “If you think about sound, it travels through the air on vibrating air particles and they create a wave. It’s the same in the brain,” Kim says. “The neurons are like air particles and they have their own activity that uses electricity. Depending on how different neurons in the same area are activated, the result is an electrical wave in that region of the brain. That wave then transmits to other parts of the brain and, more and more, it seems that memory formation and recollection depends on those waves being synchronous to other regions. I think that, 20 years from now, we could create a device that would enhance synchronous activity of the brain to aid memory recollection or create asynchrony to suppress memories.”

Who’s doing it? Dr Jee Hyun Kim is a researcher with the Florey Institute of Neuroscience and Mental Health in Parkville. Kim is studying memory formation and recall in addiction and anxiety disorders.

Will it work? Kim thinks it will be possible to use magnetic stimulation to jog memories in people with Alzheimer’s disease (as long as the neurons storing the memories are still alive). Weakening memories might be useful for patients with post-traumatic stress disorder. But erasing all recollections of a love gone wrong, as in the film Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, is a distant prospect. “If we can decode the brainwaves for specific memories then I do think that is possible – but it’s very extreme and a long way off.”

See florey.edu.au

… by 2023

See vidrl.org.au (see publications/supercomputer)

* Farmers can tell exactly what species live on their land by using “sound maps”.

What is it? The solar-powered Automated Biophony Sensor System is, essentially, a high-fidelity listening device. Wireless sensors mounted on trees or poles in, say, an orchard or a grass paddock record animal noises. Encased in an army-green plastic box about half the size of a textbook (it’s waterproof and UV-resistant) the device can collect up to a terabyte of data in a month – that’s thousands of hours of audio. The object of the exercise is to inform farmers about how many different types of animals live on their patch of land. “It’s all about biodiversity and ensuring that whatever you are doing to the land isn’t having a major impact on it,” says Aaron Maher, managing director of Procept. The sensors pick up all environmental noises: both man-made and natural. Certain sounds can be highlighted. “You can delve down further and do species identification with other algorithms as well,” says Maher. The soundscape of pristine forest can be recorded as a baseline for later comparative study. Transmitted wirelessly via the 3G network or by the satellite network, the data is sent to a central server up to a kilometre away.

Who’s doing it? Product development company Procept with the Department of Primary Industries.

Will it work? It already is. A six-month trial in an orchard in Tatura in the Goulburn Valley last June showed that the device was sensitive enough to pick up the sounds of raindrops or a car in the distance. “It’s quite a complex device with a number of technical challenges, not least the Australian environment,” Maher says. “An orchard is nearly the worst-case scenario. It’s got big, thick-foliage trees that are very dense and can get very wet with rain, so that was good to test to make sure that we could still get the wireless data through the network.” The device is yet to provide a full soundscape of a farm with details of the frogs, bats, birds or other creatures that might be living there.

See dpi.vic.gov.au

* Catching a peak-hour train is a relatively pleasant experience.

What is it? Overcrowded trains at peak times are a city workers’ bugbear but researchers at Monash are working on a redesign of train carriages that would allow passengers to get on and off faster and improve the flow of people once they’re inside the carriage. Based on the concept of “peak doors”, the new carriages would have two extra doors that operate only in peak times. As well, many of the seats would be folding so that they would be out of the way in the rush hour, making room for more standing passengers. The seats would also be reconfigured so that most run up the middle of the carriage, creating two channels for people to move through the carriage more easily. There would be directions for passengers to move on through the left channel and off through the right.

Who’s doing it? Selby Coxon, deputy head of the faculty of art, design and architecture at Monash University, with colleagues in the engineering faculty.

Would it work? Absolutely. Train carriage design has been fairly static for many years, but these changes are about reorganising what is already in use rather than inventing a new product. The idea relies on manufacturers backing the new concept as well as passengers following the new rules.

See artdes.monash.edu.au/design/news.php

… by 2018

* You can listen to music in an ultrasound “bubble” without disturbing anyone around you.

What is it? The sound bubble. At the point where two streams of ultrasound meet, the bubble envelops the listener in a private sound experience – they can listen to music without it being audible to anyone outside their bubble. Using ultrasound, television watchers will be able to hear programs only when they are facing the screen; airports will be able to communicate with individuals exclusively by tracking their smartphones (spelling the death of PA announcements); and people will be able listen to sound in quiet public environments such as libraries without bothering other people.

