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<title>Haaze.com / sbvoor / All</title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com</link>
<description>Test Web 2.0 Content Management System</description>
<pubDate>Wed, 23 Mar 2011 07:10:10 +0000</pubDate>
<language>en</language>
<item>
<title><![CDATA[How to use IE9's pinned sites]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=how-to-use-ie9s-pinned-sites</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=how-to-use-ie9s-pinned-sites</comments>
<pubDate>Wed, 23 Mar 2011 07:10:10 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>sbvoor</dc:creator>
<category>Mobile &amp; Electronics</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=how-to-use-ie9s-pinned-sites</guid>
<description><![CDATA[<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[Survey: Millions risk ID theft via social networks]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=survey-millions-risk-id-theft-via-social-networks</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=survey-millions-risk-id-theft-via-social-networks</comments>
<pubDate>Tue, 22 Mar 2011 07:10:14 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>sbvoor</dc:creator>
<category>Mobile &amp; Electronics</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=survey-millions-risk-id-theft-via-social-networks</guid>
<description><![CDATA[Nearly 13 million American adults who use social networks are more than willing to accept friend requests from strangers of the opposite gender, a new survey from Harris Interactive has found.According to Harris Interactive, 18 percent of men will accept a woman's friend request, even if they do not know the person. About 7 percent of women will accept an unknown man's friend request. A total of 5 percent of U.S. adults will accept every friend request they receive.The key to stealing a person&amp;39's identity is built with just a handful of pieces. And much of that information is openly available on social networks.(Credit:Harris Interactive) Only 50 percent trust that their connections will keep their information private. Yet more than 24 million Americans leave their personal information &quot;mostly public&quot; on social networks.The results are based on a survey last month of 1,011 Americans 18 and over, including 387 who are on social networks. ID Analytics, a consumer risk-management firm, commissioned the survey, which was released today.Leaving personal information public and allowing practically anyone to view your profile is a dangerous prospect, Harris Interactive observed. The company said that the basic information found in a social profile can help &quot;build the dossiers [that criminals] need to beat challenge questions and other security measures on financial accounts.&quot; It's a sentiment with which ID Analytics agrees.&quot;Americans' lack of caution in friending members of the opposite sex online is striking,&quot; Thomas Oscherwitz, chief privacy officer at ID Analytics, said in a statement. &quot;Friending someone online is not risk-free. Most social networking profiles contain personal information that can be used by fraudsters, and when you friend someone, you are giving them access to this information.&quot;One other interesting tidbit from the survey: respondents were twice as likely to say that having more business contacts than personal contacts in their list of friends is desirable.<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[New array of telescopes could help search for E.T.]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=new-array-of-telescopes-could-help-search-for-e-t-</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=new-array-of-telescopes-could-help-search-for-e-t-</comments>
<pubDate>Thu, 27 Jan 2011 08:10:57 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>sbvoor</dc:creator>
<category>Technology</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=new-array-of-telescopes-could-help-search-for-e-t-</guid>
<description><![CDATA[Multiple antennas of the LWA-1 station of the Long Wavelength Array in central New Mexico.(Credit:NASA)A new telescope array could bring us closer to better understanding the universe and perhaps even answer an age-old question: are we aloneTapping into the combined power of 13,000 individual antennas, the new Long Wavelength Array will be able to scan our corner of the galaxy using a wide and rarely explored range of frequencies, according to NASA. That power will give it the ability to find new worlds beyond our solar system by scanning for their radio waves.Led by the University of New Mexico and joined by NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab, which is supplying the digital electronic systems, the project will start off small this summer by powering up 256 antennas in central New Mexico. Once it's completed, though, the Long Wavelength Array will contain 53 stations with the 13,000 antennas taking up a space 248 miles in diameter.Beyond looking for distant worlds, the telescope array will be able to detect other events among the stars, those that occur naturally and possibly some that don't.