Ericsson and Samsung reach agreement on licensing terms

• Settlement ends all ongoing patent related legal disputes
• Agreement includes global patent cross licensing of cellular technologies
• License illustrates Ericsson's commitment to FRAND principles
• Settlement impacts Ericsson sales and net income in Q4 2013 by SEK 4.2 b. and SEK 3.3 b. respectively.

Ericsson (NASDAQ: ERIC) and Samsung have reached an agreement on global patent licenses between the two companies. The cross license agreement covers patents relating to GSM, UMTS, and LTE standards for both networks and handsets.

Ericsson is committed to licensing its standard-essential patents on fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory (FRAND) terms for the benefit of the industry. It believes that licensing according to FRAND principles strikes the appropriate balance between incentivizing companies to innovate and contribute technology to open standards and maintaining the overall royalty rates at a reasonable level to allow new entrants access to the market.

 "We are pleased that we could reach a mutually fair and reasonable agreement with Samsung. We always viewed litigation as a last resort," said Kasim Alfalahi, Chief Intellectual Property Officer at Ericsson. "This agreement allows us to continue to focus on bringing new technology to the global market and provides an incentive to other innovators to share their own ideas."

This agreement ends complaints made by both companies against each other before the International Trade Commission (ITC) as well as the lawsuits before the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas.

FINANCIAL IMPACT

The agreement includes an initial payment and ongoing royalty payments from Samsung to Ericsson for the term of the new multi-year license agreement.

The initial payment in the agreement will impact Ericsson sales and net income in Q4 2013 by SEK 4.2 b. and SEK 3.3 b. respectively. Ericsson expects that the initial payment in the agreement will impact Ericsson's operating cash flow in the beginning of 2014.

The details of the agreement are confidential and will not be disclosed. Information of the financial impact of the initial payment on Ericsson's Q4 2013 results will be included in Ericsson's Q4 2013 earnings report.

NOTES TO EDITORS

Download high-resolution photos and broadcast-quality video at www.ericsson.com/press

Ericsson is a world-leading provider of communications technology and services. We are enabling the Networked Society with efficient real-time solutions that allow us all to study, work and live our lives more freely, in sustainable societies around the world.

Our offering comprises services, software and infrastructure within Information and Communications Technology for telecom operators and other industries. Today 40 percent of the world's mobile traffic goes through Ericsson networks and we support customers' networks servicing more than 2.5 billion subscriptions. 

We are more than 110,000 people working with customers in more than 180 countries. Founded in 1876, Ericsson is headquartered in Stockholm, Sweden. In 2012 the company's net sales were SEK 227.8 billion (USD 33.8 billion). Ericsson is listed on NASDAQ OMX, Stockholm and NASDAQ, New York stock exchanges.

www.ericsson.com  
www.ericsson.com/news 
www.twitter.com/ericssonpress
www.facebook.com/ericsson 
www.youtube.com/ericsson

All you need to know about Mobile Lifecycle Management

What Is Mobile Lifecycle Management?

Nowadays business environments are increasingly relying in smart mobile devices and enterprise applications. Tablets and smartphones are utilized daily by employees in order to access and manage highly sensitive corporate data.

The smart leaders of the business world are improving performance by using mobility to enhance employee productivity and customer service. To effectively manage enterprise mobility strategy, companies outsource themobile lifecycle management to experts in the field.

People with broad experience, specialized on mobile lifecycle management services, will help you achieve your business objectives by providing the expected application performance, solving potential mobile problems before they can affect your business and optimizing the value of your investment.

Your role is to make sure they understand how the mobile app will be used, who will be using it and the characteristics of the environment it will be subject too. They have the means to successfully manage the mobile lifecycle management solution tailored to your specific needs.

Your mobile application will be supported by performance oriented tools and processes delivering proactive mobile lifecycle management through continuous analysis and support. Shortly, it will manage the entire mobile application lifecycle.

Key Steps To Master Mobile Lifecycle Management

Mobile lifecycle management services include all the activities associated with maximizing the return on yourmobile application investment, helping you to avoid easting precious time and valuable capital.  How you choose, deploy and manage your enterprise mobile applications has a great impact on your overall business.

A mobile lifecycle management business solution should be expertly designed to earn you a faster return and maximum benefit from you mobility investment. Such a solution is successful if it adds value to the company in an ongoing basis, providing sustained improvement on each key step.

Let’s quickly get through the phases of mobile lifecycle management:

• Planning – make sure all decisions made are properly informed and correctly evaluate application usability
• Launch – experts involved should have total control and be able to adapt to changing circumstances
• Management – it’s all about maximizing operational efficiency and reaching the business goals; make sure the mobile application works correctly.
• Analysis – companies measure the enterprise applications performance to ensure it is aligned with the overall business strategy
• Optimization – experts replicate best practices and make the appropriate changes; update and upgrade the mobile app.

