Rumors have been circulating about Google Glasses, which are designed to take virtual information and overlay it onto real-world images in real-time through a small screen worn inches from the wearer’s eyes.

Oakley Thumps

These glasses are said to resemble “Oakley Thumps” rather than the otherworldly glasses of Terminator, although, I can’t imagine many fashion-conscious women donning these shades.

These sci-fi glasses, while not the first of their kind, are certainly the first product to be designed for mass consumption. They have been circulating for at least 10 years now through companies such as Sony and Vuzik, with prices range from $5k-$25k (out of the question for most of us).  Google’s goggles are rumored to be sold at near the average price of the existing Smartphone, anywhere from $250-$600 dollar a pair.

While not perhaps the most fashion forward, these glasses do have some impressive features. These shades will be equipped with 3G-4G connection, motion sensors, GPS, a low-resolution built in camera and Google software. Navigating the world of augmented reality will be done by the user simply tilting his head to scroll and click.  I can’t wait to see this in action! I imagine it will look something like this…

But what about people who wear glasses to improve their sight? So far, there has been no word on the level of compatibility these glasses will have with prescription glasses.

Some people are worried about the possibility of being under constant surveillance, given that people can record without being conspicuous. The team at Google has been internally discussing ways in which they can make it obvious to others when the glasses are recording.

Of course, Big Brother watches in more ways than just through a camera lens. It is certainly a possibility that Google will have the ability to access everything that the user views through the glasses in order to gather data related to the consumer’s lifestyle. This data could be used directly by Google to create advertisements geared toward the wearer’s location, activities, and possibly even physical movements themselves.

While many, if not most companies, have methods of collecting data on individuals in order to market products more effectively, consider the recent case with Target. Through data analytics and tracking purchases, the company was able to infer that a high-school girl was pregnant before her father even knew. The company used this information to send the girl coupons relating to maternity and baby care needs (much to the initial anger of her father). Target was able to do all of this simply through tracking her purchases.

Imagine the power over advertising Google could have if they are able to obtain information on EVERYTHING you do or are exposed to while wearing these glasses!

Not everyone seems horribly creeped out by this possibility, however. According to an online poll at androidandme.com, only 62% said that they would wear these goggles, 8% considers the idea stupid, and the other 30% remains uncertain on their feelings toward the glasses.

Sources say that Google is already working on new projects in regards to wearable computers, such as wrist straps. I wonder how long before Apple joins in the race of computerized accessories.

Google Glasses Coming to an Eyewear Stand Near You?

Google to Sell Heads-Up Display Glasses by Year’s End

Would you buy Google’s glasses?

How Target Figured Out A Teen Girl Was Pregnant Before Her Father Did

Not only does Chrome do away with the “fat finger” problem  with a link preview feature that zooms in to allow the user to easily select the intended link, but it can also sync between devices.

According to the New York Times, “Chrome’s mobile browser syncs seamlessly with Chrome’s desktop browser so that anyone surfing the Internet on their computer can pick up exactly where they left off on their phone and tablet — with the same tabs, same browsing history and same bookmarks.”

What does that mean? I’m glad you asked.

For Android users it means easier navigation between devices. Saw something on your desktop that you want check out on your phone or tablet? No problem. Chrome for mobile brings the ultimate desktop browsing capability to the mobile platform.

And the app is free. Just download to your phone, open the app, sign in with your Google account, and you’re on your way. This is so much easier than trying to navigate the web via Dolphin on my smart phone, and so far, it’s much faster.

Now if only touch pad typing on my mobile phone were as fast as typing on a real keyboard…

This video courtesy of NBC Action News shows us just how those who are tech savvy enough can cherry-pick personal information straight from your uploaded photos.

Not only can information be found regarding the home, but also schools, work places, and regular hang outs.

So how do you avoid sharing this information?

Deactivate geotagging on your phone! Simply turn off the GPS settings on pictures you plan to post online, or disable GPS settings for your camera phone altogether. This can be done on iPhone, BlackBerry, Android, and Palm smart phones.

Just another way to protect yourself against unknowingly sharing unwanted information.

