The ranking is based on the percentage of STEM degrees awarded per capita, so it’s a fair comparison between countries with different populations.
Source: The 10 most science-educated countries on Earth – Business Insider
Oracle CEO Larry Ellison gestures while giving a keynote address at Oracle OpenWorld in San Francisc. Photo: AP
“Oracle CEO Larry Ellison envisions his recently acquired Hawaiian island becoming a “little laboratory” for experimenting with more environmentally sound ways to live.
Ellison’s ambitions include converting sea water into fresh water on the 141-square-mile island of Lanai. He also wants to see more electric cars on the island located near Maui, and hopes to increase its fruit exports to Japan and other markets.
Ellison, one of the world’s wealthiest men, made the remarks on Tuesday in San Francisco in an interview with the financial news channel CNBC.
The interview focused mostly on Oracle, a business-software maker that Ellison has been running for 35 years. He also touched upon several other topics, including his friendship with the late Steve Jobs and his interest in buying the Los Angeles Lakers, if the professional basketball team were ever for sale.
Oracle’s success has minted Ellison an estimated fortune of $US41 billion. He bought 98 per cent of Lanai from billionaire David Murdock in June for an undisclosed price. The Maui News reported that Murdock, the CEO of Castle & Cooke, was seeking $US500 million to $US600 million for his Lanai holdings.
Ellison hadn’t publicly shared his vision for Lanai until Tuesday’s interview. The silence had left Lanai’s roughly 3200 residents wondering whether their lives would be disrupted under Ellison’s ownership.
In Tuesday’s interview, Ellison said he intends to “support the local people”.
Ellison’s Lanai holdings include two resorts, two golf courses and assorted commercial and residential buildings. Three utilities on the island also are under Ellison’s control
Lanai is just one piece of Ellison’s sprawling real-estate portfolio. He also owns estates or mansions in San Francisco, Lake Tahoe and southern California, as well as in Newport, Rhode Island and Japan. He told CNBC on Tuesday that he plans to convert some of the homes into art museums and traced his interest in fancy homes to his childhood dream of being an architect.
Tuesday’s interview also gave Ellison an opportunity to reminiscence about Jobs, the co-founder of Apple, who died nearly a year ago after a long battle with cancer. The two were so close that Jobs took the photos when Ellison married his fourth wife, romance novelist Melanie Craft, in 2003. Ellison hailed Jobs as an irreplaceable friend and technology visionary who he called the Thomas Edison and Pablo Picasso of his era.
Ellison also said he would be interested in buying the Los Angeles Lakers if long-time owner Jerry Buss were ever to sell one of the National Basketball Association‘s most successful franchises. Buss has given no indication that he is ready to relinquish control of the Lakers, though Anschutz Entertainment Group recently announced plans to sell its minority stake in the team.
Ellison called the Lakers his favorite NBA team. He also said he is a fan of the Golden State Warriors and the Chicago Bulls. He tried to buy the Warriors in 2010 only to be outbid by Silicon Valley venture capitalist Joe Lacob and Hollywood movie producer Peter Guber.
Oracle, which makes database software and applications that automate administrative tasks, has been on a shopping spree that has seen the company spend more than $US50 billion buying dozens of companies over the past seven years. Ellison told CNBC that Oracle probably won’t be making any big acquisitions during the next two years as the Redwood Shores, California company fine tunes its software products so they can be sold as a service over high-speed internet connections — a concept known as “cloud computing”.
Ellison talked to CNBC shortly before he delivered the keynote address at Oracle’s annual customer conference in San Francisco.”
“The United States and Israel jointly developed the Flame computer virus that collected intelligence to help slow Iran’s nuclear program, The Washington Post has reported, citing anonymous Western officials.
The so-called Flame malware aimed to map Iran‘s computer networks and monitor computers of Iranian officials, the newspaper said. It was designed to provide intelligence to help in a cyber campaign against Iran’s nuclear program, involving the National Security Agency, the CIA and Israel’s military, the Post said.
The cyber campaign against Iran’s nuclear program has included the use of another computer virus called Stuxnet that caused malfunctions in Iran’s nuclear enrichment equipment, the newspaper said.
Current and former US and Western national security officials confirmed that the United States played a role in creating the Flame virus.
Since Flame was an intelligence “collection” virus rather than a cyberwarfare program to sabotage computer systems, it required less-stringent US legal and policy review than any US involvement in offensive cyberwarfare efforts, experts said.
The CIA, NSA, Pentagon, and Office of the Director of National Intelligence declined to comment.
Flame is the most complex computer spying program ever discovered.
Two leading computer security firms – Kaspersky Lab and Symantec Corp – have linked some of the software code in the Flame virus to the Stuxnet computer virus, which was widely believed to have been used by the United States and Israel to attack Iran’s nuclear program.
Reuters
Source: Sydney Morning Herald.