Mobile Lifecycle Management Challenges

Which are the challenges associated with mobile lifecycle management services?

Companies need to constantly test and monitor their mobile applications usability and performance. In order to gain the complete return of investment from their mobility strategy companies must make sure they implement the bestmobile lifecycle management system, capable to plan, deploy, support and test the enterprise mobile applications. You need to ensure proactive management of all steps of business mobile applications lifecycle.

[Source]

Why Developers Choose iOS Over Android and Why that Needs to Change?

Android just hit 1 billion users mark with the launch of Android KitKat. It is clearly chasing rainbows with their high popularity and variety of devices. Apple on the other hand has been very steady and have managed to sell 700 million iOS devices so far and are still continuing to do reasonably well in the smartphones market. But one can’t deny the fact that Android has been roaring all this while, but developers don’t think so.

Yes, The app developers are choosing iOS over Android. If you look at the most recent super successful apps like Vine or Instagram, you will notice one thing in common that they were both built for iOS users first. The list of such apps goes on and on.

Let’s have a look at some of the reasons why developers are happy developing apps for iOS.

Ecosystem

As you know both iOS and Android have different ecosystems; there are a limited iOS devices with perfectly configured versions of iOS for each one of them. The iOS versions have been steadily updating and the updates are available for almost each and every device at the same time. Android on the other hand is known to be a bit scattered at that, having a fragmented ecosystem. There are a lot of manufacturers involved. Therefore, tons of devices with different hardware use, different screen resolution and of course varying price range are available, which means the app has to be tested on different OS versions, different hardware levels, and different screen resolutions. That’s a lot of effort there.

Developers love tight ecosystems. With the explanation of both the ecosystem above, you can tell which one will need more resources and more time. It’s Android, hence, developers go for the iOS app first.

Money Matters

It’s a known fact that Android users will not pay for the apps as easily as iOS users would. Android users like their apps for free. And that forces the android developers to earn money via putting up ads in the apps that they develop. Putting ads is probably not the greatest way to earn money.

iOS users on the other hand like to purchase their apps from the app store, that means more money. If you were a developer you’d probably choose iOS platform as well.

Piracy Kills

With Android piracy at its peak, there are a lot of third party websites that provide the paid apps for free, which is a real set back for many developers. It doesn’t mean there are no piracy issues with iOS but they are very limited to jailbroken iOS devices.

Lack of good Android Tablets

Believe it or not, but this factor does play an important plan in setting a particular mindset for the developers. Apple’s iPads are indisputably the best piece of tablets that you could buy from the market. It has definitely been able to change the smartphone markets by filling in with a lot of large sized smartphones. More iPads selling means more reach, and more reach means more business. That’s enough to make up developers minds to go for iOS first.

Manufacturers like Samsung, LG, ASUS are working on Android tablets but not as good as Apple, and while some tablets are doing good, there are no tablet friendly apps for those devices, which ultimately adds up to less sales and leads to less android apps.

Customers force Developers to go iOS First

In most cases, customers want developers to go iOS first in which case developers have no other option. For example, Facebook rolls out most of their significant updates on iOS devices first. Here, the developers working under Mark Zuckerberg have no option but to follow the orders.

Why This Needs to Change?

Well, things are changing now. The famous Android vs iOS war is taking a big turn. Android has now released Android Kitkat, which according to Sundar Pichai, head of android, will support on all the devices ranging from cheap galaxies by Samsung to expensive “Ones” by HTC. What does that mean? That means less to no fragmentation in the ecosystem. Developers will need less resources and more importantly less time to create Android apps.

With Nexus 7 and Nexus 10, Google’s flagship tablets, Google has been able to break the less-sales-less-apps chain and both the tablets are doing very well with Nexus 7 topping the Amazon sales charts. Technically both the tablets are feature rich with great displays and are very cheap. This should boost developers morale to go for Android first.

The growth rate of Android has been very impressive and assuming that Google will be able to get rid of the piracy that Android is going to be the best thing for the developers unless Apple acts.

With Android KitKat, Google is looking to get to another billion soon while iOS is yet to hit the billion mark. And as we know that money matters, the billion mark should give the message to developers on how big Android is going to be in next few years.

The last and probably the best argument would be, “Android is Open Source”. You have heard of it over and over again and this is the reason Android took off in the first place. It still remains the single reason for a lot of developers who like the sense of openness and independence.