Who’s doing it? Kyle Slater, engineer and inventor. This is a side project for Slater, who splits his time at the Bionics Institute in East Melbourne between work on the bionic eye project and his PhD on epilepsy research. Born to a musical family, Slater first dabbled at inventing while working at Jaycar Electronics, where he became fascinated with ultrasonic detectors (in sensors that help you park your car). As an electrical engineering and physics undergraduate at the University of Melbourne, he built a device that sent complex sounds (for example, a recorded voice) up to 30 metres away and audible in an area between two and three metres round. His invention, soundBeam, won him an award at a global engineering and technology competition in London in 2010.

Will it work? Well, Slater is convinced but concedes there’s always a risk that it won’t. He hopes to experiment over the next year with audio-visual artist Robin Fox creating sound bubbles using single tones. But it will be a few years before complex audio bubbles are possible, he says. “I know I can create audible sound in a bubble but how good is that audible sound? … If we can make it sound really good then that’s it, it works and it’s not just a novelty science thing – it becomes a reality.” Slater argues that rather than isolating us, sound bubbles could bring us closer together. In public spaces such as airports, a combination of Wi-Fi and mobile phone technology could allow sound bubbles to track and follow individuals, making it feel like the airport is playing our song.

See bionicsinstitute.org

… by 2013

* Thin, flexible solar panels power your camping gear, mobile phone and house.

What is it? Solar panels are big, heavy and made of glass, metal and silicon, right? But it won’t always be that way. A consortium of scientists is working on creating thin, flexible solar cells, which could be printed on sheets of plastic and ultimately incorporated into other materials. The new panels would be cheaper and lighter than the current alternatives. In June the group aims to print thin A4-sized, flexible, plastic solar cells. It will then work on including printed electronics. In what would be “a paradigm shift” for electronics, the combination of flexible electronics and printable solar cells could lead to solar cells incorporated into a range of materials such as roofing sheets and fabrics. Think solar cells in the fabric of shadecloths, clothes and tents. The new technology could also be used to get solar energy to remote and developing communities.

Who’s doing it? A consortium led by Melbourne University (project co-ordinator Dr David Jones) with research partners Monash University and the CSIRO and industry partners including Bluescope Steel, Securency, Innovia Films and Bosch SEA.

Will it work? The team is confident of meeting its June deadline to print A4 sheets of solar panels. With work on flexible electronics progressing fast, solar panels embedded in other materials seem achievable.

See vicosc.unimelb.edu.au

* Physios build 3D pictures of their patients’ movements in real time to monitor progress.

What is it? A device slightly larger than a wristwatch, called a portable motion analysis system, which allows physiotherapists to monitor the movements of patients recovering from stroke. Developed over two years at the Parkville base of NICTA (National Information and Communications Technology Australia), the wireless device tracks patient’s limb movements in real time. Physiotherapists can compile a 3D picture. “It gives the physiotherapist better quantitative metrics to know how well the patient is doing in terms of their rehabilitation,” says Dr Jia-Yee, director of health and life sciences in NICTA’s business team. The device, which can be worn on the arms or legs, has the potential to prevent falls by elderly patients and in sport medicine. It could even prevent cricket injuries by looking at the rotation movement of the bowler, says the leader of the biomedical devices and signal processing at NICTA, Dr Tharshan Vaithianathan.

Who’s doing it? NICTA, Royal Melbourne Hospital, Southern Health and the National Ageing Research Institute.

Will it work? It already is. A three-month trial, started in December, involved five Royal Melbourne Hospital stroke patients. “We have been able to monitor how, for example, an injection such as botulinum toxin (Botox) makes them better or worse,” Dr Vaithianathan says.

See nicta.com.au/business/health
Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/digital-life/digital-life-news/ideas-that-could-change-your-life-20130312-2fxo6.html#ixzz2OmRWHBZk

By Bernard Condon

To workers being pushed out of jobs by today’s technology, history has a message: You’re not the first.

From textile machines to the horseless carriage to email, technology has upended industries and wiped out jobs for centuries. It also has created millions of jobs, though usually not for the people who lost them.

“People suffer their livelihoods, their skills and training are worth less,” says Joel Mokyr, a historian of technological change at Northwestern University. “But that is the price we pay for progress.”