&quot;We'll be looking for the occasional celestial flash,&quot; Joseph Lazio, a radio astronomer at JPL, said in a statement. &quot;These flashes can be anything from explosions on surfaces of nearby stars, deaths of distant stars, exploding black holes, or even perhaps transmissions by other civilizations.&quot;The Long Wavelength Array will use a radio frequency of 20 to 80 megahertz, says NASA, which corresponds to wavelengths of 49.2 feet to 12.5 feet. That's significant because these frequencies point to one of the last and least explored regions of the electromagnetic spectrum. On Earth, scientists will be able to examine high-resolution, detailed images of regions in space that are hundreds of times larger than the full moon.Radio astronomy and the project itself are the beneficiaries of lower costs and advances in technology, such as enhanced image processing, according to NASA. As a result, researchers are now able to grab a much better glimpse of the galaxy and learn more about the universe in which we live.<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[Super-efficient Passive House standard draws fans]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=super-efficient-passive-house-standard-draws-fans</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=super-efficient-passive-house-standard-draws-fans</comments>
<pubDate>Fri, 17 Dec 2010 08:10:55 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>sbvoor</dc:creator>
<category>Eco</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=super-efficient-passive-house-standard-draws-fans</guid>
<description><![CDATA[BOSTON--Among green-building cognoscenti, the Passive House standard is setting a new bar for architects and designers making eco-friendly buildings.The Passive House concept, which is well established in Europe, is now getting a foothold in the U.S. with a method that promises overall energy savings of about 70 percent overall and a 90 percent lower heating load without on-site solar power. While the U.S. Green Building's Council's LEED certification touches on energy, water, materials, and location, Passive House, which started in Germany as Passivhaus, brings rigorous requirements focused entirely on building energy efficiency. Because of that focus on lowering building energy demand, some say it yields better performance than LEED on efficiency.Technische Universitat in Darmstadt, Germany won the Solar Decathlon competition with a Passive House-certified building design. (Credit:Martin LaMonica/CNET )At a recent symposium on green buildings here, builders and designers explained how they are using Passive House techniques, such as air-tight construction and mechanical ventilation, in a variety of projects, including individual homes and multi-unit residences in the city.A notably large one is a multi-unit apartment building in South Boston next to a converted 19th-century rum distillery, which aims to be one of the largest to get the Passive House certification in the U.S. The first phase of the project, which could break ground next spring, will have 28 residential units and a few retail locations, followed by a second phase with 65 units.Following Passive House guidelines typically means about 10 percent higher cost for new buildings, according to the Passive House Institute US. Retrofitting an existing building to be super efficient costs more like 20 percent more than traditional techniques, said Katrin Klingenberg, an architect and the executive director of the Passive House Institute US during the symposium.The cost difference can be lower, depending on the experience level of consultants and the type of project. With the Distillery, the building's designers focused heavily on the return on investment and project a 5 percent premium, said developer Fred Gordon from Second Street Associates during a presentation. One residential Passive House home in the U.S. came in at 6 percent over market costs, said Klingenberg.What is itAlthough it's gaining attention, Passive House is just a blip in the overall U.S. housing industry, and there are few certified consultants. In terms of structures, there have been 13 fully certified buildings, with about 40 in the certification process, Klingenberg said. In Europe, there are some 20,000 certified buildings and market share there is growing.The approach is beginning to appeal to more in the U.S. green-building scene, including people like Matt Capone, a project director at Nauset Construction, which worked on the preconstruction work of the Distillery project in Boston.The LEED system works by getting a series of points for promoting sustainability in general. For example, a LEED building can get points for using recycled material or locating near public transportation. Passive House appeals to Capone because it is more quantitative and focused narrowly on energy efficiency.