Microsoft’s Bing Gains More Market Share In August

Well it may not be earth shattering news, but Microsoft’s Bing went from an 8.9 percent of the search market place in July to 9.3 percent in August. It has gained market share for 4 consecutive months in a row. The current data shows Google at 64.6 percent, Yahoo at 19.3 percent, Microsoft at 9.3 percent Ask at 3.9 percent and AOL at 3 percent. Google actually gave up a meager .1 percent to Bing. Google may not be losing sleep at this point, however if this trend continues it could prove to be especially troublesome.

Microsoft is planning on providing a new release twice a year with the latest technology enhancements. The latest Bing release was previewed to employees at the Microsoft annual meeting. The comments were heard to be very favorable. Google is not known for sitting on its hands, so it will be interesting to watch what kind of changes makes in its next release.

The Law, Privacy and Cloud Computing

The rapid advancement of Cloud Computing has the government scrambling to evolve privacy protection laws to keep them relevant. If the laws do not keep pace with technology, the constitution protections are seriously jeopardized. Unfortunately the Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA) was written more twenty years ago and pre-dates the internet. Many legal experts are advocating serious reform of the ECPA to provide clear guidelines to service providers about all the data that is in their cloud infrastructure.

The popularity of cloud computing resources being used by businesses and consumers for storing photos, e-mail, private data, and medical records is growing as it provides a low cost alternative. The security of this information may be jeopardized as a subpoena for e-mail can be served to a service provider and the owner of the e-mail may never be notified. As a result the government and attorneys are utilizing the vast amount of data and information stored on the cloud for purposes of their lawsuits and investigations. A single subpoena can provide the potential to gather information from millions of users. The Fourth Amendment of the Constitution affords protection against unreasonable search and seizure for houses and papers. As technology has changed how information is shared and stored, it is time to extend the protections afford under the Constitution to provide appropriate level of protection to digital information.

Reliable Cell Phone Service In 2009?

How hard can it be to find a reliable cell phone service provider in America in 2009? Well unfortunately, it is harder that you would think it would be. AT&T first did a prototype way back in 1977. Lots of time has passed, so you would think with technological advances it should be perfect by now. Not quite.

In a survey published in 2008, by Consumer Reports, it looked at the top 20 metropolitan areas and included responses from 47629 readers. It says that cell service typically gets the lowest ratings of any services offered with "fewer than half of the respondents were completely or very satisfied with their cell phone service." Verizon took the survey lead with a meager 70% approval rating, followed by closely by T-Mobile. AT&T came in third, followed by Sprint coming in last place of the major cell phone service providers.

Service quality varies widely by carrier and metropolitan area. Take California for example. In California T-mobile and Sprint are known for spotty service throughout the state. Verizon is strong in the San Francisco Bay Area and San Diego, but mediocre in Los Angeles and elsewhere. AT&T is strong in Los Angeles, Sacramento with just OK but not great service in the Bay Area and San Diego.

Check the local reputation with your friends and associates before signing up for a long term contract. MetroPCS provides low cost service in select major metropolitan areas; however do wander too far if you want to stay in the service area. It is best to stay with the major four service providers if you live in rural areas. Some carriers such as T-Mobile, provide detail coverage map which may be helpful as a rough guideline, but check with your neighbors just to be sure. I live two blocks from a major freeway in California and I was amazed to find out that my service provider, a major carrier, provided no service at that location. Now that my contract has expired, I am ready to make my move. Good luck and good hunting.

Making the Case for Unified Communication In Today's Economy

Although Bernanke has stated that the economy is on the "cusp" of recovery, the harsh reality of day to day business in 2009 puts a lot of pressure corporate IT budgets. Unified Communications (UC) offers real productivity gains; however IT managers face the daunting task of making the case that the spending for unified communications really justifies the benefits especially with the current state of the economy. One problem is identifying the real cost base line for non-integrated solutions that are already deployed, along with the support required for these services. It is common for IT managers to under estimate the cost of the current solution because it is difficult to gather all of the information on the separate tools, processes, and support costs.

Some IT managers have found it beneficial to present information on building a unified communication solution as part an overall effort to provide business process automation. UC solutions that encompass the breadth of an enterprise's need for integrated solutions can save money over separate solutions in numerous ways. The effort required to use, integrate and support communications from various sources requires time (i.e. money) for the users as well as the IT staff. In addition to productivity gains for the whole enterprise, moving to an integrated solution simplifies the support process and reduces support costs.