Its all about marketing…One good product, Camera Phones is helping sell another good product, Digital Cameras.

The following Reuters.com article explains.

Contrary to expectations, camera phones are spurring U.S. consumers to buy digital cameras, according to a study released on Monday by research firm IDC.

Mobile phones equipped with tiny cameras are seen as less of a threat to replace digital cameras as camera prices fall, IDC said in its Mobile Imaging Survey. In fact the report said new phones help to introduce users to digital photography, which uses no film and allow pictures to be e-mailed.

Sharp growth in sales of cameraphones with powerful lenses was once seen as a threat to digital cameras, since most new mobile phones sold are equipped with tiny camera lenses that lets user spontaneously snap pictures in places they might not have in the past.

The study said that over 30 percent of camera phone owners plan to purchase digital cameras because they learned about digital photography through camera phones, IDC said.

[ Continue reading at Reuters.com ]

Workers at call centres based in India are selling personal information which puts tens of thousands of people at risk of computer fraud, Australias national broadcaster said.
In an investigation for ABC Televisions Four Corners programme, reporters were offered banking pin numbers, passport numbers, credit card details and other personal information on thousands of Australians.
The information would enable fraudsters to assume false identities for online transactions, the ABC said in a preview of the programme to be broadcast Monday night.
Former World Bank cyber intelligence expert Tom Kellerman is quoted as saying that cyber fraud is the most pervasive crime in the world.
Organised crime has created a business model around hacking, he said, adding that the Internet was becoming more hostile every day.

How safe is your personal information?

Continue reading how privacy laws are being flouted by these Indian call centres.

Music copied onto blank recordable CDs is becoming a bigger threat to the bottom line of record stores and music labels than online file-sharing, the head of the recording industrys trade group said Friday.

Burned CDs accounted for 29 percent of all recorded music obtained by fans in 2004, compared to 16 percent attributed to downloads from online file-sharing networks, said Mitch Bainwol, chief executive for the Recording Industry Association of America.

The data, compiled by the market research firm NPD Group, suggested that about half of all recordings obtained by music fans in 2004 were due to authorized CD sales and about 4 percent from paid music downloads.

CD burning is a problem that is really undermining sales, Bainwol said in an interview prior to speaking before about 750 members of the National Association of Recording Merchandisers in San Diego Friday.

Not only are people copying CDs but with the proliferation of music available Online that can be easily downloaded then the market will and has felt the effect of this for some time…

Continue reading this aAssociated Press story

Are you a jerk on the phone? You might want to be a bit nicer the next time you take that call.

Thats because theres new technology coming out of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology called the Jerk-O-Meter. The software measures stress levels in your voice and rates you on a scale of zero to 100 to let you know just how annoying you might be sounding.

Project leader Anmol Madan, a Ph.D. candidate at the MIT Media Lab, said his wife came up with the product name as they were discussing his research on using speech patterns to measure interest in conversations.

The result is speech software that measures vocal activity and stress during a call and then translates that into a couple of actions. The group is also working on better reading empathy.

Now here is something to think about…Are you being a Jerk?

You might just want to consider this a little more carefully next time you are on the phone.

So how do you find out if you are a Jerk then continue reading this article from news.zdnet.com

Blogging is blooming in China as the countrys vast pool of Web users clamor to make their mark online and ambitious local start-ups battle foreign heavyweights for a piece of the market.
China now boasts a 14.2 million-strong blogosphere, with a new blog — a form of online diary whose name is a shortened form of personal Web log — created every second, according to Web site Technorati.

The growing stable of e-scribes, still small by global standards, has attracted homegrown firms and foreign giants like Microsoft, Google and Yahoo Inc offering blogging Web pages to outspoken Chinese Internet users.

One of the last great markets is being broken into at a rapid pace…be assured that the short to medium term benefits for the majors like Google and Yahoo will be tremendous as a wide range of advertising opportunities emerge.

This story continues to unfold and pundits are suggesting some of the things that will possibly emerge from this boom.

Courtesy of news.yahoo.com