&quot;What it brings is a measurable system that goes well beyond LEED, something that truly evaluates the building performance at a higher level. There's nothing else like it,&quot; he said.The Passive House concept calls for an air-tight, well insulated building, and a mechanical ventilation system, although a ground-source heat pump is not required. If south-facing walls are available, the building can take advantage of solar heating. (Credit:Passipedia)Attaining Passive House certification requires meeting certain energy-efficiency performance thresholds--15 kilowatt-hours per meter square space of living space per year, or 4,755 BTUs per square foot per year. That quantitative, spreadsheet approach doesn't appeal to all designers and has proved to be too stringent in certain areas, according to Alex Wilson, executive editor of BuildingGreen.com and building efficiency expert. But it appeals to many designers because it's an actual, quantifiable standard, Wilson found.In a talk at the Boston symposium, Wolfgang Feist, who heads the Passivhaus Institut in Germany, said that Passive House follows a few principles, rather than require high-tech materials or fancy energy-monitoring systems. To meet the voluntary standard, buildings should have a very air-tight building &quot;envelope,&quot; high levels of insulation, and a heat recovery ventilator that circulates in outdoor air preheated by outgoing indoor air. &quot;This is not a question of architecture, it's a question of detailing--that's the most crucial thing,&quot; Feist said. Mechanical ventilation in an air-tight building ensures that there is very good indoor air quality, he added.For example, part of the Passive House concept calls for eliminating thermal bridges, or structural components that serve as conduits for heat loss. That means that instead of having a steel beam extend from the building interior to suspend an outside deck, designers need to create a &quot;break,&quot; either with insulation or different construction techniques, to stop the heat transfer.By lowering the energy demand, architects can equip homes with much smaller heating and cooling equipment. Homeowners, meanwhile, benefit from lower bills. The system doesn't impose an architectural style and works for different building types, including standalone homes, row houses, or larger buildings such as schools, adherents say.Because the Distillery project is larger than an individual home, it is easier to meet the Passive House per-square-foot energy requirements, Capone said. Some products, notably very efficient windows, will likely need to be imported from Germany to meet the requirements, which adds to the cost, he said. Existing guidelines, such as LEED and EnergyStar, to cut energy consumption in buildings, which account for about 40 percent of energy use in the U.S., will continue and can incorporate some Passive House concepts. In the meantime, the U.S. Passive House Institute, which recently gained a Passive House Alliance advocacy group, is trying to scale up beyond the leading-edge thinkers in green buildings. &quot;Hopefully, we can work together to become a broader solution,&quot; Klingenberg said.<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[Google tweaks search recipe to ding scam artists]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=google-tweaks-search-recipe-to-ding-scam-artists</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=google-tweaks-search-recipe-to-ding-scam-artists</comments>
<pubDate>Wed, 01 Dec 2010 08:10:05 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>sbvoor</dc:creator>
<category>Mobile &amp; Electronics</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=google-tweaks-search-recipe-to-ding-scam-artists</guid>
<description><![CDATA[One retailer&amp;39's quest for negative ratings--and Googlejuice--has forced the search giant to change its algorithm.(Credit:Screenshot by Tom Krazit/CNET)Google has changed its search algorithm to penalize sites deemed to provide an &quot;extremely poor user experience&quot; following a New York Times story on a merchant who justified abusive behavior towards customers as a search-engine optimization tactic. Amit Singhal, a Google fellow and a key search engineer, announced the change in a blog post today by noting &quot;we were horrified to read about Ms. Rodriguez's dreadful experience.&quot;  Sunday's Times article highlighted the experience of Clarabelle Rodriguez, a customer of a site called DecorMyEyes.com (deliberately not linked), who was berated by site owner Vitaly Borker after disputing a credit-card charge for a purchase of eyeglasses that appeared to be counterfeit.  Borker claimed that he enjoyed negative publicity about his company on consumer advocacy Web sites because it improved his ranking within Google search results. Although search experts noted that Borker wasn't actually benefiting from those reviews--most of the sites added &quot;no follow&quot; attributes to their links to his site--Google nonetheless decided to incorporate some notion of business ethics into the hundreds of signals that make up the Google algorithm, Singhal said. &quot;In the last few days we developed an algorithmic solution which detects the merchant from the Times article along with hundreds of other merchants that, in our opinion, provide a extremely poor user experience,&quot; Singhal wrote. &quot;The algorithm we incorporated into our search rankings represents an initial solution to this issue, and Google users are now getting a better experience as a result.