[Source]

OPM3

by Dennis Stevens

Last week I became an OPM3® Certified Consultant. After spending almost three years as the Deputy Project Manager with the volunteer team developing OPM3 Second Edition, I spent a week taking the OPM3 Certified Consultant course and passed the final exam. I have received a lot of questions about what that means and whether there is any value in it. There are about 100 OPM3 Certified Consultants in the world. I want to talk about OPM3, project management standards, getting organizationally mature, and what being an OPM3 Certified Consultant means. This might not sound exciting, but hang with me. There are very few organizations that won’t benefit from getting better at implementing strategy.

What is OPM3?

OPM3 is a standard that was first published in December of 2003 by the Project Management Institute. OPM3 stands for Organizational Project Management Maturity Model. Per PMI, “Organizational project management is the systematic management of projects, programs, and portfolios in alignment with the achievement of strategic goals. The concept of organizational project management is based on the idea that there is a correlation between an organization’s capabilities in Project Management, Program Management, and Portfolio Management, and the organizations effectiveness in implementing strategy.”

[There is some conflict in the terms process and capability. I will use the term capability consistently through my discussion. A capability describes “what you do and why you do it”. A process describes “how”. PMI doesn’t describe “how” in their standards even though they call them processes.]

To put this simply, organization’s have to implement changes in their structure, processes, management practices, and/or technology to implement a strategy. This is difficult but there are some capabilities that have been show to support them in consistently implementing these changes.  These capabilities can be categorized into effectively and efficiently executing projects, the coordination of multiple projects to optimize resource utilization and project performance, and deciding which projects are the best ones for the organization to invest in based on the organizations strategy. These are Project Management, Program Management, and Portfolio Management respectively. OPM3 uses the capabilities identified in PMI’s Project Management Body of Knowledge-4^th Edition, The Standard for Program Management-Second Edition, and The Standard for Portfolio Management-Second Edition. More on standards in a minute.

OPM3 wraps a continuous process improvement approach around these capabilities. For example, when implementing a project you probably want to manage the scope of the project. Within most organizations -most of the time, that means you have to gather requirements, define the scope of the project, and create a work plan when planning a project. There are a lot of different ways to do this. It may make sense on some projects to do this once at the start of the project and on other projects, you should do it iteratively and in progressively more detail. What organizations that are good at executing strategy do is they define how they are going to manage scope. Then they pay attention to how well this works continue to improve their method over time. This is organizationally mature.  OPM3 breaks the capabilities down into Standardize, Measure, Control, and Improve.

OPM3 also includes a set of Organizational Enablers. These are the capabilities that must exist in an organization to support the implementation and ongoing existence of Project Management capabilities. These include things like project management training, project management sponsorship, and other structural, cultural, technological and human resource practices.

You can pick up a copy of the OPM3 standard from PMI’s website for about $100. This standard describes the approach in detail, lists all the capabilities, and includes a nice Self Assessment tool in the appendix.

Project Management Standards

The Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBoK) is a catalog of capabilities (called “processes” by PMI)  related to the management of projects. When the first OPM3 standard was published, PMI had not published standards for Portfolio Management or Program Management.  These first versions came out in 2006 and have been significantly updated with the simultaneous release of new Editions of the standards for Project, Program, Portfolio, and OPM3 in December of 2008.

The new standards provide a comprehensive catalogue of the capabilities that cover Project, Program, and Portfolio Management. These standards show the capabilities that will work in most organizations most of the time. They are based on years of research and the input of thousands of volunteers. They give examples of existing practices within the capabilities.  Despite what some critics claim, they don’t tell you “how” to implement those capabilities, just “what” you should be thinking about. They also don’t tell you to do all the capabilities whether they make sense for you or not, follow a high ceremony waterfall process, or make the purpose of the organization about project management.

Getting Mature

Maturity is an interesting concept. It has a lot of meanings. Mature can be a show you wouldn’t like your kids to watch, a bill of exchange that is due, or a ripe or fully aged piece of fruit. The definition of maturity I am using here is fully developed. What makes organizational project management maturity an interesting concept in business is that fully developed is different in almost every business. It can also change over time within an organization as the needs for project management change.  The key to organizational project management maturity is not to try to implement every capability with a robust set of process maturity. But to implement the capabilities that are right for helping a specific organization implement their specific strategy. This includes implementing an appropriate level of continuous improvement and only the necessary organizational enablers.

I have written about this focused approach to improving project management performance here and here. Invest when it improves the organizations ability to drive value. The goal is not to get better at project management, it is to get better at profitably delivering value to your customers. Project Management maturity efforts should be tied directly to business results.