A look at breakthroughs that made the goods we buy more affordable, our lives more comfortable and our jobs more precarious:

The First Industrial Revolution

For most of history, people made many goods themselves. That changed with the First Industrial Revolution, which began in England in the mid-18th century and lasted about 100 years.

New mechanical devices that allowed one man to do the work of several flooded the market with products, most notably textiles. Using cords, wheels and rollers, inventors sped up the twisting of threads to make yarn and the weaving of yarn to make cloth.

Next, steam was used to free the new machines from the limits of man’s muscle and make them run faster. The new machines produced so much, so fast and so cheaply, more people could afford to buy textiles. Demand soared and so did jobs manning the machines and doing other work.

In America in 1793, Eli Whitney freed slaves from the laborious work of picking sticky seeds from cotton bolls by inventing a cotton gin that did that automatically. It led to widespread planting of cotton but even more work for the slaves.

Whitney also is credited with another invention: interchangeable parts. At a workshop he ran for making firearms, he had his staff make the same part many times so that his guns could be assembled quickly. It worked, and industries such as watchmakers copied his method.

In 1831, Cyrus McCormick invented a reaper that cut wheat stalks as it was pulled by horses and piled them on a platform. Farmers could harvest faster.

In 1837, John Deere stuck the blade of a steel saw onto a plow and invented the steel-edged plow to replace cast-iron ones. Farmers could cut a furrow in the earth more easily and sow faster.

So began a series of inventions that made farming efficient, and began to drain farms of people. In 1800, two-thirds of Americans worked on farms; today, 2 percent do.

The Second Industrial Revolution

Life sped up more in this second period of innovation, from the mid-19th century to the early 20th century, an age of steel and electric power, expanding railroads and the automobile.

In 1856, an Englishman discovered a way of making steel fast and cheap, and other inventors soon improved the process. Railroad companies started using steel for their rails instead of wrought iron, which bent easily and needed to be replaced often. Trains could carry heavier loads, which meant businesses could send more products to distant markets. Sales increased, and so did jobs.

In 1861, a telegraph line was strung from coast to coast in the U.S., vastly improving communication. It also wiped out the Pony Express delivery service; it went out of business the same year.

In 1879, Thomas Edison made a light bulb that wouldn’t burn out in a few hours. Factories replaced gaslights, reducing the number of fires.

In quick succession came a string of breakthroughs the automobile, an automatic typesetting machine for printing, a tractor propelled by an internal combustion engine instead of pulled by horses and the Wright brothers’ airplane.

Henry Ford started his eponymous car company in 1903. He put men and their tools in stationary positions and had a car being assembled roll from one man to the next. The moving assembly line was born, and cars could be made faster and cheaper. As with textiles earlier, car prices plummeted and demand soared, creating new kinds of jobs in a new industry  and helping to wipe out 100,000 jobs for carriage and harness makers.

The Information Age

The inventor’s focus shifted from building things to manipulating information. The tools of this new period help people gather and analyze data and communicate faster, cheaper, better.

No invention is commonly accepted as first of the age, but one contender is the first digital computer in 1937, created by George Stibitz of Bell Labs, the former research arm of AT&T. Stibitz seized the idea of using the open and closed positions of metallic devices when electricity runs through them to do simple math.

In 1947, a team at Bell Labs led by William Shockley discovered how to amplify and switch electronic signals using semiconductor material. It was the first transistor. A decade later, many of them were crammed onto a small chip, dubbed an integrated circuit.

Before the transistor, electronic products worked with bulky vacuum tubes. Now computing power could be miniaturized, a breakthrough that led to small radios, personal computers, cellphones and an array of other devices today. In 1971, the first email was sent by a Defense Department computer engineer.

The same year, John Blankenbaker built the Kenbak-1, the first computer small and cheap enough for the masses to buy. They didn’t. Fewer than 50 Kenbak-1s were sold, mostly to a community college, according to oral history by Blankenbaker at the Computer Museum in Boston. His company went out of business within two years

In 1981, the National Science Foundation set up a network linking university computers, a milestone in the development of the Internet. Its impact could scarcely be imagined then.

The past three decades, new products and innovations have allowed people to entertain and inform themselves anywhere, anytime.