&quot; Of course, just exactly what constitutes an &quot;extremely poor user experience&quot; was not detailed, and could be immediate fodder for those who feel Google's secret ranking sauce already holds too much power over the Internet. It's a difficult problem: Google can't explain its methods because malevolent sites like Borker's would immediately seize the advantage to boost their rankings, but some sites that get bounced by the new changes might have a legitimate beef that they've been unfairly smeared. &quot;We know that people will keep trying: attempts to game Google's ranking, like the ones mentioned in the article, go on 24 hours a day, every single day. That's why we cannot reveal the details of our solution--the underlying signals, data sources, and how we combined them to improve our rankings--beyond what we've already said,&quot; Singhal wrote. Google is constantly tweaking the search algorithm that has made it billions, averaging more than one change a day, according to Google's spam czar Matt Cutts. Some are obviously bigger than others, however: few changes get their own blog post.<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[Apple drops Xserve rackmount server, Mac Pro Server takes its place]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=apple-drops-xserve-rackmount-server-mac-pro-server-takes-its-place</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=apple-drops-xserve-rackmount-server-mac-pro-server-takes-its-place</comments>
<pubDate>Mon, 30 Nov -001 00:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>sbvoor</dc:creator>
<category>Latest News</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=apple-drops-xserve-rackmount-server-mac-pro-server-takes-its-place</guid>
<description><![CDATA[Apple  is getting out of the server room, sort of. The company announced today  that ita4a4s dropping the Xserve rackmounted server, but at the same time  ita4a4s also introducing a new Mac Pro Server configuration.Apple  will accept orders for Xserve until January 31, 2011, and says it has  no plans to develop future versions of the server. The company will  continue to ship the servera4a4s hard drive modules until the end of 2011.Apple wona4a4t be leaving current Xserve customers high and dry, though.  AppleCare warranties will still be honored, and the company says it has  repair parts for up to seven years in California, and five years  elsewhere in the world.Xserve  was Applea4a4s only rackmounted server &amp;8212' a system that could be stacked  in server room racks. The form factor allows administrators to easily  sandwich significant amounts of hardware together in tight spaces  (Virgina Tech relies on Xserve for its world-class System X  supercomputer).In  its Xserve Transition Guide (embedded below), Apple recommends that  users adopt its new Mac Pro Server configuration, or its Mac mini  server. The Mac Pro server is slated to ship in a few weeks with a  $2,999 base option that features a quad-core Intel Xeon processor and 8  gigabytes of RAMWhile  it would seem that Apple has effectively pushed itself out of the  traditional server room, it offers some suggestions on how users can fit  the Mac Pro and Mac mini into server racks. The Mac Minia4a4s thin profile  allows it to fit in a single rack unit (or 1U of space), and they can also be  stacked side-by-side to fit two units on one rack. Thata4a4s certainly  better than the alternative &amp;8212' the Mac Pro takes up 12 racks of space,  according to Apple.With XServe on its way out, it&amp;'s also unclear what role, if any, the server will play in Apple&amp;'s upcoming North Carolina datacenter. In job postings for the datacenter, Apple says that it will run &amp;''MacOS X, IBM/AIX, Linux and SUN/Solaris systems.a4 So even if XServe systems are part of its infrastructure, it likely won&amp;'t make up a significant chunk.I  dona4a4t suspect too many server administrators are going to jump at the  chance to throw in Mac Pros or Mac Minis in their setups, but the  addition of the Mac Pro Server configuration may be useful to some. The  news of Xservea4a4s demise is certainly a reminder that, despite Applea4a4s  recent iPad and iPhone success with business users, it cana4a4t quite  compete with the likes of IBM or HP in enterprise server rooms.Via Electronista, Engadget' photo via Christopher BrownNext Story: Adobe Acrobat X goes beyond PDF Previous Story: Lessons learned from GreenBeat: Data is the new wave in cleantechPrintEmailTwitterFacebookGoogle BuzzLinkedIn      DiggStumbleUponRedditDeliciousGoogleMore&amp;8230'          Tags: Mac mini, Mac Pro, servers, System X, XserveCompanies: Apple          Tags: Mac mini, Mac Pro, servers, System X, XserveCompanies: AppleDevindra Hardawar is VentureBeat's lead mobile writer and East Coast correspondent. He studied philosophy at Amherst College, worked in IT support for several years, and has been writing about technology since 2004. He now lives in Brooklyn, New York. You can reach him at devindra@venturebeat.com (all story pitches should also be sent to tips@venturebeat.com), and on Twitter at @Devindra.VentureBeat has new weekly email newsletters.  