Mycestro - 3D Mouse, Thumb Activated Wireless Mouse

The latest in the tech world is now the Mycestro 3D mouse, a thumb activated wireless mouse which can be attached to the index finger. A computer mouse which wraps round the finger could be good for a while though it could get a bit awkward. `Mycestro’, as the device is named is like a bulky futuristic ring which is around 4.5 cm long and appears like a sort of an arrowhead placed on the index finger, presently for now, only the right one.

The side closest to the thumb comprises of touchpad with three small buttons for scrolling, selecting and clicking and to use the Mycestro, one needs to plug a small Bluetooth dongle which comes with it in a USB port on the computer. Thereafter one can slide the ring on and touch the thumb anywhere on the side touchpad and begin waving the hand to see the movement of the cursor.

Though this mouse weighs only half an ounce, it tends to feel heavy really quickly and wearing it for more than half an hour while typing is a challenge. When it comes to human computer interface scenarios,we face these days; the traditional mouse has its limitations, which led to the original inspiration for this design.

Prototype Utilises 3D Space Recognition 

Nick Mastandrea, Founder of Ohio based Innovative Developments LLC, worked on the design for about two years. The present prototype utilises 3D space recognition in order to control the computer without the need for dedicated mouse space or a touchpad on the device.

Mycestro, which is the size of a Bluetooth earpiece is designed to be worn on the index finger and uses a combination of sensors as well as algorithms to collect finger movement information with a touch sensitive panel which is located at the side of the finger closest to the thumb.If the hand is removed from the mouse, the it remains inactive till it is touched and held anywhere on its side panel indicating that one can type or make a coffee without having to remove it. When the cursor gets active, finger movements together with the active thumb press directs it to the desired location while further thumb motions on the touch panel button provides a full range of mouse clicks as well as scroll functions.

Compatible with Bluetooth Smart Ready Devices 

The 3D mouse helps users to personalize programmable gesture commands along with the usual mouse functions like a flick or swipe movements. This device started at Kickstarter project in 2013 and presently being sold online for $149. The Kickstarter campaign is on to raise funds for tooling as well as preproduction prototype run. This mouse uses BLE – Bluetooth 4.0 Low Energy Protocol in order to provide a range of 30 ft. and is compatible with Bluetooth Smart Ready devices which include iPads, MacBooks as well as any PC with a compatible BLE dongle. Android devices should probably be online by the end of the year according to its creators. The present version has two interchangeable clip sizes for different digits and can be charged through USB where a single charge is believed to provide eight hours of battery life based on its usage.

NSA's Auroragold spies on carriers to breach cell networks, report says

The Inside Story 

The Intercept reports that the US National Security Agency has the ability to collect information at will by targeting cellular networks around the world.It is called Auroragold, and allows the NSA to exploit and also introduce new security vulnerabilities in cell networks, which helps it to eavesdrop on calls and text messages.

The report says that the Auroragold program has been operational for a few years now; continuously monitoring communications with over 1,200 e-mail accounts associated with major cellphone networks.The Intercept claims that the chief target is the UK-based GSM Association.

Its members include some of the largest tech and telecom companies in the world, like AT&T, Microsoft, Vodafone, Cisco and Samsung. The technical documents, of the GSMA’s, connected to roaming arrangements have been of particular interest to NSA. Mobile phone owners can use their devices while traveling abroad using this. These documents highlight encryption methods as well as new technologies being used by carriers.

The Information Leak and Further Reports

The former NSA contractor, Edward Snowden, leaked certain copious files containing this information. Reporter Glenn Greenwald, co-founder of The Intercept, obtained the files.Snowden, in 2013, had revealed reams of information to a fellow journalist Laura Poitras and Greenwald about the inner workings of the NSA. Since then, regular reports containing classified information about NSA have kept appearing, this being the latest.

The Intercept further states that Auroragold is operated by a "specialist" unit within the agency.It is called the Wireless Portfolio Management Office, with a logo that says its three charges are to "predict, plan, prevent."The Intercept's report also states that technical information have been obtained, and potentially exploited, from around 70 percent cellular networks around the world by the NSA.

These include almost all in North Africa, scores in the Middle East, and almost three-quarters in China. On the list of network information obtained, the US is surprisingly low. The NSA’s reputation has been scalded in public perception and caused tensions with international intelligence agencies, after the subsequent leaks.

