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Facebook's New Messaging System Handles E-mail, Chat, SMS, Office Web Apps All In One

Thursday, June 23, 2011 at 7:09 PM Article by Unknown 0 Comments

Mark Zuckerberg says it's not email. But it might just replace it. Get ready for your @facebook.com address.

Every Ping In One Place

What are the difference between Facebook messages and regular email? It incorporates emails, Facebook messages, SMS, other chat clients. Eventually VoIP may also be in play. Instead of having some chats here and some texts there, every time you talk to someone it'll be come part of a stream of information.
And while you can collect it all at an @facebook.com email address, it's not mandatory. You can redirect your Gmail messages there, for instance. And yes, an iPhone app update is coming shortly that incorporates Facebook Messages.
Notable differences from regular email? There are no subject lines, no CC or BCC. You can send a message just by hitting the Enter key. It's going to feel like chat. A lot of times, it's going to be chat.

Hanging On a Thread

There will also be a threading solution, which records every type of contact you've had with a person in one place. It's a one-stop conversation shop, a way to tell the full story of a conversation.

Facebook Messages: Every Email, Text, and Chat In One Place

A Friends-Only Inbox

Facebook will also introduce the Social Inbox, which sorts your personal messages, prioritizing notes from friends and setting aside people you aren't as close with. This is the killer function: as a default, you'll only see messages from your friends (and friends of friends). Junk—from people who are outside of your Facebook circle—will go into a separate folder. And you can move people from one folder to the other (which is nice for those of us whose family doesn't have Facebook). You can also choose to actively bounce any email that's not from a friend.
As much as I enjoy Gmail's Priority Inbox, it can't filter nearly as effectively as Facebook can. That's the advantage of the "social graph" that Facebook can access, and why you're going to want to give this a serious look.

Why It Matters

Zuckerberg insists that this isn't going to be a Gmail killer, and for the time being, at least, he's right. But Facebook's looking towards the future, towards a generation that's steadily and increasingly been abandoning email for instant communication. And the more we abandon email for text and chat, the more Facebook's going to be the communication hub.

The new system puts a user's identity above the communication protocol. Facebook Engineer Joel Seligstein today said, "You decide how you want to talk to your friends...They will receive your message through whatever medium or device is convenient for them, and you can both have a conversation in real time. You shouldn't have to remember who prefers IM over email or worry about which technology to use. Simply choose their name and type a message."
Messages are received in an inbox, but it eschews the conventions of email and Facebook messaging (subject lines, recipient/cc/bcc fields, and such,) and instead turns all conversation into a chat, where the conversation and the person you're conversing with are merged.
So if you and a friend are conversing over Facebook chat, then he switches over to a mobile device, the conversation stays in the same place, except it's being sent through SMS.
It currently handles the four different methods of communication, but as it rolls out, it will also become a sharing and collaboration platform. Microsoft announced today that it is integrating the Office Web Apps experience into Facebook's new messaging system. Users will be able to share Word, Excel, and Powerpoint documents in Facebook messages, and download them to your desktop.
Facebook's new messaging system will be rolled out to different groups of users over the next few months, and will include a new mobile app, and @Facebook.com email addresses for interested users.

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Avoid this two emotions and Be a successful Investor

Wednesday, June 22, 2011 at 11:15 PM Article by Unknown 0 Comments



Let’s start having a look:

An experienced long-term investor once told me that when he looked at his face after a share market fall he found despair and fear, while the same face showed enthusiasm and happiness with a share market appreciation. This made him realize that greed and fear were the 2 magnetic forces that caused confusion in investment goals. A balanced and objective approach would help him achieve his long-term financial goals.

Hindrances to positive and objective approach to investment decisions:

My close look at investment behavior has made me realize that fear and greed is not separate but complimentary emotions in an investor. Greed is merely a mental state born out of fear, with investors feeling the fear to lose money and then being unable to meet their family financial obligations. In addition, social pressures to earn in line with close relatives and friends and provide for benefits like higher education in a prestigious college, a grand marriage for children and a house with all modern amenities and furnishings leads to greed.

It is interesting to observe our brains dwell in the middle of negative emotions like fear, disappointment and greed, and these emotions influence our investment decisions, creating confusion in investment decisions. So we as investors start looking for security and confidence in our investments.

This makes me highlight 2 powerful influences on investor behavior namely 1) An investment portfolio based on ones personality
2) The follow the flock policy.

Basing investment portfolios on ones personal likes and dislikes are the first of the powerful influences, it is like investing in cars and fancy gadgets just because you love them. Investing on shares just because you think they are smart or flashy is ambiguous, for they could sink in the long run. It is better instead to invest in profitable ventures that pay in the long run. It is true; our investment fancies make us pay a heavy price.