All too often, we quickly put together a listing of where we have been and what we have done, without a second thought to it.  So many people assume they can win an opening with their brilliant personality.  Though this may be true, you have to first develop your “brilliant” resume to shine above the rest, so you may then truly show off who you are, and what you can do.

“The average resume is reviewed for less than a minute, says Kimberly Schneiderman, owner of City Career Services. That’s why a nicely formatted resume is so important.” Resume Refresher: Less Is More by Rebecca R. Hastings: 2006 via SHRM.org.

Start the clock – one minute and counting.  Over 50 additional resumes. 45 seconds.  Name. Skills summary.  30 seconds. Job title. History. 20 seconds.  Too much to read.  Your resume is now in the trash.  Less than a minute, no way of arguing your points and it is over before it began.

So how do you prevent this show stopper?

1. Target the company and its needs that you are applying for.  Prove you have the experience and knowledge to be the person they need.

2. K.I.S.S.  Keep is simple stupid.  If there is too much clutter, resumes look sloppy.  If it is too complicated, the employer will not know where to look.  Keep it simple, you have less than 1 minute.

3. “‘A resume is not a job description, … It’s a tickler to get the reader to want to call you. As a result, brevity is to be desired…’” – Carla Vaughan, owner of Professional-Resume-Example.com.

4. Save in a rich or common text so nothing is lost in transmission.  This also keeps it clean and professional.

5. Unprofessional-sounding e-mail addresses should be avoided.  Managers have a hard time taking kitty2cool4u@hotmail.com seriously as an Executive Manager.

6. Career paths can take an unexpected turn, in which case it is even more important for a resume to be carefully considered and modified accordingly.

• Vaughan says. “The only time I would really suggest a functional format is if someone is changing careers or re-entering the workforce” as a way to deemphasize employment gaps and experience that doesn’t match the position being sought.
• Emphasize skills that obtain to this new career path you have learned or performed in previous jobs, as opposed to your primary skill sets
• “Eliminating information from a resume isn’t lying,” Schneiderman says. “You should do that when the content isn’t going to lend itself to your ultimate goal; don’t feel obligated to include years of graduation, for example.”

7. Personal information, such as hobbies, marital status and religious affiliations should be avoided unless they directly pertain the career being applied for.

8. Check it TWICE! It may seem like the small stuff, but typos, grammar errors, or even resume inconsistencies (such as writing out “January” then abbreviating it later) can make all the difference.  Skipping this step could give the impression of a lack of detail or laziness.  Do not be afraid to have other persons look over your resume, edit and critique. It could make all the difference.

9. Avoid titling your resume “Resume”.  We all know what it is, and if we do not, there are bigger problems at hand.

10. Show what you are capable of doing, not what you did.  “Clean” “Customer service” “Computer/Printer/Copier Trouble Shooting” is not telling anything other than you are a 1980’s robot.

Resumes that have real thought and time put into them shine through, and only need less than a minute to prove that you are the best person for the job.

SHRM.org

This guest post is authored by Lindsey Blakeman, 
Customer Care Manager at TriCom Technical Services

Wine and dinner at Oeno Wine Bar helped bring the year to an end with a bit of fun. Thanks for all your hard work guys!

So why not use Facebook as a professional tool?

To provide another way to connect with you on a professional platform, we have joined Monster’s BeKnown.

This Facebook application allows you to build and expand your professional network and reputation. You can also follow companies and view job postings in your field of interest.

Be sure to check us out there or connect with our staff:

• Shane Null
• Mendy Mainard
• Stacy Yelton
• Tracy Hollstadt
• Bill Joeckel
• Jennifer Smith
• Lindsey Blakeman

According to PCWorld, Sony announced that user information including name, address, country, e-mail address, birth date, PlayStation Network/Qriocity password and login, handle/PSN online ID, PSN purchase history, billing address, password security answers, and possibly even credit card information was stolen.

Talk about a PR nightmare!

To prevent a breach of your own system, the Wall Street Journal has worked out the following 4 step approach:

Step 1. Estimate the potential loss from a security breach for each of the company’s various sets of information. For starters, it’s useful to simply categorize information sets as having either Low Value, Medium Value or High Value.

