climate and comms

It is now time to think BIG. About the MACRO picture. How the massive growth in INFRASTRUCTURE continues unabated and how it will impact on you and me. Our lives are slowly adapting/evolving because of the availability of more and more BANDWIDTH, faster PROCESSING speeds and the increasing ubiquity of WIRELESS networks – both GSM and WIFI. How are we changing the way we behave? You just need to look at two markers – 1.) MOBILE phone growth especially in emerging markets ( there will be almost 5bn mobile phone users by the end of 2010) and 2.) growth in SOCIAL media especially the likes of FACEBOOK (400m users and growing ) which takes up an inordinate amount of our spare and working time. People are increasingly connected in an ALWAYS ON ALWAYS CONNECTED WORLD. The curse of the CRACKBERRY has now been extended to all SMART phone users. We have become slaves to technology. Almost every human interaction whether work or play is increasingly reliant upon ...

I am back and this is a hot off the press news piece that I believe is so important I have to share 'verbatim' - I got this off the PC Advisor website today. This whole issue of authentication and related security is put into context in light of this alarm bell from Michael Dell. He is singing my mantra.   It is self-explanatory and should highlight how seriously we should be taking cybercrime and coming up with solutions that are effective and scalable. ' Cybersecurity needs a global rethink, and fast, Dell's CEO Michael Dell and Services CIO, Jim Stikeleather, have warned experts at the EastWest Institute Worldwide Cybersecurity Summit in the US. In separate presentations and briefings, the men developed the theme of piecemeal reactions to the rapid rise of cyber-criminality, which included economic crime and direct threats to critical infrastructure. The message was unusually blunt. Governments haven't done enough and have fallen into the trap of se...

In this my second posting – I plan to dive straight into the nitty gritty of one of the MOST important issues about engaging efficiently with the Internet today. This is AUTHENTICATION. So what is it and why is it so important ?? Something which is regarded as being ‘real’, bona-fide, true or genuine is regarded as being AUTHENTIC. In the old days when you bought a valuable item such as a work of art or jewelry you would determine its AUTHENTICITY before parting with your well earned cash. Your method of AUTHENTICATION might have been to consult an expert in the field, who used technical analysis to determine the nature of the metal ( eg Gold ) or the gem ( eg Diamond) or their expertise to compare the artifact with similar genuine ones . You would have been defrauded if the expert you had employed was fooled by a copy or if the expert was in cahoots with the FRAUDSTER and he deliberately gave a misleading valuation thereby leaving you out of pocket by overpaying or bein...

Dear World If you are reading this then by some miracle you have been directed / linked to this site by the incredible power of Google and the Internet. This whole ‘social media ‘ thing is still new to me and I am now tentatively dipping my toes into the raging torrent of the Blogosphere. I hope that my musings will not be confined to the cold hard world of ‘work’ but that every now and then I will break away and explore some esoteric philosophies that help to explain our place in the Universe. Well that’s what  my six year old son would say!! My current project is the launch of a new Website which will provide online authentication to the ‘masses’ . Live Ensure TM ( www.liveensure.com ) goes live in early July ( assuming no acts of God like Icelandic volanoes!) This is the most exciting project I have worked on since my days at MTN which probably still ranks as my most exciting project so far. But more of that another time. So through this Blog I hope to share so...