The follow the flock for fear of being the black sheep policy makes you as an investor to believe in following others in the share markets. You would then be playing a vital role when the going is good and exiting never to return when the share market goes down. The pitfalls of group behavior lead us to buying high and selling less.

It is also true that follow the flock behavior leads to unbalanced investment emotions of black or white (wrong or right) with no shades of objectivity and rationality. In addition, group behavior leads to extreme situations of profit or loss and price swings in the share market that is highly undesirable. Buying high and selling low has made many investors suffer heavy losses in the long run.

A look at positive investment behavior:

Aim at lower returns for market forces play a very vital role in deciding the price. It is good to be investment smart with humility and lower aspirations that makes achievement of financial goals a reality. I have never known of any high return investments that did not have high risks.

Patience over a lifetime and being able to assume stress helps in aiming for long term positive returns and contributes to assuming less financial stress after retirement.

Positive investment behavior requires balanced moods, one of neither elation nor panic. Neither selling in a panic due to share market positions or adverse world or country conditions is advisable, nor is a reaction of extreme financial prosperity, both can destroy a lifetime of healthy investment. A long-term investor needs to realize that neither despairing nor elation of situations in civilization proves worthy for long term financial portfolios.


Let’s just sum up:

I am sure you would be congratulating yourself with all the knowledge gained and would neither allow emotions, group behavior nor your personal likes and dislikes to influence your long term financial goals. It is true you would have also realized that patience, humility and appetite for stress could contribute to long-term achievement of your financial goals.

The author is Ramalingam K, an MBA (Finance) and Certified Financial Planner. He is the Founder and Director of Holistic Investment Planners (www.holisticinvestment.in) a firm that offers Financial Planning and Wealth Management. He can be reached at ramalingam@holisticinvestment.in.

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What Is Icloud?

Saturday, June 11, 2011 at 10:01 PM Article by Unknown 0 Comments



iCloud stores your music, photos, apps, calendars, documents, and more. And wirelessly pushes them to all your devices — automatically. It’s the easiest way to manage your content. Because now you don’t have to.
iCloud is so much more than a hard drive in the sky. It’s the effortless way to access just about everything on all your devices. iCloud stores your content so it’s always accessible from your iPad, iPhone, iPod touch, Mac, or PC.* It gives you instant access to your music, apps, latest photos, and more. And it keeps your email, contacts, and calendars up to date across all your devices. No syncing required. No management required. In fact, no anything required. iCloud does it all for you.
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How Much Storage?

When you sign up for iCloud, Apple will give you 5 GB of storage space. Now that’s not too bad because of the way iCloud stores your content. Your purchased music, apps, and books, as well as your Photo Stream, don’t count against your free storage. That leaves your mail, documents, Camera Roll, account information, settings, and other app data. And since those things don’t use as much space, you’ll find that 5GB goes a long way.
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Which Apps Work With iCloud?

When you update your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch to iOS 5, your favorite Apple apps become seamlessly integrated with iCloud. Just like that. So all your content and information is available and up to date, no matter which device you’re using.
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iTunes In The Cloud

With iCloud, the music you purchase in iTunes appears automatically on all your devices. You can also download your past iTunes purchases. Where you want, when you want.
New purchases. Automatically everywhere. Beta Available Now
iCloud automatically downloads any new music purchase to all your devices over Wi-Fi — or over 3G if you choose. Which means you can buy a song from iTunes on your iPad at home, and find it waiting for you on your iPhone during your morning commute. All without having to sync.
Your past purchases. Available on all your devices. Beta Available Now
Now you can download music you’ve previously purchased to all your devices. When you buy music from iTunes, iCloud stores your purchase history. So you can see the music you’ve bought — no matter which device you bought it on. You can access your purchase history from the iTunes Store on your Mac, PC, iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch. And since you already own that music, you can tap to download your songs or albums to any of your devices.
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iTunes Match

If you want all the benefits of iTunes in the Cloud for music you haven’t purchased from iTunes, iTunes Match is the perfect solution. It lets you store your entire collection, including music you’ve ripped from CDs or purchased somewhere other than iTunes. For just $24.99 a year.
Here’s how it works: iTunes determines which songs in your collection are available in the iTunes Store. Any music with a match is automatically added to your iCloud library for you to listen to anytime, on any device. Since there are more than 18 million songs in the iTunes Store, most of your music is probably already in iCloud. All you have to upload is what iTunes can’t match. Which is much faster than starting from scratch. And all the music iTunes matches plays back at 256-Kbps iTunes Plus quality — even if your original copy was of lower quality.


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LinkedIn To Launch Job Application Button

Thursday, June 02, 2011 at 8:01 PM Article by Unknown 2 Comments


LinkedIn will launch a button for employers’ websites called “Apply With LinkedIn” that allows job candidates to submit their LinkedIn profiles as resumes, according to a report.