Step 2. For each set of information, estimate the likelihood that it will be stolen, by examining the probability of an attempt to steal the information and the vulnerability of the information to attack. Again, broad categories are useful: Designate each set of information as either Low Threat/Vulnerability, Medium Threat/Vulnerability or High Threat/Vulnerability.

To combine the two factors, assign each a numerical rating—say, on a scale from 1 to 10—and multiply the two numbers by each other.

Using that scale, you might consider any combined ranking below 30 to be Low Threat/Vulnerability, and any ranking above 70 to be High Threat/Vulnerability; different people will draw those lines in different places.

A key point: Information that is highly vulnerable to attack but unlikely to interest a hacker (think of a banged-up old subcompact parked with the keys in the ignition, in a high-crime neighborhood), or that is very attractive to a thief but is very well protected (a brand-new luxury car on the White House grounds), would fall into the Low Threat/Vulnerability category.

Step 3. Create a grid with all the possible combinations of the first two steps, from Low Value, Low Threat/Vulnerability up to High Value, High Threat/Vulnerability. Then plot each set of information on the grid. This gives a clear view of where the greatest potential losses lie—not just in terms of the cost of a breach, but also in terms of its likelihood.

Step 4. Focus spending where it can reap the largest net benefits—where a given amount of money will produce the biggest reduction in potential loss.

Security investments should continue to be made as long as the incremental benefits are greater than the incremental costs—which usually stops being the case where the costs are roughly one-third of the total expected loss from a security breach.

Well yesterday news hit that Adobe Systems Incorporated will soon cease Flash player plug-in development for mobile browsers.

Now, the American computer software company will encourage mobile users to utilize the Adobe Air platform, and even back it’s former competitor – HTML5.

According to Wired.com, Adobe VP Danny Winokur said, “HTML5 is now universally supported on major mobile devices, in some cases exclusively. This makes HTML5 the best solution for creating and deploying content in the browser across mobile platforms. We are excited about this, and will continue our work with key players in the HTML community, including Google, Apple, Microsoft and RIM, to drive HTML5 innovation they can use to advance their mobile browsers.”

So does this mean that Adobe Flash has failed in one form or another, or is just simply giving up?

Some would say it is because Flash never made the transition from PC to mobile web. But why couldn’t such a successful company make the change?

According to TechCrunch, mobile devices “rely on small batteries, which need to last for days at a time. For this reason, mobile phones have slower, less power-hungry CPUs. The original iPhone had a 412 MHz CPU. That’s about how fast desktop CPUs were back in 1998. That was basically a 9 year setback in CPU speeds, which was more than Adobe’s Flash Player could handle.”

Hence, slowing down the CPU means slowing down the graphics performance.

It’s not really worth putting in the effort on an application when the results will work much slower than intended.

Maybe pulling out of the game is the best move for Adobe at this time. Who knows – maybe they’ll surprise us with something new in the near future.

We’ve all seen the Groupon ads and likely most of us are subscribed to these daily deals. I’ve even downloaded the Groupon app to my Android phone, which can be a bit of a content overload.

Now, according to the New York Times, Groupon’s latest deal offers investors a share in the company for $20 a unit. The internet-based company is initially selling just 35 million shares, offering roughly 5 percent of its total.

“On Thursday morning, whispers of zealous demand snaked through Wall Street, with orders well over 10 times the amount of the shares offered, according to two people with knowledge of the offering who requested anonymity because the matter was confidential. As investors clamored for shares, Groupon, at the end of the day, priced its initial public offering at $20, above the expected range of $16 to $18. The stock sale, which raised $700 million, values the company at $12.65 billion.”

That’s billion with a B.

Groupon founder and chief executive, Andrew Mason, told 300 investors the company is working in a market measured not in billions but trillions of dollars.

Launched in November 2008, the first market for Groupon was Chicago, followed soon thereafter by Boston, New York City, and Toronto. As of October 2010, the company serves more than 150 markets in North America and 100 markets in Europe, Asia and South America and has amassed 35 million registered users.

The company owns numerous international operations, all of which were originally deal-of-the-day services similar to it, but most of which were subsequently re-branded under the Groupon name after acquisition.

And they’re only getting started.

Wikipedia