In 1983, Motorola introduced the first portable cellphone, a 2-pound clunker called the DynaTac 8000x. In 1984, the first PDA, or personal digital assistant, was sold the long-forgotten Psion. In 1994, BellSouth sold its first Simon, the start of a stream of ever-smarter smartphones from which you can access virtually any information while on the run, including that staple of the telephone operator a phone number.

Which helps explain why there were just 36,000 U.S. operators in 2010, down nearly two-thirds in 10 years.

A job that rose in the same period? Software engineer. They numbered 1.03 million in 2010, up nearly 40 per cent.

AP

Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/it-pro/business-it/is-technology-a-job-killer-a-few-history-lessons-20130123-2d708.html#ixzz2JKcr6sQ7

The Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) confirmed the booming 104% upswing in Smartphone and Tablet usage in Australia between June 2011 and June 2012 in their report launched yesterday. Nearly 50% of all adults in Australia have an internet-enabled smartphone.

The ACMA research report mirrors the explosive growth in smartphones and tablets (commonly referred to as “BYOD” devices i.e. “Bring Your Own Devices”) being seen within all organisations on a global basis.

According to Andrew Cook of Blue Coat Systems Australia, what is not evident from this report, is that this accelerating adoption of mobile devices is fundamentally shifting the security threat landscape for Internet usage.

Porn and banking sites accessed on the go increase the risk of criminal access or phishing of mobile users according to Blue Coat’s latest survey of 75 million users, which was released this week.

“Classic security attacks that have dominated traditional PCs for many years such as spam, phishing, and malware are being increasing detected on mobile devices.  The global report launched by Blue Coat this week shows that cybercriminals are shifting their gaze from desktops to mobiles as a highly lucrative, expanding, and uncontrolled new opportunity for theft and fraud,” said Andrew.

“Blue Coat’s data shows that there has been a 600% increase in malware designed for Android smartphones during the end of 2012.  40% of all mobile malware blocked by Bluecoat’s security solutions has originated from known ‘malnets’ – diverse malware networks used to launch highly dynamic malware threats and increasingly malicious mobile applications.

“So while the growth in uptake of mobile devices in the Australian markets is quite interesting within the context of device numbers, 4G services, and increased Internet usage, the underlying security implications are both profound and acute.”

Link to Blue Coat’s Mobile Security Report: http://www.bluecoat.com/sites/default/files/documents/files/BC_2013_Mobile_Malware_Report-v1d.pdf.

Link to the ACMA Report: http://www.acma.gov.au/webwr/_assets/main/lib310665/report-3-smartphones-tablets-comms_report_11-12_series.pdf

Ben Grubb

Deputy technology editor,  theage.com.au

Who needs a mouse?

Gesture-based computing will become one of the biggest trends in 2013 as devices begin to make use of our eyes, and different movements of our hands.

Just like the technology in the 2002 sci-fi film Minority Report, gesture-based computing will enable people to control their smart TVs and computers using only their hands, and without having to touch a remote or keyboard.

In 2002, gesture-based computing was the stuff of sci-fi films.

Gadgets such as Samsung’s MV900F – a digital camera that can zoom in and out or capture a shot just by waving your hand – already make use of gestures.

But it will take a company such as Leap Motion to truly revolutionise gesture-based computing in 2013 with the release of its iPod-sized controller, which senses your individual hand and finger movements so you can interact directly with your PC.

On Friday, ASUS announced it would bundle Leap Motion’s gadget with select new computers “later this year”. This deal will ensure widespread adoption of the technology. Eye-tracking is also set to become more prevalent in computers by way of accessories such as REX.

Made by tech company Tobii, REX can be used with software to track exactly what you’re looking at on a screen, allowing you do things such as scroll sideways or blast moving asteroids with your eyes. Tobii is due to sell 5000 REXs later this year with pre-orders starting in March.

Vodafone Australia begins to make a come back

Can Vodafone’s rollout of 4G help it make a comeback? Photo: Getty Images

It might sound like a bit of a stretch, especially when you consider that in the two years to July 2012, Vodafone lost a million customers (a loss attributed primarily to poor network performance).

But hear me out. The company said last year that in “early 2013″ it would begin rolling out a 4G LTE network “in selected areas” (something Telstra began rolling out in September 2011 and Optus in April 2012).