Stay on top of the news, and don't miss a beat.<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[Google Voice and FaceTime &8211' Why the Carriers Are Losing Their&nbsp'Voice]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=google-voice-and-facetime-8211-why-the-carriers-are-losing-theirnbspvoice</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=google-voice-and-facetime-8211-why-the-carriers-are-losing-theirnbspvoice</comments>
<pubDate>Mon, 30 Nov -001 00:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>sbvoor</dc:creator>
<category>Latest News</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=google-voice-and-facetime-8211-why-the-carriers-are-losing-theirnbspvoice</guid>
<description><![CDATA[Lately it seems like there is endless news around messaging, VoIP and video calling. Apple recently announced theya4a4d added FaceTime supporta4sfor the Mac, and had shipped 19 million FaceTime-enabled iOS devices since June. Google Voice also made headlines last week fora4san outage, but I think the bigger news associated with that downtime is how fast theya4a4ve been growing. And therea4a4s been a flurry of startup activity around messaging and communication as well, such as the super innovativea4sGroupMe releasing ana4sAndroid App.The resounding theme from all these seemingly disparate announcements is that messaging, voice, video, and chatting applications are on fire. Sure, we all use social media, but it sure hasna4a4t dampened peoplea4a4s affinity for texting or making a call.More revealing, all of this innovation seems to be happening at the application layer, far from the AT&amp;amp'Ts of the world, who are missing another wave of innovation which is happening on top of their networks. Ita4a4s very evident that Google and Apple are making overtures to become your de facto voice and messaging provider, and the carriers are sitting with their pants down, struggling to plan how they stay relevant.Why the Carriers Will Become Irrelevant in Voice and MessagingIta4a4s easy to bash carriers. I recently wrote about the technical reasons why AT&amp;amp'Ta4a4s network is so awful which got their higher ups to contact me and whine about what Ia4a4d written. Truth is, there are long-standing reasons behind AT&amp;amp'Ta4a4s failuresa4&quot;network decisions take many years to unfold, especially since the telco monopolies are, by their very nature, slow to respond to change and innovation.But forget the past, leta4a4s look at why the carriers are poised to become more and more irrelevant beyond being pipe providers in the future. And leta4a4s do so specifically around voice and messaging, the bread and butter services that they evolved to provide.Imagine the future of communication on your smartphone: youa4a4re on a video call with your significant other across the world on different networks, you tap your screen, and instantly their phone screen mimics yours as you flip through photos of your trip while continuing your call. Or imagine sending out an MMS to a group, and when each of your friends open it they immediately tap into a live HD audio/video stream which youa4a4re broadcasting to everyone. No delays, no dialing, and no going in and out of different appsa4&quot;it just works.All of these amazing use-cases, and more, will be enabled by 4G wireless standards. This is because 4G is 100% IP-based, which is what the internet was founded upon. Today, voice is routed separately from data on mobile networks due to legacy a4Acircuit-switcheda4 architecture. With LTE, the first phase of 4G, voice and video sessions will be packetized and sent over the network from your smartphone just like any other application layer data, which will open a range of new capabilities.LTE Now' Voice in 2013 a4&quot; Are You Kidding Me But therea4a4s a roadblock to realizing this vision of ubiquity. Right now the carriers cana4a4t agree on whata4a4s happening with respect to voice. In classic fashion, they are stuck in endless consortium meetings arguing about standards instead of moving forward, picking one, testing, and deploying.Some carriers are behind a voice technology called IPMS (IP Multimedia Subsystem), which is 100% IP-based, and others are clinging to VoLGA (voice over LTE via generic access), which splits mobile voice and messaging apart from the IP-based LTE network in a technique called a4Acircuit-switched fallbacka4.Guess when they plan to resolve all this 2013! Per this AT&amp;amp'T slide from a few weeks ago. And ita4a4s