 OPM3 Certified Consultant

An OPM3 Certified Consultant isn’t just someone who understands the OPM3 standard. Just to get into the course OPM3 Certified Consultant course you must demonstrate comprehensive knowledge of the OPM3 standard through completion of a SAM assessment or an OPM3 fundamentals course. An OPM3 Certified Consultant has demonstrated significant program or project management experience, since a PMP or PgMP is an eligibility requirement. An OPM3 Certified Consultant also has significant assessing and/or consulting experience.

Once in the course, the consultant is trained on the OPM3 assessment methodology and tool set, and the improvement methodology and tool set. This is during an intense four day training course. The consultant must successfully complete an exam.  The handbook that walks you through this process can be found at the PMI website.

The Value of OPM3 Certified Consultants

Most businesses can benefit from getting better at executing their strategy. Improving Organizational Project Management Maturity is a method of improving the organization ability to execute their strategy. OPM3 provides a systematic approach to identify and implement Organizational Project Management improvements appropriate to each business. Project Management Maturity is a tricky thing – it requires insight and experience to focus improvements in project management so it improves the organizations ability to deliver value to its customers. An OPM3 Certified Consultant has an assessment and improvement methodology, a robust tool set, and has demonstrated the experience with identifying and implementing improvements based on PMI’s standards.

For me, the value of the certification includes the assessment and improvement methodology training I received, the time I have spent with other experienced Organization Project leaders, access to the assessment and improvement tools provided by PMI, and some branding. I can combine this with my experience in software development and IT Operations excellence and cost optimization to rapidly deliver value to organizations. For organizations looking for a way to rapidly improve the performance of thier projects, an OPM3 certified consultant with proven experience and expertise in your domain is a good option. Guided by a proven systematic approach, they can perform an assessment and create an improvement roadmap and tie the improvements to your business results. 

Facebook Hit With Lawsuit: Could Mistrust Spell The End Of The Social Giant?

Facebook, the popular social network with over a billion users world wide, has just been hit with a class-action lawsuit. The allegations, revealed in the FT, are that Facebook systematically scans the content of private messages so it can sell the data to third parties such as advertisers.

Facebook’s entire business model is based on the fact that it monitors what users write, like and up-load in order to sell this information on to others. I have covered some of the concerns about this in my articles ‘How Facebook Exploits Your Private Information’ and ‘How Facebook Likes Reveal Your Intimate Secrets’. In principle, there is nothing wrong with Facebook using our data to make commercial gains. In the end, the service is free and Facebook has to make money somehow. However, my biggest concern is that the data mining activities are not as transparent as they should be.

Facebook has been criticized for this lack of transparency on many occasions, but two Facebook users now believe Facebook has gone too far. Users Matthew Campbell from Arkansas and Michael Hurley from Oregon have filed a class-action lawsuit on behalf of the over 166m Facebook users in the US. The accusation is that Facebook is violating the Electronic Communications Privacy Act by scanning and exploiting the content of private messages sent via the Facebook platform without prior consent by users.

The issue here is that ‘private’ messages are seen by most users as exactly that: private! The accusation is that Facebook identifies website links (URLs) contained in private messages and then searches these websites in order to profile users. In their accusation Campbell and Hurley argue: "Representing to users that the content of Facebook messages is 'private' creates an especially profitable opportunity for Facebook, because users who believe they are communicating on a service free from surveillance are likely to reveal facts about themselves that they would not reveal had they known the content was being monitored."

A Facebook spokesperson told Bloomberg that the allegations are without merit and that Facebook will defend itself vigorously. Of course they would say that. The trouble for Facebook is to strike the right balance between offering a customer service in form of a free social networking platform and shareholder returns, especially profits from selling data and advertising.

To answer my own question from the headline: No, I don’t think that this lawsuit will be the end of Facebook. However, I do feel very strongly about the need for better transparency about how our data is used and believe it can lead to a loss of trust that could seriously threaten companies like Facebook. To me, it feels like Facebook (as well as many other companies including Google, Yahoo! etc.) are trying to hide the data mining and analytics activities in their very long Terms and Conditions, to which most people sign up but rarely fully read or understand. Maybe a simple opt out with an alternative “paid for” service would be a good option.

What do you think? What is your view on Facebook exploiting your private data? Would you consider a “paid for” service if your privacy was guaranteed? Please share your views…

[by Bernard Marr]

This Is How Startup Entrepreneurs Think Differently [Infographic]

When everybody grows up, there are two types of people in the industrialized world. There are entrepreneurs and non-entrepreneurs. They are very different, and sometimes they have trouble relating to each other. If you are an entrepreneur, you probably don’t understand how people could spend their lives working to make someone else’s dreams come true. If you are a corporate employee, you probably think startup entrepreneurs are irresponsible for taking so much risk.