“The technology giant will ask a federal judge this week to stop sales of a Samsung tablet for allegedly ripping off the iPad. The case rests on an increasingly vital set of assets: design patents.
By Roger Parloff, senior editor
FORTUNE — On Friday, Apple will ask a federal judge in San Jose, California to yank a popular model of Samsung tablet computer off the market for allegedly copying its iPad design. Given the central part played by Apple in the Silicon Valley industrial design renaissance, it is fitting that the company’s demand also marks the coming of age of a murky form of intellectual property that many may have never even realized existed: the design patent.
Unlike the much more common utility patent, which lasts for 20 years from application and covers the way something works, a design patent lasts for 14 years from issuance and covers the way something looks, explains Christopher V. Carani of Chicago’s McAndrews, Held & Malloy, an attorney who practices this burgeoning black art. (Apple’s (AAPL) patent suit against Motorola (GOOG) in Chicago, which was surprisingly dismissed Friday by Judge Richard Posner, acting as a district judge, involved only conventional utility patents.) The necessarily subjective test for infringement of design patents is simply whether the “overall impression” of the accused product looks “substantially the same” as the patented design in the “eyes of an ordinary observer.” The design must also be “ornamental” — that is, not “dictated by” function.
In the Samsung case, the iPad design patent at issue (on which Steve Jobs is listed as a co-inventor) is just five pages long. Four and a half of those consist of sketches, from different angles, of an object that, to the untrained eye, looks like an unopened TV dinner. The crucial “claim” is just one sentence: “We claim the ornamental design for an electronic device, substantially as shown” — referring to the sketches. In those, solid lines show what’s being patented, while dotted lines show incidental features. Like the proverbial Jackson Pollock painting, your kid could have drawn these.
On the other hand, Apple invests fortunes to come up with its minimalist masterpieces, and consumers will move heaven and earth to possess one, so is it fair to let Johnny-come-lately’s just rip Apple off?
In May, a panel of the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit preliminarily ruled that Apple’s iPad design patent, known as D504,889, was valid, notwithstanding the existence of at least two roughly similar designs for earlier tablets—a 1994 Knight-Ridder prototype and the 2002 HP-Compaq TC1000. Circuit Judge William C. Bryson, writing for the panel, then ruled that the iPad design was likely infringed by Samsung’s popular Galaxy 10.1 Tab, which came out in June 2011. He ordered the case sent back to U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh to decide whether to pull the Samsung tablet from shelves immediately or wait till after she has presided over a full jury trial, currently scheduled to start July 30. That preliminary injunction hearing is now set for Friday.
In the same ruling Judge Bryson also preliminarily approved the validity of two of Apple’s (and Jobs’s, as co-inventor) iPhone design patents and found that they, too, were likely infringed by Samsung’s Galaxy S 4G and Infuse 4G smartphones—though Bryson affirmed Judge Koh’s earlier decision to order no pretrial embargo on those devices. (Samsung did not respond to requests for comment on the suit.)
Though the U.S. Supreme Court has not heard a design patent case since 1871 — that one involved the ornamentation on some pre-Civil War silver flatware handles — it might be time for a fresh look. While the number of design patents issued annually across all industries has increased only incrementally over the past decade — cumulatively, about 26% — tech design patents have shot through the roof. While Apple obtained just 10 of them in 2001, when Samsung acquired 8, last year Apple hauled in 123 (an 1100% increase), while Samsung harvested 333 (a 4000% increase).”
Source: Fortune CNN News
Hello,
Microsoft just unveiled their latest Tablet cum ‘notebook’ which signifies their entrance into the hardware market.
You can have a fill of 
below;
From touch to type, office to living room, from your screen to the big screen, you can see more, share more, and do more with Surface.
Create, collaborate, and get stuff done with Office.
Explore your world with fast, fluid Windows 8 apps.
Discover new music, movies, and games in the Windows Store.1
Surface is thin, light and it has a great battery. At 9.3mm, Surface for Windows RT is just thin enough to still sport a full sized USB port. Print, share, or charge your phone on the go.2 Head out knowing that you are ready for anything.
Surface has a 10.6″, 16:9 widescreen HD Display. Microsoft’s ClearType HD Display technology delivers a great picture for movies. An ultra-wide viewing angle makes it easy for your friends to share in the vibrant experience. The auto-adjusting screen intensity delivers great visual clarity, indoors and out. The addition of the Micro SD card slot means you can bring your entire movie and music collection with you on vacation.
Some activities call for a keyboard. Surface comes with an integrated kickstand and a revolutionary, 3mm thin, pressure sensitive cover that doubles as a fully functioning keyboard and trackpad. Your Touch Cover connects to your Surface with a single magnetic click. Now you can chat with friends and respond to emails comfortably.
