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This USA TouchPoints analysis sought to explore the extent of any differences in the use of various types of Web sites between Moms and Dads in the average week and found there are at least some disparities between the two.
Whereas the vast majority of both Moms and Dads can be found on the Web during the average week, social networking, news and to a lesser extent banking and food/cooking sites all show marked differences in average weekly reach. The greatest difference (just) is in the use of social networking sites, which is dominated by Moms: 44% vs. 26% for Dads. While the female skew in itself may not be surprising, its extent may be more so. However when considering the amount of other research that points to the same conclusion, the well-documented “Mommy-Blogger” phenomenon and the amount of time many Mothers – particularly those of young children – spend at home, this becomes much less surprising. When one also considers how many work environments are not conducive to the use of social networks (or in which they are prevented by firewalls), then this also logically contributes to the disparity.
The Whole Story: Parents' Average Week On The Web
Pentagon plans to create an award for drone operators and cyber warriors that ranks above medals earned in physical battle is drawing fire from combat veterans, a former high-ranking Defense Department official and an advocacy group. But a Pentagon spokesman said that Defense has no plans to reverse that order of precedence.
Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said the award, the Distinguished Warfare Medal, will recognize high tech warriors -- personnel who operate “remotely piloted platforms and cyber systems [that] have changed the way wars are fought.” Sec Panetta said the new award “recognizes the reality of the kind of technological warfare that we are engaged in, in the 21st century. “
Pentagon Takes heat for Elevating Cyber warrior Medal Above Other Honors
[Commentary] I am convinced that Netflix has won this round of the cable vs. Internet content distribution battle. After struggling to maintain subscribers due to lack of new content (attributed largely in part to costs set by the cable industry), Netflix took a gamble based on the habits of the next generation of viewers. And the viewers won. As a recent Forbes columnist lamented after realizing the ability to access an entire season of content was surprisingly convenient, “It turns out that waiting for the next episode is an artifact of an earlier era. A linear viewing experience in what is now an non-linear, on demand, always on, world.” This is ultimately what Bewkes and the cable industry at large fail to understand, but why House of Cards is such a success. Holding on to the delivery methods of the past might just as well cause you to lose the consumers of the future.
House of Cards: A TV Distribution Model for the Next Generation
US consumers experienced the highest level of identity theft in three years in 2012, although much of the fraud losses were absorbed by banks and merchants, according to a new survey.
Incidents of identity fraud affected 5.26 percent of U.S. adults last year, according to a survey of 5,249 people by Javelin Strategy and Research. That's up from 4.9 percent in 2011 and 4.35 percent in 2010. The company put the total number of identity victims in 2012 at 12.6 million. At least half of those victims did not bear the cost of the fraud, Javelin said in its report. Of those who did, the mean cost rose to US$365 in 2012, from $354 in 2011. The bulk of the fraud was absorbed by financial institutions, merchants and other businesses, Javelin said. One of the largest spikes came in new account fraud, where criminals collect personal data and then open, for example, a new credit card account. New account fraud climbed to 1.22 percent of adults last year, from 0.82 percent in 2011.
Identity fraud in U.S. reaches highest level in three years
Apparently, Nielsen is expanding its definition of television and will introduce a comprehensive plan to capture all video viewing including broadband and Xbox and iPads.
The decision to expand beyond traditional TV ratings measurement came out of a meeting in New York of the What Nielsen Measures Committee, a group that has been meeting for nearly a year. The committee is composed of representatives from major TV networks, local TV stations, cable TV networks, advertising agencies and some big brand advertisers. The decisions made by the committee are not binding but a source at one of the big four networks was ecstatic at the prospect of expanded measurement tools. The networks for years have complained that total viewing of their shows isn't being captured by traditional ratings measurements. This is a move to correct that. By September 2013, when the next TV season begins, Nielsen expects to have in place new hardware and software tools in the nearly 23,000 TV homes it samples. Those measurement systems will capture viewership not just from the 75 percent of homes that rely on cable, satellite and over the air broadcasts but also viewing via devices that deliver video from streaming services such as Netflix and Amazon, from so-called over-the-top services and from TV enabled game systems like the X-Box and PlayStation.
Nielsen Agrees to Expand Definition of TV Viewing
Carol Marin, Chicago's preeminent broadcast journalist, will host a new online newscast for the Chicago Sun-Times website.
Starting soon, The Marin Report will appear at noon Monday through Friday on suntimes.com. From a studio in the Sun-Times’ newsroom, she will deliver a 90-second roundup of headlines and highlights of her colleagues’ work. Sun-Times Media editor-in-chief Jim Kirk said Marin will go in-depth on bigger topics some days, talk to newsmakers on other days, and bring reporters in to discuss major stories. “Launching the Sun-Times’ first video program with Carol is a powerful step forward for the organization," he said. The effort coincides with the launch of Wrapports Interactive, a new division of parent company Wrapports LLC, designed to deliver an array of multimedia video content to mobile, tablet and personal computer users. Under Marin's new contract, she'll also write a weekly column for the Sun-Times. “Joining the Sun-Times in 2004 was one of the great decisions of my professional career,’’ she said. “Launching this new digital newscast while still doing a political column is the best of both worlds. We are all very excited about the possibilities it brings.”