There is no right or wrong. It’s all comes down to mindset. Since I’ve been an entrepreneur most of my life, I am a bit biased, but I can still see both sides. Over the years, I’ve just naturally gravitated to other startup entrepreneurs, and those are who most of my friends are. The same goes for corporate employees. I’m sure they mostly mingle with other corporate employees. As such, we don’t get to see into each other’s worlds very often. We’ve written many articles about the corporate lifestyle, but today it’s all about entrepreneurs.

This infographic called Inside The Mind Of A Startup Entrepreneur (by Top Management Degrees) will give you a glimpse into the mindset of startup entrepreneurs. For me, it’s all about dreams. I could never imagine letting go of the vision and dream I have for Bit Rebels, and I know Richard feels the same way. We’ve been through a lot of ups and downs over the past several years, but our steadfast perseverance and progress towards our goals will never fade. That is why we make such good partners.

---

ALSO SEE: Inside The Brain Of An Entrepreneur [Chart]

---

If you are an entrepreneur, you probably have a similar story. Some people call people like us crazy, and maybe we are, but this is how we choose to live our lives. It’s not always easy, but I wouldn’t have it any other way. I’m grateful I live in a country where it’s possible to follow my dreams. Hopefully you do too. You can read more about this topic at How To Develop An Entrepreneurial Mindset. Enjoy!

This Is How Startup Entrepreneurs Think Differently

(Click Infographic To Enlarge)

[Source]

The Era of Declining Self-Employment

The number of employed Americans rose from 144,144,000 in October 2013 to 144,775,000 in November 2013, an increase of 631,000, according to Federal government data.

That’s good news. More people going back to work is something that everyone – left, right and center – agrees is good for the country.

But a closer look at the data shows that the employment situation isn’t as good for those Americans in business for themselves as for those who work for others. Hidden in the rise in the number of employed Americans is another trend. It’s a divergence between what has happened to people working for themselves (what economists call the self-employed) as compared to those working for others (what economists call the wage-employed).

Last month, the number of wage-employed Americans increased by 673,000, while the number of self-employed Americans declined by 42,000. (Wage employment is total employment minus the sum of incorporated and unincorporated self-employment.)

This divergence isn’t just a one-month aberration. Consider what has happened over the last year. From November 2012 to November 2013, the number of Americans working for others rose by 1,451,000. But, over the same period, the number of self-employed Americans fell by 225,000.

Both wage and self-employment took a similar-sized hit during the Great Recession, with self-employment dropping 5.5 percent between November 2007 and November 2009. During the same period, wage employment declined by a comparable 5.4 percent. But since then the recovery has been uneven. Wage employment has nearly returned to levels seen before the economic downturn. In November 2013, it was only 0.8 percent lower than it was in November 2007. By contrast, self-employment has declined further, and is now 8.1 percent below its November 2007 level.

The divergence in wage and self-employment means that fewer Americans are in business for themselves now than before the Great Recession. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) data reveal that 6 percent of the American population is now self-employed, versus 6.9 percent six years ago. While a difference of 0.9 percentage points might not sound like a lot, it is. If the same fraction of the population was self-employed today as six years ago, 2,223,000 more Americans would currently be self-employed.

The history of self-employment over the past six years stands in sharp contrast to what happened over the previous seven. From November 2000 to November 2007, the number of self-employed Americans increased by 10.9 percent, while the number of U.S. wage-employed rose by only 6.6 percent.

If policy makers are as interested in self-employment as they seem to be at election time, they might take a look at what’s been different over the past six years versus the previous seven. The earlier period was far more favorable to self-employment than the latter one. Perhaps a change in policies is responsible.

[Source]

The 11 Worst Things About iOS 7

BY SAMANTHA MURPHY KELLYSEP 20, 2013

If you ask someone what they think of Apple's new iOS 7 software, you'll likely get a strong reaction. Opinions on "the biggest change to iOS since the original iPhone" have also been mixed, to say the least. Some people love it, while it's making others cry. No, really. We're talking about actual baby tears.

At the surface level — as with anything — beauty is in the eye of the beholder. What one person heralds as a stunning, vibrant overhaul, another might think has been designed by a 6-year-old with crayons. This contrasting sentiment has seeped into many aspects of how people view the new mobile operating system.

First, it's important to note that it's different. Really different. Many people don't like change, and similar to most software updates, there are kinks. A new Tumblr account called Sloppy UI has even curated issues from users across the web.