With that in mind, and the fact that it has been upgrading its 3G network to cope better with traffic by utilising dual-channel HSPA+ (DC-HSPA+) technology, I predict that the telco will make a significant comeback this year after users begin to notice significant network improvements.

Once its 4G network is rolled out in capital cities, Vodafone’s iPhone 5 users will be some of the first users to notice faster speeds. Those who use 3G phones will probably also notice a difference once 4G users jump off the 3G network and onto 4G, meaning the 3G network will become less congested.

Essentially, 4G will lighten the load of its 3G network. But will it be enough for the telco, whose reputation has been damaged by past under-investment in its network, to win back customers?

Telsyte senior research analyst Chris Coughlan believes “post 2015 as a more realistic turn-around timeframe”.

Augmented reality gets closer

A Google employee wears a pair of Glass. Photo: Getty Images/AFP

Debuted in June last year, Project Glass, a research and development program by Google to make an augmented reality head-mounted display, will start to gain some traction this year after prototype devices ship early in the year to US Google I/O (input/output) developers who pre-ordered them for $US1500 ($1436).

A consumer version is expected to be ready within a year of the device shipping to developers. Project Glass has a lot of potential, and that potential will start to become clearer once developers get their hands on it.

Looking at the sky might show you the weather; looking at someone whose name you’ve forgotten could also become less awkward with facial recognition built-in; and remembering to get the milk and bread your husband or wife told you to get at the supermarket will become easier when notifications based on where you are pop up with reminders.

Smartphones flex their muscles

Nokia shows off its bendable prototype device

Cracked and broken screens are a common smartphone curse, but Samsung has developed bendable screens to make phones more flexible – and much less prone to breaking. The company is expected to unveil a 5.5-inch bendable display with a high-definition resolution of 1280 x 720 and 267 pixels per inch at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas this month.

Samsung isn’t the only one testing out bendable screens. Nokia previewed a prototype flexible mobile computer in October 2011 that you twist and bend to control, and also a special coating that can be applied to gadgets to repel water, oily fingerprints, dust and dirt.

Wi-Fi technology gets faster

Wi-Fi is set to become faster this year. Photo: Jamie Brown

The 802.11ac Wi-Fi standard is expected to be ratified this year, meaning data transfers of up to 1.3Gbps will be possible, theoretically, on first-generation gear in perfect conditions.

Transferring data via 802.11ac should also mean longer battery life for devices using it, as data will be delivered quicker. Reports suggest Apple’s 2013 MacBook line-up will make use of the new standard care of chip maker Broadcom.

Devices such as the iPhone 5 currently use 802.11n technology, which supports up to 300 Mbps under the best conditions. This makes 802.11ac more than four times faster than what’s currently available.

Hackers target your mobile/tablet

“Ransomware” has been customised to scare Australians. Photo: Botnets.fr

Ransomware – hacker software that holds a user’s PC to ransom for money after they visit an infected website – will continue to be a problem and will rise to become one of the best ways for criminals to scam money.

Security company McAfee predicts that Ransomware will this year begin to affect mobile and tablet users, as well as PC users. Similarly, hackers will continue to hold businesses’ data to ransom by breaking into their poorly secured servers and demanding money for files to be decrypted.

Although this type of hacking has been possible for some time, hackers will begin targeting new industries that haven’t thought about computer security in the past. One such industry affected in late 2012 was the health industry: at least three medical centres were targeted in Queensland.

‘Find my iPhone’ comes to anything and everything

StickNFind … the technology that helps you find things you’ve lost that use it.

Apple made losing your iPad or iPhone and then attempting to find it almost fun with its Find My iPhone app.

Now, a Florida start-up is taking a similar experience to other gadgets with its “StickNFind” Bluetooth-powered locations stickers.

The stickers, which are being crowd-funded on indiegogo.com, can be attached to almost anything including people, iPads, cameras, books or wallets, and then found using a smartphone app with a radar-like screen, which locates them within a 30-metre range.

StickNFind plans to distribute the stickers to backers of its project beginning in March.

TVs get bigger, better and clearer

LG’s 55-inch OLED TV that is just 4-millimeters thick.

You’d think TVs couldn’t get any thinner, but just this week LG started taking pre-orders in South Korea for its wafer-thin, 4mm-thick, 55-inch OLED TV.

Large OLED TVs were meant to come to market late last year but were delayed because of manufacturing issues. This year, we’ll finally start to see LG and Samsung bring them to market.