Surface has not just one, but two cameras. Use the front LifeCam to chat with the people that you care about. The rear-facing LifeCam is angled to 22 degrees so you can flip out the Kickstand and record meetings and events hands-free. Stereo speakers and dual microphones tuned for Skype help you sound like you are right next door.
Surface was designed to be your go-to-device. It comes with a precision crafted VaporMg casing that protects the vital technology inside and leaves a high quality finish and feel.
Touch Cover comes in five vibrant colors. Type Cover offers classic typing experience for those who prefer a more traditional keyboard. Pick the one that best meets your needs and represents your sense of style.”
Hello readers, i have just read about these products coming soon from Apple.
I am looking forward to getting them after i must have saved some dollars and read other reviews about them, before then you can also have a feel on Apple’s website http://www.apple.com and from Techcrunch http://techcrunch.com/tag/apple/
Enjoy your money.
“Did your mouth water, your jaw drop and your eyes bulge over the beautiful new retina display MacBook that Apple announced at Monday’s Worldwide Developer’s Conference? Yeah, us too. As for the $2,199 starting price point? Well, pixels are pricey, especially when there’s 5 million of them.
But there is hope. Supplement your purchase of a stylish new gadget with money you’ve earned from selling the old ones.
First of all, don’t bother with eBay — the site is overloaded with used tech. At last check, there were 51,000 listings for MacBook Pros and 15,000 listings for MacBook Airs. Your gadget might get overlooked in the clutter.
Instead, we suggest you turn to one of these “re-commerce” sites, which specialize in trade-in and buy-back of used electronics. Simply enter information about your device, including its condition and original packaging, if applicable. Bing bang boom! The sites will give you an estimate right then and there; if you accept, they send you a pre-paid shipping label (and in some cases, even a box).
If your assessment of the device’s condition is fair, the money is yours — and your home will be less cluttered for it. I just wonder if the new and improved Siri could have told you that.
Keep in mind that when you’re trading in a laptop, unlike a smartphone or tablet, the resale value will vary by hard drive, RAM and optical drive. Those configurations will have a greater impact on the yielded value than the actual model of the device.
According to Jeff Trachsel, chief marketing officer for NextWorth, the best laptop trade-in values are for Apple, HP, Dell, Sony, Toshiba and Compaq. The highest-value laptops will likely come with Intel Core i7, Intel Core i5, Intel Core i3 or Intel Core2Duo 2.0+ GHz processors.
We’ve rounded up a selection of five re-commerce sites, each with a slightly different schtick. Pick the one that’s right for you, and sell, sell, sell!
Quick Tip: Before you send anything in for a re-sell, make sure all of your information is wiped from the device. It’s best to restore your gadget to its original factory settings to be sure everything is deleted. For full details on how to erase the contents of your devices, see Apple’s tutorials for iOS and OS X.”
Source: http://www.mashable.com
“A couple weeks after Oracle bought Vitrue for $300 million and Salesforce.com bought Buddy Media for ~$700 million, the gossip we’re hearing is that the next social media marketing tools provider to sell will be Victoria Ransom‘s Wildfire Interactive.
That’s Ransom, a Kiwi, on the right.
On its Web site, Wildfire describes itself as “an easy-to-use yet powerful tool to grow, engage, and monetize your audience on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and LinkedIn.”
Facebook, we’re told, is a leading suitor. This makes some sense. Facebook needs to find a way to tax marketers for the value they get out of pushing their products using Facebook’s free tools.
We don’t know a price, but you have to figure it would be in the hundreds of millions of dollars. One number we heard: $250 million.
Our source on this gossip says Goldman Sachs is Wildfire’s banker, and that Goldman is pushing Wildfire to include more bidders.
Given that Google wanted to buy Buddy Media, but lost out, it’s probably safe to assume its interested.
We reached out to Goldman, Wildfire, and Facebook for this story. None responded. It’s OK, if they had talked to us, they would have declined to comment on rumors and speculation, which is actually what this story is. We thought you’d like to hear the whispers anyway.”
“The FBI is in the process of launching a new surveillance unit to help the bureau snoop on conversations that take place on Skype and other wireless communications, CNET reports. The new unit has a very unassuming name: the Domestic Communications Assistance Center.
CNET parsed through government documents and interviewed people familiar with the project. Here’s what the publication has learned so far:
“DCAC’s mandate is broad, covering everything from trying to intercept and decode Skype conversations to building custom wiretap hardware or analyzing the gigabytes of data that a wireless provider or social network might turn over in response to a court order. It’s also designed to serve as a kind of surveillance help desk for state, local, and other federal police.”
CNET reports that the idea behind the new unit has been floating around for about four years, and it’s intended to serve as “the technological component of the bureau’s ‘Going Dark’ Internet wiretapping push, which was allocated $54 million by a Senate committee last month.”
Source: Business Insider.
Life is short,have fun!!! 