Below, take a look at our biggest complaints about iOS 7 so far:

1. Flat UI

The user interface has gone completely flat, so apps look a lot less like actual buttons. We miss the subtle depth provided by previous iOS versions that made it seem like we weren't just tapping the screen. Flat is so in these days — for example, Bing and Google just rolled out new, flatter logos.

2. Unnecessary Movements

iOS 7 is more gesture-focused than previous versions, and it's fun taking advantage of features such as "swipe to unlock." But there are many animated movements that border on "disorienting." The main offender here is how apps open and close, by zooming in and out of content via diagonal movement. It looks sleek, but at the same time, it creates a dizzying effect.

3. Parallax Effect

The jittery-nature of the parallax effect on the background will give you vertigo. (For example, if you shift your phone from side to side, it will look like the wallpaper is moving behind the apps). The good news is you can turn this off by selecting "reduce motion" in Settings > General > Accessibility > Reduce Motion.

4. Spotlight vs. Notifications

If you want to do an internal search (the Spotlight feature), swipe your finger from the top of the screen downward (anywhere on the display). If you want to see recent notifications, do the same thing but start the swipe at the very top of the screen. It's very easy to confuse the two and bring up one function when you actually want another. Plus, it makes finding Spotlight more challenging, which has been a major complaint for many iOS 7 users.

5. Less Intuitive

Navigating iOS 7 has been far less intuitive than previous iterations. We're still trying to figure out where certain features are hiding and what used to take one click — like closing a new webpage in Safari — takes a bit more work (and if you use the "x" button, instead of swiping the page away, it's just so small).

6. Keyboard Changes

The keyboard has a new look too, and although (stylistically) it's looking good, there are some challenges with its basic functionality. It's difficult to tell when you've capitalized a word or pressed the shift key. In addition, the .com button is no longer in plain view.

7. Battery Issues

Another huge complaint with iOS 7 is that it's a battery suck. The update comes with the Background App Refresh function on, which allows apps to refresh their content when using Wi-Fi or cellular in the background. But it's known to drain your battery. To turn it off, visit Settings > General > Background App Refresh.

8. More Folder Steps

Android users are familiar with this complaint: When you open a folder on the homescreen and then open an app within that folder, hitting the home button will take you back to the folder and not the home screen. When closing out of the app, iOS users are trained to be back at the main screen — but now they have to go through the extra step of leaving the folder. Although this might make sense — you opened the folder, so now you have to close it — it's just adding more steps iOS users aren't used to taking.

9. Charger Issues

We've seen some complaints from users with cheaper, non-Apple chargers who can no longer use them with their device. With the new iOS, this note pops up on screen: "This is not an authorized Apple product and may not be reliable." As a result, you might have to splurge for Apple's original (and more costly) chargers.

10. Battery Notification

When you typically charge your iPhone and the battery is less than 20%, the icon at the top right will switch from red to white when it's plugged in. Now, we've noticed it stays red until it surpasses 20% battery capacity — so you might think you're phone isn't charging when it actually is.

11. No Home Button Swipe

Everything about the iOS 7 experience is gesture-based, but when you want to go back to the main screen, you have to press the home button — an actual, physical button. When there's a short cut for most things, we'd like to see one for the function we use most.

[Source]

Apple Says It Has Never Worked With NSA To Create iPhone Backdoors, Is Unaware Of Alleged DROPOUTJEEP Snooping Program

Apple has contacted TechCrunch with a statement about the DROPOUTJEEP NSA program that detailed a system by which the organization claimed it could snoop on iPhone users.

Apple says that it has never worked with the NSA to create any ‘backdoors’ that would allow that kind of monitoring, and that it was unaware of any programs to do so.

Here is the full statement from Apple:

Apple has never worked with the NSA to create a backdoor in any of our products, including iPhone. Additionally, we have been unaware of this alleged NSA program targeting our products. We care deeply about our customers’ privacy and security.  Our team is continuously working to make our products even more secure, and we make it easy for customers to keep their software up to date with the latest advancements.  Whenever we hear about attempts to undermine Apple’s industry-leading security, we thoroughly investigate and take appropriate steps to protect our customers.  We will continue to use our resources to stay ahead of malicious hackers and defend our customers from security attacks, regardless of who’s behind them.

The statement is a response to a report in Der Spiegel Sunday that detailed a Tailored Access Operations (TAO) unit within the NSA that is tasked with gaining access to foreign computer systems in order to retrieve data to protect national security. The report also pointed out a division called ANT that was set up to compile information about hacking consumer electronics, networking systems and more.