NSA’s Reaction

NSA spokesperson Vanee Vines, not confirming the latest Snowden leak details, said in an e-mail that it operates within legal spheres when attending to everyday means of communication, as it obeys a presidential mandate, which signals that intelligence activities should consider the globalization of trade, information flows and investments seriously-- and the commitment to an interoperable, open and secure global internet.

The NSA has, of late, tried to play nice with technology companies, at least publicly. Adm. Michael Rogers, NSA Director, stated his keenness to work with Silicon Valley for ensuring the establishment of an open line of communication between the parties. He also indicated that he understands the technology companies’ point of view, although he might not always agree with them and their collective displeasure over the NSA's practices.

Rogers spoke to about 100 students, professors and reporters at Stanford University. He said that it’s no good to discredit either side of the argument and also that logical and reasonable people can come to various conclusions regarding what is appropriate and what is not.

The Importance of Long Term Planning for Your New Website

There’s few things quite as exciting as launching your brand new website. You’ve got everything in place, you’ve run all your tests, and now you can’t wait to set it out into the world and wait for all those visitors to flock by in their droves.

The day comes, you upload the last of your files and there you have it, your very own website, live on the Internet. Thrilled with the results, you tell everybody you can about the site. Your friends and family hear about it through texts, phone calls and even around the dinner table, your colleagues and clients receive an enthusiastic email, and your social media followers are urged to check it out.

Many of them do. They swing by, take a look around and tell you how great it is. Then they leave again. Sure, some may come back on occasion, but after that first visit, most have already seen everything they want to see and have no real reason to visit again.

Weeks go by. Weeks turn into months, and soon that sparkling new website you launched with such gusto now languishes in some dusky corner of the Internet, unloved, uncared for, and neglected.

What a waste of time and resources, right?

Not really. With a bit of long-term planning, you stand a much better chance of keeping that initial momentum running strong long after launch.

Fresh content

Nothing works quite as well at keeping your visitors coming back to your website like a frequent stream of fresh content. After all, why would they return time and time again to see the same old thing they saw last time?

Updating your website with a regular stream of new material such as blog posts, articles, or even photo galleries and videos gives those visitors a reason to return. They liked what you posted last time, so when they see you’ve posted something new, chances are they’ll like that too and want to check it out.

Fresh content also has the added advantage of helping with your Search Engine Optimisation. The more quality material you post on your site, the more favourably those major search engines are going to look on your site, and the further up those search results you soar.

Cheap hosting

When you first set out to create your website, it’s all too tempting to get drawn into those bargain deals offered by cheap web hosting companies, though again, here’s where a little long term planning can really come in handy. Some of the best web hosting deals are in fact some of the cheapest so it's always best to look at the options by using sites like this.

Those deals usually only last for a single year term. After that, you’ll be asked to pay the full price, or at least something close to it.

To make sure you can still afford to keep your website live after that first year, look into how much its going to cost you once the honeymoon period is over, and set that aside in your budget.

Marketing plan

That initial influx of traffic that comes when you tell everybody about your new website is great, but once that early hype dies down, how are you going to continue to attract new visitors to your site?

We’ve already talked about the importance of adding new content to hit those search engines and keep your existing audience returning, but to increase that audience base, you’re going to need to do a little bit of marketing.

This is neither as complicated nor as costly as it sounds. With a bit of planning and forethought, you could create compelling social media campaigns, set up a newsletter or even reach out through offline media to draw attention to your new site and ensure you keep the momentum up long after you launch.

Signup Begins For Google Fiber in Austin

Finally the wait is over for the residents of Austin, and now they can get the gigabit-speed connectivity, which is 100 times faster than other the speed of other of ISPs provides. 

Now residents of South and Southeast Austin can sign up for high-speed Internet service Google Fiber, Google Fiber representatives said. Before some days Google Fiber has unveiled its Downtown “Fiber Space” and payment plan options. In an official event company announced the launch of Google Fiber, a gigabit-speed service for the residents of Austin, Texas. As per Mark Strama, Google Fiber Head, “As we all know that the greater speed can bring the tons of opportunities for the city as well as for country, perhaps at this time we can’t even predict those opportunities”.