Twitter and Google have both launched new buttons this week, and now it seems LinkedIn will also introduce a new way for third-party sites to integrate its services.

A “source briefed on the feature” told GigaOm that the new feature, which will be displayed alongside job descriptions on partner sites, will launch later this month.

Aside from making it easier for candidates to apply for jobs, the plugin uses applicants’ data to automatically sort candidates for the employer. If a company wants more than a LinkedIn profile to vet candidates, it can use additional questions from a template (i.e. Are you willing to relocate?), add customized questions or request a cover letter. Submissions can be sent to an email address, a URL or JavaScript callback.

Employers are an important demographic for the newly public company. As GigaOm points out, hiring solutions are LinkedIn’s highest earner, generating 43% of the company’s revenue.

Although other social networks can easily compete for ad dollars, LinkedIn has long dominated the professional corner of social media. Integrating itself further within the jobs space is a smart move.

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8 Family Budgeting Misconceptions Demystified

at 7:38 PM Article by Unknown 0 Comments


Let’s put on our thinking cap:

Depositing our pay cheques in bank and using the credit and ATM card for spending seems easy. However keeping the track of your income and expenses, to get full value for your money is possible only with budgeting. Budgeting helps most of us to keep track of our income and spending and not overspend.

In practice 10 budgeting myths retard the savings of a lifetime. They are:


1) I earn a lot and need not budget:
 
This requires a change of perspective. Michel Jackson lived like a king but died awash in $400 million debt.  Budgeting by watching your spending pattern helps trace unnecessary     expenses on clothes or eating out, and help you save for a future or for a much wanted dream holiday.  So how much you earn has got less relevance. What is more important is budgeting. Proper budgeting can make a low income earner to retire richer and overspending can make a high income earner a pauper.

2) I hold a secure job and see no reason to save: 

This does not hold well today with large corporations going in for labor layoff to save costs during recession. Small corporations also put you at a risk with the death of the owner or the company going into losses.

This insecurity demands caution to save for spending during such periods when you are caught unaware, with an emergency fund coming handy.

3) I am poor in calculations and cannot budget:

With useful tools like spreadsheet that help account for expenses and income earned make the budgeting much easier.  A look at the spending helps avoid unnecessary expenses to budget and save in future. If you are interested one can easily learn budgeting. So if you say ‘I don’t know how to make a budget’, it shows your level of interest and willingness to save for a secured future.

4) I am lucky; I will never be short of money: 

However your ability in meeting high bills and other unpredictable expensive events like life threatening accidents, or a major surgery without experiencing shortage of money may not be always true.

So better save and be prepared to face unpredicted contingencies and then use the savings for something else that you may consider desirable.



5) I pay my bills promptly and do not need budgeting:

Congratulations I appreciate your credit worthiness, but going into negative balance is also quite easy. You may be self disciplined. It doesn’t mean that you need not make a budget. Preparing a budget makes you much more disciplined and spend consciously. So budgeting with saving helps avoid going into negative balance or overdraft.

6) Budgeting could lead to deprivation:

Budgeting is not frugal living and foregoing all pleasures like a movie a month and an eat out once a week, but it just not allowing your earnings to be not overtaken by your expense. Everyone is planning to save, planning to invest, but do we have a well thought out plan for spending. A smart spending plan only can lead you to save more.

There is no need to feel deprived with budgeting; it just means saving a percentage of your income spent unnecessarily to have a secured future.

7) I have small wants and find no need to save:

This need not be a stable attitude in human nature, with you wanting to take advantage of certain financial trends in the market like buying house or land at cheaper rates, or investing at higher rates towards building a bigger retirement corpus.  Hence budgeting helps to save when you do not want money for a time when you could profitably use it.

 Your wants may be small but basic needs like food, shelter, and clothing are becoming costlier with inflation. Also you need to take into account your health care needs of the future.


8) I get rises, bonus and tax refunds and find no need to budget:

I think you have been lucky all these years, however these benefits are highly unpredictable and placing ones hopes fully on them is futile. It is better to budget and save than depend on unpredictable benefits like bonus, raise and tax refunds. The recent recession has taught us a lesson to all of us which we should not forget easily.

Budgeting and your future

Take charge of your future now. Budgeting is the first step towards controlling your financial destiny. Don’t let your unconscious spending habits decide your financial destiny.

The author is Ramalingam K, an MBA (Finance) and Certified Financial Planner. He is the Founder and Director of Holistic Investment Planners (www.holisticinvestment.in) a firm that offers Financial Planning and Wealth Management. He can be reached at ramalingam@holisticinvestment.in.




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