The story detailed dozens of devices and methods, including prices for deployment, in a catalogue that could be used by the NSA to pick and choose the tools it needed for snooping. The 50-page catalog included a variety of hacking tools that targeted laptops and mobile phones and other consumer devices. Der Spiegel said that these programs were evidence that the NSA had ‘backdoors’ into computing devices that many consumers use.

Among these options was a program called DROPOUTJEEP — a program by which the NSA could theoretically snoop on ‘any’ Apple iPhone with ’100% success’. The documents were dated 2008, implying that these methods were for older devices. Still, the program’s detailed capabilities are worrisome.

Researcher and hacker Jacob Applebaum — the co-author of the articles, coinciding with a speech he gave at a conference about the programs — pointed out that the ’100% success rate’ claimed by the NSA was worrisome as it implied cooperation by Apple. The statement from the company appears to preclude that cooperation.

The program detail indicated that the NSA needed physical access to the devices at the time that the documents were published. It does note that they were working on ‘remote installation capability’ but there’s no indication whether that was actually successful. The program’s other options included physical interdiction of devices like laptops to install snooping devices — but there have been security advances like hardware encryption in recent iPhone models that would make modification of devices much more difficult.

Early reports of the DROPOUTJEEP program made it appear as if every iPhone user was vulnerable to this — which simply can’t be the case. Physical access to a device was required which would preclude the NSA from simply ‘flipping a switch’ to snoop on any user. And Apple patches security holes with every version of iOS. The high adoption rate of new versions of iOS also means that those patches are delivered to users very quickly and on a large scale.

The jailbreak community, for instance, knows that once a vulnerability has been used to open up the iPhone’s file system for modification, it’s been ‘burned’ and will likely be patched by Apple quickly. And the process of jailbreaking fits the profile of the capabilities the NSA was detailing in its slide.

Applebaum’s talk at the 30th Chaos Communication Congress walked listeners through a variety of the programs including DROPOUTJEEP. He noted that the claims detailed in the slide indicated that either Apple was working with the NSA to give them a backdoor, or the NSA was just leveraging software vulnerabilities to create its own access. The Apple statement appears to clear that up — pointing to vulnerabilities in older versions of iOS that have likely since been corrected.

I do also find it interesting that Apple’s statement uses extremely strong wording in response to the NSA program. “We will continue to use our resources to stay ahead of malicious hackers and defend our customers from security attacks,” the statement reads, “regardless of who’s behind them.”

Lumping the program in with ‘malicious hackers’ certainly makes a clear point. This year has been an eventful one for NSA spying program revelations. Apple joined a host of large companies that denied that they had been willing participants in the PRISM data collection system — but later revelations of the MUSCULAR program indicated that the NSA could get its hands on data by monitoring internal company server communications anyway. This spurred targets like Google and Yahoo to implement internal encryption.

Last month, Apple released its first ever report on government information requests, detailing the number of times domestic and foreign governments had asked it for user information. At the time, it also filed a suit with the U.S. Government to allow it to be more transparent about the number and frequency of those requests. It also began employing a ‘warrant canary’ to warn users of future compliance with Patriot Act information requests.

Most recently, Apple joined AOL, Yahoo, Twitter, Microsoft, LinkedIn, Google and Facebook in requesting global government surveillance reform with an open letter. Though the NSA is located in the United States and these programs were largely designed to target ‘foreign threats’, these companies have a global customer base — making protecting user privacy abroad as well as at home just as important.

[Source]

The Pros and Cons of Remote Project Management

You’ve got to love technology. It wasn’t too terribly long ago that everyone thought faxing was amazing. The image came across on the other side on a long, scrolling piece of thermal paper that looked similar to a big roll of toilet paper. Plus, you needed to read the fax pretty quickly because the image seemed to fade and disappear in just a matter of weeks. Regardless of minor inconveniences, it was remarkable that documents and images could be transmitted from one side of the world to the next within seconds.

Now, faxing is so 1990. Think about what we have now: webinars, video conferences, the ability to take control of someone else’s computer remotely, remote whiteboard sessions, and long distance phone calls that don’t cost a thing! All of this new technology is NOW amazing (think about what we’ll have in the next 20 years) and extremely affordable for everyone.

The accessibility and affordability of technology has made working remotely not so remote anymore. It’s commonplace for teams to be spread throughout the state, country, and even world and still collaborate as if they are right in the same building. This has brought with it new found freedoms as well as challenges for you as a project manager.

The following are some of the practical pros and cons of working remotely as a project manager.

The Pros of Working Remotely

There is definitely an upside to working remotely. The following are some based upon my own experience as well as those of other colleagues that have an office in their home.