Earlier in April 2013, Google was announced the launch of Fiber into Austin, and residents have been eager to start using the service ever since, but due to some reasons its take too long. David Anthony, a Technical program manager, stated that “We have three stages before the launch of Google Fiber and they are planning, permitting, and construction”. The more he added that Google Fiber service is now ready for the south and southeast portions of the city as here we got the permits earlier to build the infrastructure.

Google Fiber plan for residents of South and Southeast Austin: 

In normal plan all the Google Fiber customers have to pay the $70 a month and then they will have the download and upload speeds up to 1 Gbps in an addition of 1 TB of cloud storage across Google Drive, Google+ photos and Gmail. For premium service customers need to pay the $ 130 per month and they will get the TV plan with over 150 channels including HD channels and they will be able to record up-to eight shows simultaneously as package offers. In both plans customers need to pay the $ 300 as construction fee with a commitment of one-year. Whenever, the speed is limited to only1 Mbps upload speeds and 5 Mbps download speed. Google Fiber is also available for professional organizations where small business owners need to pay the $100 a month for the plan which will include super-fast Internet speed with a 1 static IP in $ 20 a month or 5 static IPs in $ 30 a month.

Signup deadline for Google Fiber: 

All the five regions in Austin have different deadlines to sign up for Google Fiber as; the region of Bluebonnet has the deadline of January 19, 2015, but in closer look at Bluebonnet shows the split into smaller portions and each portion need to get the certain number of sign-ups to get the Google Fiber connectivity. On the other hand region of Onion Creek have the deadline of July 16, 2014 to sign up for Google Fiber, however in all 28 regions no none have met the sign-up goal yet.

The other cities for who will get the Google Fiber connectivity are Provo, Utah and Kansas City, but the people might have to wait for some more time, as the Sign-ups process for the 2 counties in Kansas City is expected to open in 2015.

Everything That You Need to Know About Snapping

Marketing and sales plays a major role in a business to get it flourish. Snapchat is one that application that has become popular among the teens within short period of time. You must be amazed by couple of facts about the Snapchat that,

• It was founded in 2011, as a class project at the Stanford University. 
• Over 20 million snaps were sent per day in October 2012. 
• In the mid year of 2013 that is around in the month of June, over 200 million snaps were sent per day.
• Today in the present time around 400 million snaps are sent per day. This is around 1,750 percent in just a year.

Teenagers response to snapchat’s leaked images

Secretly several thousands of snapchat images and videos were hacked by the third party applications but the recent news confirms that the hacked images and videos have been released by the third party online sites after reserving them for long period of time. The most shocking part of the news is that total of over 90,000 personal snapchat pictures and 9,000 snapchat videos of the teenagers have been leaked online. The users of the snapchat were mostly aged between 13 and 17; news is confirmed by the officials.

But can the snapchat alone be questioned for this negligence? Another app that is being investigated is the Snapsave. Snapsave is an android application that allows users to save their snapchat pictures and videos.

The snapsave application

When the representative of snapchat Georgie Casey was questioned about the leaking or snapping of the pictures, he replied, “Our application has nothing to do with it and we have never logged usernames or password and neither the snapchat runs on a cloud setup.”

Another popular app which came into limelight was Snapsaved which is similar to that of snapsave. Snapsaved impersonated the original app which allows the users to save their pictures permanently. This snapping scam has not only affected the common people but its impact has also affected several Hollywood celebrities like Rhianna, Kate Upton, Jennifer Lawrence, and Kim Kardashian. The nude pictures of these popular celebrities were also leaked.

Many users have downloaded the leaked images claiming that the images downloaded by them were not searchable unlike any other images from viralpop.com. Several cases and objections have been logged against the app but the app is constantly declining the responsibility for the snapping of the leaked pictures issuing a statement snapchatters were victimized by their usage of the third party apps to save the pictures, a practice that we prohibited in our terms and conditions of use.”

The popularity of the snapchat among the teenagers can be easily revealed by a fact that universal studio’s production movie; Ouija’s 19 sec promotional trailer was launched in the snapchat as Universal Studio’s have been collaborated with the snapchat. According to the news the movie Ouija got massive opening, topping the charts and made over $20 million in its first week and 75 percent of its visitors were under the age of 25 years and 61 percent of the visitors were female.