easy to envision any resolution extending years past this date, which is crazy considering whata4a4s at stake for the carriers as they struggle so stay relevant in voice communication.FaceTime best foreshadowed their dwindling relevance, since video calls over WiFi bypass the carrier network entirely. And though FaceTime doesna4a4t yet work on 3G you can see the writing on the wall.a4sMeanwhile Google Voice still requires you to dial out using your carriera4a4s network, but Googlea4a4s acquisition of Gizmo5 last year foretells this will go away in favor of full VoIP too. Then of course therea4a4s Skype, which now works over 3G, bypassing the voice network of your carrier too.The Bureaucracy Behind Why The Carriers are Missing OutCarriers are in the process of transitioning from a telco model, which is closed, to the internet model, which is open. In the old days it was deemed acceptable for them to stew over standards for multiyear periods, but innovation on the internet doesna4a4t work this way.Recently at CTIA, Verizon declined to discuss the VoLTE situation because they simply dona4a4t have anything cohesive to communicate. This is embarrassing, considering their LTE network is supposed to be ready by the end of the year. What this means is that voice will be routed over their old network for years to comea4&quot;fabulous.This is absurd, and is symbolic of how consortiums and standards bodies work in telecoma4&quot;anyone who has ever sold to or interacted with a carrier understands the glacial pace at which they move. What the carriers really need to do is get out of bed and resolve how voice will be packetized, then move forward and deploy it. Ita4a4s simply embarrassing that they cana4a4t do this, but ita4a4s not surprising, since they still receive so much revenue from voice plans.The Internet Wins Again a4&quot; Go Back to Sleep CarriersThe future in mobile communication is being written at the application layera4&quot;both by innovative giants like Apple and Google, and smaller startups such as GroupMe and Twilioa4&quot;not at the infrastructure layer by the AT&amp;amp'Ts and Verizons of the world. The carriers had a chance to provide a better voice and messaging experience with 4G, and to charge a toll for that experience, but they are missing that window.Apple and Google are closing it fast. Back in June, when iPhone 4 was released, people wondered why Apple made FaceTime an open standard. Here is one important reason why: A closed standard may have caused an overly fragmented market for video-calling, which would definitely benefit the carriers. This is a4slikely, at least in part, why Steve Jobs decided to open up FaceTime, as any open standards success in video/telephonya4slimits the power of the carriers.The funny thing is, they seem to be screwing it all up without Stevea4a4s help. There is simply no doubt that the future of voice and messaging is with companies innovating at the application layer, and my guess is there is going to be a ton of investment activity and M&amp;amp'A in this space as new realtime communication tools are developed over the next few years.CrunchBase InformationAppleGoogleGroupMeTwilioInformation provided by CrunchBase<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[Helping professionals escape unfulfilling (city) jobs - Springwise]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=helping-professionals-escape-unfulfilling-city-jobs---springwise</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=helping-professionals-escape-unfulfilling-city-jobs---springwise</comments>
<pubDate>Mon, 30 Nov -001 00:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>sbvoor</dc:creator>
<category>Style &amp; Leisure</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=helping-professionals-escape-unfulfilling-city-jobs---springwise</guid>
<description><![CDATA[There are plenty of sites out there dedicated to helping professionals find their next professional job a4&quot; The Ladders, for instance, which focuses on matching high-paying jobs with qualified earners. What''s less common is to see a site that helps those professionals leave their current career track and find something more fulfilling.Such, however, is precisely the premise behind London-based Escape the City, whose mission is to a4Aliberate talented people from corporate jobs that dona4a4t excite them,a4 in the site''s own words. Toward that end, the company a4&quot; which was started by two such former management consultants a4&quot; has built an online platform that aims to connect ambitious and talented but unsatisfied people with a4Aexciting career changes, innovative business start-ups and epic adventures.a4 Employers with approved life-changing opportunities can list them on the site, while Escape the City''s more than 17,000 members can use it to connect, reflect and find their new path. A coaching program, meanwhile, provides support and guidance during the transition. Escape the City''s success stories so far include Jennifer, an ex-KPMG staffer who has since gone