It’s unclear when Sony and Panasonic will do the same. OLED is a new large-screen technology that is much more energy-efficient than traditional liquid crystal display (LCD) screens.

But with an expected Australian price tag of $10,000, the power savings will be hard to justify. An OLED display works without a backlight – hence why it doesn’t use as much power as an LCD. It can therefore display deep black levels, which is also why it can be a lot thinner and lighter than an LCD.

Wireless charging comes to gadgets

Last year, Nokia released its Lumia 920, which utilises wireless charging via an inductive charging power mat that uses an electromagnetic field to transfer energy.

This year, wireless charging will become more prevalent on smartphones and gadgets as manufacturers figure out ways to make it work with their devices.

Inductive charging has advantages and disadvantages, but when used in conjunction with regular charging, it can be a neat feature for those who just want to place their device on a mat and have it charge without having to fiddle with a charger (especially in the dark).

Advantages of inductive charging include convenience and a lower risk of getting electrocuted, while disadvantages include its extra expense and the fact that devices can’t be moved while charging.

Anonymity on the web disappears

Foursquare is the latest social networking website to crack down on anonymity online, but it definitely wasn’t the first.

In September 2011, I wrote about the death of anonymity online and throughout 2012 a number of social networking sites moved to make sure you started using your real name. Many policies resulted in suspension if you used a fake name, and Facebook even started trialling a pop-up that asked your friends to confirm your identity to try to see if you were lying about your name. Because of this, I don’t see anonymity on the web lasting too much longer.

Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/technology/technology-news/augmented-reality-and-bendy-screens-in-a-handsfree-2013-20130104-2c8c6.html#ixzz2H5sfZyRb

By Bernard Sia

As an IT Outsourcer, I cringe at the thought of having to support 30 different variations of mobile operating systems; it does not matter whether the phone is service provider locked or jail-broken with viruses and all.

Who is to be blamed when the proverbial mess hits the fan?

Naturally the easy way out for an outsourcer is to draw a solid line that says, I am sorry, that is not within our contract. But seriously, as an innovative company; you would want to stand head and shoulders above your competitors and say; YES, we are able to support that phone. Not only that, we can secure critical business information, anywhere; anytime!

Personally, I find the whole security issue overblown. Since the dawn of civilization people have been lurking the halls of temples and rat on priests feasting on animal offerings, and no amount of inner sanctums could keep a lid on towns folk whispering.

Fortunately today; we have a host of technologies that allows us to trace how information flows, from who, to whom, on top of versioning every change that occurs.

Unfortunately, technology cannot change the human psyche. Whenever there’s an opportunity, opportunism arises.

Over in Malaysia, BYOD devices have taken over the boardroom; and senior management have made iPads and Berry’s the communications medium of choice. Don’t be surprised if you walk into the elevator of PETRONAS Twin Towers and you see tenants carrying an iPad, a Blackberry, his own personal mobile; with potentially an ultrabook tucked inside the suitcase.

So the right question to ask is not about the perils of BYOD, but how do you manage risks arising from Human Behaviour.

My take on it:-

a)    Make it a corporate policy
Ensure that all staffs sign on a document specifying their roles and responsibilities with corporate information.

b)    Make it known that big brother is watching

“WARNING”  this email is Information Rights Managed (IRM) and Data leakage Protected (DLP), and the sensitivity setting is “CORPORATE USE ONLY”. As mentioned, a number of IRM technologies allow you to monitor unauthorized information leakage and trigger a warning should the mail be forwarded beyond the corporate domain.

But seriously, if your staffs are bent on selling corporate information; there’s nothing that can stop the employee from taking a picture off the monitor; or even scribbling it down on a piece of paper.

c)     Be a great company, with a purpose, manned by good people

That trumps any security tool out there in the market.

Happy New Year!

By Gavin Stamp Political reporter, BBC News

Most people are well-acquainted with the concept of BYOB (bring your own bottle).

But could the acronym BYOD (bring you own device) be about to revolutionise the way councils and other public bodies operate?

One in five local authorities in England are reported to be looking at the idea of allowing their staff to use their own mobile phones, laptops and other devices at work while IT managers say the concept has risen up their agenda with “astonishing speed”.

Steve Halliday, head of information communications technology at Solihull Metropolitan Borough Council, suggests it is a natural step.