Chicago Sun-Times to launch Newscast
The Software Engineering Institute’s (SEI) report, “Ultra-Large-Scale Systems: The Software Challenge of the Future” sought to answer the question: “As more and more systems become interconnected and have to work together, how do we manage an interacting code base that exceeds 1 billion lines of code?”
The reality is that different health IT systems (when they are connected together and interoperable) could collectively represent much more than 1 billion lines of code. The report suggests that we need to change the way we look at these large, interconnected “systems of systems.” Ultra-large scale systems are not about a single software application, or a couple of applications working together, but rather an “ecosystem” of interacting software systems.
In health care, small practices may have:
- a billing system
- a clinical system
- web portals, and
- other IT systems.
Most medical centers have 20 or 30 different computer programs that work together to take care of patients. Take 20 or 30 different programs, multiply that by the number of medium to large medical centers in the country, add in the small practices, and we are talking about thousands of programs that need to work together.
Building that from the top down isn’t going to work. The report argues that we need to think differently about how we create ecosystems in the health IT industry.
IT in Healthcare: Why Building an Interoperable Health IT System is So Tough
[Commentary] According to a just-released report by the Information Technology & Innovation Foundation (ITIF) entitled The Whole Picture: Where America’s Broadband Networks Really Stand, “Despite the frequent claims that the United States lags in international broadband comparisons, the studies cited to support this claim are out-of-date, poorly-focused, and/or analytically deficient.” We couldn’t agree more, and extend our kudos to Richard Bennett, Luke Steward, and Rob Atkinson for a thorough and dispassionate analysis of broadband deployment and adoption across developed economies.
Indeed, I suspect ITIF’s report will become the ”go to” document of the most current basic statistics on where the U.S. falls in international broadband comparisons. Given that the authors’ conclude that the U.S. presently fairs very well in international comparisons and that its position is improving, this document will not please everyone, particularly those who have long been fabricating a broadband crisis in order to support increased government control of the Internet. If you’re still hung up on the international comparisons debate or interact with people that are, I encourage you to read the new ITIF report. But better, I hope you find that this study (along with the other research mentioned here) has put this issue to bed once and for all so we can move on to more relevant and substantive topics in the broadband debate.
The Misuse of International Broadband Rankings Continues…
[Commentary] Last year, we released a paper entitled Justifying the Ends: Section 706 and the Regulation of Broadband (and forthcoming, Journal of Internet Law) where we demonstrated how the Federal Communications Commission deliberately ignored its own evidence to support expanded regulatory jurisdiction over IP-based services. With the release of its new Measuring Broadband America Report last week, the FCC once again undermines its factual predicate for Internet regulation.
Let me explain. Over the last several years, we have seen the Federal Communications Commission put forth a rather clever argument to expand its regulatory authority over broadband services. Under Section 706(a) of the Communications Act, the Commission “shall encourage the deployment on a reasonable and timely basis of advanced telecommunications capability to all Americans … by utilizing … price cap regulation, regulatory forbearance, measures that promote competition in the local telecommunications market, or other regulating methods that remove barriers to infrastructure investment.” If the agency determines that broadband capability is not “being deployed to all Americans in a reasonable and timely fashion,” then “the Commission shall take immediate action to accelerate deployment of such capability by removing barriers to infrastructure investment and by promoting competition in the telecommunications markets.” (Emphasis supplied.) So, stating it plainly, if the Commission reasons that deployment is not “reasonable and timely”, then the agency reasons it has the legal authority to impose broad-reaching regulation over advanced services.
The FCC Contradicts Their Facts (Again) To Justify Expanded Broadband Regulation…
[Commentary] The Information Technology and Innovation Foundation (ITIF) recently published a report, “The Whole Picture: Where America’s Broadband Networks Really Stand,” in which it assesses the deployment, performance, and price of broadband in America in comparison to other nations. The report makes a solid case that the U.S. is doing well when it comes to building advanced networks across the country.
ITIF also examines broadband adoption and highlights some challenges to increasing adoption rates in the United States, which have recently stagnated. This continues to be a thorn in our side, especially given the benefits we know broadband can bring to every American. Broadband adoption is a complex issue. Consumer adoption of any good or service is driven by a variety of factors, and it is not always easy to determine the main factors influencing consumer demand. On the one hand, adoption of many technologies in the home, from televisions to dishwashers has been fairly widespread over time. By comparison, the uptake of broadband in the home has been very rapid. We’re seeing even faster adoption of mobile broadband via smartphones and tablets, and some people are already relying on mobile connectivity as their primary source of broadband.
The ITIF Report: A Good Picture but Home Adoption Remains a Challenge