• HUGE Timesaver – Working remotely is a HUGE timesaveron so many fronts. I know for those who work in any metropolitan area (like Atlanta for instance), it can easily take 1+ hours of commuting to get into the office and home at the end of the day. Now, we’re not talking about 1+ hour for getting to the office AND home at the end of the day.
  We are talking about over an hour to get into the office and then ANOTHER hour to get home at the end of the day. That’s over two hours each day spent on the road.
  Do the math on that one. Two hours per day, five days per week is 10 hours per week. There’s a little over 4 weeks each month (4.3 to be exact) for a total of over 43 hours that someone is in their car per month. Over one work week per month is spent behind the wheel!
  Then, think of the morning rituals that people need to go through in order to decompress once they’ve made it into the office. It may consist of a stop at the coffee machine on the way in, a quick chat with a friend on way to their desk, and then 30 minutes of aimlessly clicking through email to take your mind off the frustration of the morning rush.
  Ah, finally, work can crank up about 10:00 AM.Working remotely can save over 500 hours per year that would otherwise be spent on the road battling traffic and losing your sanity.
• HUGE Money Saver – Another very practical benefit to working remotely is the substantial reduction in expenses. Do you know what it takes to drive an hour each way into and home from work? Gas. And, gas costs money, and lots of it.
  Plus, despite the best of intentions of wanting to bring your lunch into work…it’s oh so tempting and easy to just grab a quick bite out with your friends. It may start out as only a twice a week thing, then it becomes three times per week, and next thing you know the days are few and far between when you bring your lunch in from home at all.
  You can quickly save $400 – $500 or more each month by working remotely. Wouldn’t it be better to put that money toward YOUR 401(k) instead of the retirement plan of some executive at BP or Exxon each time you filled up your car?
• Great For Your Health – Another surprising benefit of working remotely as a project manager are those related to health. A colleague of mine lost 30 pounds in 6 months simply by swapping out being on the road for two hours each day for the treadmill 45 minutes each day. Plus, he was in more of a position to control what he ate from home instead of the calorie-laden choices that beckoned him each day around his office.This still requires a bit of discipline on your part. You can’t just sit at your desk all day eating potato chips and expect to derive some health benefits. Get your exercise out of the way first thing in the morning and you’ll feel better for the rest of the day!

The Cons of Working Remotely

Yes, there is a darker side of working remotely. You may or may not hear this from your colleagues that telecommute, but, there are some things you need to be conscious of if you have the choice of being able to work remotely.

• Camaraderie Suffers – Remember your morning routineof battling the traffic, grabbing a cup of coffee and chatting it up on the way back to your desk each day? Two of those three things are gone when you work remotely. You won’t battle traffic and you can still grab your cup of coffee, but you won’t have that friendly banter you used to have.
  You may think it’s not a big deal to lose that friendly conversation with your workmates, but it does have a downside. With friendly banter comes insight. Insight into what is going on with the company. Insight into what the other person overheard somebody else say after a meeting late yesterday afternoon. Insight into a change in the direction of the company. Insight into the fact that a new project is starting up on the other side of the building and it’s something you will want to be involved with.
  You’ll still get bits and pieces of this information when you work remotely, but it will be just bits and pieces and it will be somewhat outdated and stale by the time you receive it.
• It’s Hard to Turn Things Off – You know you’ve got to be out of the office by a certain time or your stay in traffic will be even that much longer. So, you shut things down, pack it up, and hit the road.
  You don’t have that concern when you work remotely as a project manager. You can just keep working and working and working.
  The next thing you know the clock says its 9 PM. You missed dinner, the kids are getting ready for bed, and your spouse is ticked. Or, you may trick yourself and say you’ve wrapped things up around 6 PM, which still gives yourself plenty of time to head downstairs and have dinner with the family.
  But, you don’t turn things off.
  Lights are flickering, all your gear is running, and files are downloading while you hurry through a rushed and distracted meal. Then, you come up with an excuse to head back into your home office (“I need to get my keys,” for example) and hunker down for another hour to really wrap up your day.
• Other People Live In Your Office – Here’s the catch…it’s called a home office for a reason. The reason is that your office is in your home…along with your family, spouse, kids, pets, delivery guys, neighbor’s dogs, mail people and others that will ring your doorbell at inopportune times throughout the day. You’ll find yourself interrupted more often than expected, loud noises and ringing phones sneaking their way into conference calls more often than you’d like, and the buzzer going off on the dryer right when you are about ready to speak. I haven’t quite figured this one out yet…but will let you know when I do!

We’ve all come a long way from the fax machine. The flexibility, freedom, and opportunity afforded to us as remote project managers is unprecedented. Look at the ability to work from home with eyes wide open and you’ll do just fine as a remote project manager.

[Source]