“You would not expect your company to provide your own suits or shoes and the company car has become much less prevalent than it used to be,” he says.

“Your personal device is quite intimate and people will choose and want to use the devices they want.”

‘Pleasant experience’

In the past six months, he says 12% of his staff has shifted to using their own devices at work – as well as 9% doing the same from home – and he expects this number to rise.

As well as giving staff a “richer experience”, he says it has led to quicker and more efficient decision-making, citing the council’s ability to co-ordinate its response to the recent floods in the west Midlands.

The process is being driven by staff – some of whom want to use “the squeaky toys they got for Christmas” at work and others who are fed up having to go through the log-in protocol of office computers or simply want to be less tied to their desks.

“Nobody is being forced to do so,” he adds. “But I think it is a more pleasant experience being able to use the device you want rather than whatever the council can afford to buy you.”

This is not a purely money-saving exercise, he insists, although it is clearly less expensive than other options.

The council will not pay for staff to buy the device of their dreams – but it is considering how those who use their own technology to the benefit of the council and taxpayers can be rewarded.

Surrey County Council and the Essex Online Partnership – a consortium of county and districts councils – are among the other public sector organisations pioneering the use of BYOD.

In a recent report, the body that represents IT managers in the public and voluntary sectors – Socitm – set out some of the potential benefits and pitfalls involved.

It warns that councils wanting to buy devices and lease them – or offer allowances to staff to buy them – face potential tax liabilities.

Organisations also need to consider how they can support multiple software platforms and deal separately with corporate and personal information in the inevitable event of devices being lost.

As for security, it acknowledges the “obvious” risk of running business and personal applications side-by-side and urges councils to upgrade their “conditions of acceptable use” policies for employees.

‘Reduced risk’

It also points out that staff must be protected if devices are infected or hacked into while being used for work and thought must be given to contingency plans when employees change jobs.

It advises that initially limiting BYOD usage to smart phones and tablet devices would “minimise complexity” as allowing staff to use their own laptops at work would involve more controls that could make the move “unattractive” to people and limit its usefulness.

The tendency for big companies and public bodies to lose memory sticks and computer disks with sensitive personal information on has been a regular sources of embarrassment in recent years.

Solihull Council says the system it is using operates a “secure container” to separate business and personal mobile application data. The files on which business data are stored are encrypted and password protected.

While acknowledging that no system is risk-free, Mr. Halliday maintains “the risk is as reduced as it is possible to be and the benefit and the flexibility is huge.”

Andy Jacques, general manager of Good Technology, which makes “secure containers”, says they can cut down on the time employees spend downloading data on to their own phones, tablets or laptops as well as preventing leaks of sensitive data.

The “containers” are also designed to prevent data being lost by careless workers.

“If your IPhone gets left in the back of a taxi, the IT department can remotely wipe data that may be sitting in the phone without touching personal photos and other information,” he says.

Adrian Hancock, Socitm’s chief executive and formerly of Stockton-on-Tees Borough Council, says BYOD is “fashionable” but organisations need to consider the merits to their operations, thoroughly test the benefits and “proceed with caution”.

“You should not drive a business case for this simply because people want to without much more serious analysis,” he says. “Is it true that people want to? If so, why and why and have they thought through the implications.”

POTENTIAL BENEFITS FOR STAFF AND EMPLOYERS

• Familiarity with technology
• Remote access to work email
• Increased productivity and better morale
• Greater freedom to manage work-life balance
• Ability to better track staff on off-site visits

Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-20539715

Mobile Australian Workers Are Challenging Unresponsive Organisations by Using Unauthorised BYO Apps, Unisys Research Finds

Employees download unauthorised software for work – even at risk of dismissal and despite risks it poses to their organisations

The 2012 Australian “Consumerisation of IT” research into enterprise mobility, commissioned by Unisys and conducted by Forrester Consulting¹, reveals that while many large organisations see smartphones, tablets and employee-owned devices in the workplace as inevitable, the majority is lagging in providing employees with more than basic (email/calendar) mobile applications to take advantage of this new mobility. This shortfall in support for employee mobility is driving employees to download unauthorised apps (BYO apps) even though doing so may be grounds for dismissal.