on to found a social enterprise in Tanzania. Ultimately, Escape the City plans to introduce revenue streams focused on helping to connect organisations with exciting open positions and members interested in filling them.Some 70 percent of young professionals don''t find their current job interesting, Escape the City says, and 30 percent are actively looking for alternatives. Fifty-seven percent intend to leave their current position within a year. Who will help the disillusioned Generation G masses find fulfillment in your neck of the woods...Website: www.escapethecity.orgContact: team@escapethecity.orgSpotted by Charlotte Symington<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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<title><![CDATA[Ning adds lots of knobs and dials to prettify its custom social networks]]></title>
<link>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=ning-adds-lots-of-knobs-and-dials-to-prettify-its-custom-social-networks</link>
<comments>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=ning-adds-lots-of-knobs-and-dials-to-prettify-its-custom-social-networks</comments>
<pubDate>Mon, 30 Nov -001 00:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
<dc:creator>sbvoor</dc:creator>
<category>Latest News</category>
<guid>http://www.haaze.com/story.php?title=ning-adds-lots-of-knobs-and-dials-to-prettify-its-custom-social-networks</guid>
<description><![CDATA[Ning, the social networking startup that made some big, painful changes last year, just announced two new features that sound like the first in a wave of improvements coming in early 2011.The Palo Alto, Calif. company allows customers to create their own social networks. It previously eliminated its free product and focused on paying customers, and chief executive Jason Rosenthal told me yesterday that Ning has been working hard on a number of fronts to keep the pay product compelling.The big picture, Rosenthal said, is that companies want to have control over their social presence, which is why they come to Ning in the first place, so it&amp;'s important to provide as many customization options as possible.Specifically, Ning plans to launch a new Design Studio on February 9, which Rosenthal said will &amp;''give all of our Ning creators the ability to create a stunning visual experience that&amp;'s as good as anything in the Ning community.&amp;'' Products like Ning often give a similar, simplified look to all of their websites (it&amp;'s something that companies like Weebly and Posterous, for example, have been working on too). Rosenthal said Ning is trying to tackle that problem by giving Ning customers control over more than 80 design settings in their social network.The Design Studio will also include new social network templates and will eventually offer designers a chance to sell custom designs to website owners.Ning is also announcing a new Ning Engagement System. The idea is that different kinds of data are valuable to different Ning customers, so the new system gives them access to a broad swath of analytics, identifying things like the most active users and most popular content, and allows companies to focus on the data that they want. It also introduces a new &amp;''like&amp;'' button for Ning social network members to emphasize the content that they like and share it with their friends. It&amp;'s similar to Facebook&amp;'s &amp;''like&amp;'' button (which it also integrates with).When I last spoke to Rosenthal, he was launching the Ning Everywhere program, where it partnered with mobile development companies who could turn social networks into mobile apps. There will be more mobile announcements coming soon, Rosenthal told me yesterday. He also reemphasized the growth that Ning saw after last year&amp;'s refocus, with the number of paying customers increasing from 15,000 to more than 80,000.Next Story: News Corp. launches The Daily iPad newspaper with Apple Previous Story: Egypt restores Internet access amid continued Mubarak protestsPrintEmailTwitterFacebookGoogle BuzzLinkedIn      DiggStumbleUponRedditDeliciousGoogleMore&amp;8230'          Tags: Ning Design Studio, Ning Engagement SystemCompanies: NingPeople: Jason Rosenthal          Tags: Ning Design Studio, Ning Engagement SystemCompanies: NingPeople: Jason RosenthalAnthony is a senior editor at VentureBeat, as well as its reporter on media, advertising, and social networks. Before joining the site in 2008, Anthony worked at the Hollister Free Lance, where he won awards from the California Newspaper Publishers Association for breaking news coverage and writing. He attended Stanford University and now lives in San Francisco. Reach him at anthony@venturebeat.com. (All story pitches should also be sent to tips@venturebeat.com) You can also follow Anthony on Twitter. Have news to share Launching a startup Email: tips@venturebeat.comVentureBeat has new weekly email newsletters.  Stay on top of the news, and don't miss a beat.<br/><br/>0 Vote(s) ]]></description>
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