In responding to the 2012 survey, 42 percent of Australian employees said that they had downloaded unauthorised mobile apps or PC software.  The most common reason given for doing so – cited by 63 percent of respondents – was that they needed it for work purposes and their employer didn’t provide an alternative.

Aside from personal email apps and websites, the most common apps downloaded by Australian employees are video conferencing tools such as Skype or Face Time (33 percent of respondents), file sharing such as Box or Dropbox (29 percent), and chat tools such as Microsoft Messenger or Google Talk (25 percent).

Importantly, employees say that they are using these apps to conduct work with customers, partners and/or suppliers, not just for personal reasons or to communicate with each other.

When asked which unsupported apps they use to interact with customers, partners or suppliers, almost a third (28 percent) of Australian employees say they use file sharing apps instead of sending email attachments, 26 percent use video conferencing and 7 percent use chat apps.

“The findings show that as part of their increased mobility, employees are increasingly seeking tools for better collaboration and customer service – whether or not those tools are sanctioned by their employers, ” said Mr. Rob Dewar, Vice President, Technology, Consulting and Integration Services, Unisys Australia and New Zealand.

“However, their behaviour is risky because an easily available app could contain malicious code and be used as a vehicle to steal data, spy or access a network.  This behaviour can also lead to operational inefficiency and complicate end-user support if numerous employees are using too many different applications,” Mr. Dewar said.

The survey reveals that to date, the primary strategy taken by employers to manage BYO apps has been to ban them, often with harsh penalties.  More than a quarter (27 percent) of Australian organisations surveyed said that they had an IT policy prohibiting the downloading of third party applications.  Moreover, 67 percent say that downloading unauthorised software was prohibited or even potential grounds for dismissal.

Mr. Dewar said that many employees using their own devices at work expect to be able to download their own applications.  However implementing a corporate-managed enterprise app store containing mobile apps that have been reviewed and approved for use on the corporate network can remove the need for employees to find and download their own apps.

“The key for security-sensitive organisations is to deliver a compelling app suite to their employees via controlled methods, such as a dedicated app store, so that users don’t need to come up with workaround methods to access applications they feel necessary to do their jobs productively. Those organisations would do well to consult with their most innovative, productive mobile workers to determine what type of apps they require and then select or build them based on functionality and security.  Of course, that approach needs to be combined with clear policies on application use and an education program around the security implications of third party apps,” Mr. Dewar said.

Australian Organisations Look to Provide Mobile Employees a Range of New Apps

While email and calendar apps are currently the most common mobile applications provided to employees, many Australian organisations say they plan to provide a range of other applications over the next 12 months – including those which employees have been downloading themselves, such as web conferencing (29 percent of organisations), file synch or access (24 percent), and productivity tools (24 percent). Other planned apps include access to team sites (24 percent) and internal business apps such as financials, ERP and HR (24 percent).

By Chris Johnson

Australia’s Prime Minister Gillard to enable more to join the workforce

In a speech delivered via video link at a telework conference, Julia Gillard will demonstrate the government’s commitment to enabling 12 per cent of federal public servants to work from home by 2020.

Prime Minister Julia Gillard will use additional data in the Deloitte research today to support her commitment to have 12 per cent of the Australian Public Service regularly working from home using high-speed broadband by 2020.

The current level of the APS involved in what is known as ”teleworking” is about 4 per cent.

Teleworking is underpinned by the rollout of the national broadband network and involves working at home one or more days a week using such technology to connect with colleagues and clients.

”Harnessing the benefits of new technology and work patterns will be important for Australia if we are to embrace the opportunities of the Asian century,” Ms. Gillard said.

”That’s why the government is building the NBN and why we want to engage with employers and employees to inform them of the possibilities of telework.

”To drive this, the government will show leadership and commit to a goal of having 12 per cent of the APS regularly teleworking by 2020.

”This will be informed by trials of some government agencies, which will commence next year.”

The Prime Minister will make the announcement via video link from Parliament House into the Telework Congress being held at Melbourne University.

She will launch National Telework Week, and after her presentation will take part in a video link question and answer session.

The Deloitte research suggests teleworking will deliver nationally an extra $3.2 billion a year to the gross domestic product by 2020-21, which will be the equivalent of 25,000 full-time jobs.

Read more: http://www.canberratimes.com.au/it-pro/government-it/public-service-teleworking-target-of-12-20121111-296sb.html#ixzz2ByjltIpj