Archive for the ‘ethics’ Category

We live in the digital world, so how come employers of the 21^st century are struggling more than ever to find the digital skills required to run a successful business?

Digital skills are not always taught in high schools and the technicality of computer science degrees scare away more creative teenagers, leaving the huge demand for e-skills unsatisfied.

This week all you need is… shows you the avant-garde approaches to teach teens to code with fun, the latest Google’s Movies app and much much more.

• ‘Hakitzu’ Teaches Kids to Code With Robot Warriors - Mashable

According to the president of the European commission Manuel Barroso, coding and the understanding of programming languages is quickly climbing the ladder of the most requested skills by employers.

This is what the creators of Hakitzu: Code of the Warrior must have had in mind when they developed a strategy game that prompts players to type basic JavaScript to control characters.

The free iPad app pits two robots against each other in a battle arena, where each user takes turns coding increasingly complex instructions to move and use weapons.

Hakitzu takes an immersive gamification approach to stimulate players’ interest in coding and allow them to learn variables, functions, core construction of code, and syntax for JavaScript, without having to attend an expensive, and rather dull, programming course.

This is very much inline with what FreeFormers, one of our clients, is doing.

They are a social enterprise, driven by a one-for-one business model, which, as the name says, teaches teenagers how to code for free every time a business signs up for one of their trainings.

What’s your idea about coding games and training for teens? Is this the future of education?

Leave a comment below and let us know your thoughts.

• Google Play’s Movies and TV App Gets a Pop Up Video Feel - MarketingPilgrim

Have you ever found yourself pondering over the name of an actor or song while watching a film?

Those days will soon be over, as Google’s Movies and TV app will include a new feature known as “info cards”, which relies on Google’s Knowledge Graph to give greater insight into your favourite actors, films and shows.

By tapping on an actor’s face you’ll be able to learn more about him, his age, place of birth, his character in the movie, and his recent work, or scroll through the info cards to learn more about the movie or soundtrack.

However, at least for now, not everyone will benefit form the new Google app, as the “info cards” will work only on movies watched on an Android tablet.

If your planning to buy a tablet, would “info cards” influence you purchase?

Let us know what you think about it, regardless of whether you’re an iOS or an Android fan.

• The Biggest Cyber-Attack Ever Is Slowing Down The Internet - Forbes

The Internet is currently suffering under the largest cyber-attack ever, which seems to have slowed down the traffic and sites across the World Wide Web.

The attack follows a conflict between Spamhaus and Cyberbunker, a Dutch hosting company.

Spamhaus maintains lists of servers that are known to be used for illicit or malicious uses. These lists are then used by ISPs around the world in order to block access from those places to the wider net.

On the other hand, Cyberbunker is willing to host on its servers pretty much anything but child porn and terrorism related stuff, which has gain the company the reputation of spam’s heaven.

Spamhaus has added those servers to its block listings and this seems to have annoyed some people who are now conducting denial of service attacks against it.

But there’s a bright side to this huge cyber attack. Despite it causing great disruptions, it’s likely it’ll motivate the security industry to take more serious action on the open DNS issue.

What’s your take on this? Do you think Cyberbunker I s responsible for the attack? Or do you believe Spamhaus doesn’t have the right to tell what’s acceptable and what’s not on the Internet?

• Twitter Shuts Down Tweetdeck For Android, Iphone And AIR, Discontinues Tweetdeck’s Facebook Integration. - TechCrunch

Just when we were starting to recover from the recent ‘loss’ of Google Reader, Twitter announces it’ll discontinue another of our favorite tech services: TweetDeck for mobile. Twitter will remove its older TweetDeck apps from their respective app stores in May but it hasn’t yet said whether it’ll replace it with a new app.

Furthermore, the web-based service version of the app will loose its Facebook integration, but Twitter hasn’t provided any details on why and when this will happen.

If, so far, you had eyes only for TweetDeck, do not panic. There are many worthy alternatives that will allow you to keep track of your tweets and, perhaps, even mend your broken social heart.

Here’s a snapshot.

• 10 Technologies You Don’t Need to Upgrade – Angela Liao

If you too work in digital, you’re probably familiar with that feeling of wanting to stay up to date with the latest technologies and constantly trying to figure out what the next big thing will be.

But not everyone thinks like us, and we like that.

For the less tech savvy people out there, and for the many of us who are a bit too obsessed with technology, here is an infographic that may help to put things into context…

Whether you’re at school or in full-time employment, it’s never too late to learn how to code. And why shouldn’t you when it can be just as much fun as playing a videogame?

If you agree, or disagree, leave a comment below and join the conversation. Till next week… Gabs (@gabrielegenola)

Earlier this week, I was at a lecture at the RSA where Sky’s Adam Boulton was in conversation with Stephen Green, chairman of international banking group HSBC. They had both just returned from the G20/G8, which provided a backdrop to discussions on financial turbulence, money and morality. The presentation was especially interesting as it took a long-term historical view: King Edward III was noted as the first British sovereign to default on his debts; Franciscan thinking from the middle ages on poverty versus wealth was quoted; the ebb and flow of world trade was examined. You can watch the RSA’s video of the talk here. Well worth a look.

Mr Green was questioned on his book, Good Value: Building a Better Life in Business. He gave his perspective on the current macroeconomic climate, talking about a clear rebalancing to the East. He says ‘emerging markets’ is a misnomer, preferring the re-emergence of markets. China was the world’s largest economy until 1820 – before the growth of super powers – and was the dominant economic power in 18 of the last 20 centuries. Over a generation, he says, we will see the rise of the ‘new G20’ states, and the relative marginalisation of the G7/G8.

However, he is positive about the opportunities for business offered by this rebalancing. Companies that plan responsible, sustainable business strategies, in tune with the cultural needs of growing markets will thrive. Real CSR will have real impact.

As a spokesperson for the global banking community, Stephen Green is impressive. Highly engaging and authoritative, without a hint of arrogance. He expertly batted away questions inviting comment on BP’s current problems and focused on broad issues of strategy and morality. As an ordained Anglican priest, his views on ethics in business are especially interesting. From a reputation manager’s perspective, he is a valuable asset. A thought leader with original, coherent thoughts and a distinctive view of the world. Good value.

As a Public Affairs Consultant it has struck me as very odd that the Copenhagen Conference - set to begin in under a month - has no confirmed attendees. The UN announced over the weekend that they had assurances from 40 heads of state, but formally no-one is set to attend, which is merely fuelling speculation that the event will be a flop. When organising events for clients it is essential to get the messaging right before the event: it is key to have a good bill of attendees lined up and to put time into strategic promotion of the event. If an event is organised with assurances rather than confirmed attendance and there is a raft of negative media coverage then, suffice to say, it is bound to bomb.

Why is it then that the Copenhagen Climate Change Conference has fallen down this route? It may be that negotiations over what the conference will actually achieve are still ongoing. But even taking this into account there has been a severe lack of strategic organisation around the attendee list. Surely the UN still desperately wants world leaders to meet at Copenhagen, even if proposals are weaker than hoped for.

Firstly, organisers should have invited delegates months ago, the formal invitations should have gone out in the summer and the haggling over attendance should have taken place several months ago. Having left this element to the 11^th hour, there is a chance that at the last minute all goes to plan; but the conference has been tarnished by two months of speculation about the attendees. Still no formal invitations have been sent and so the press have no stories to run except intrigue about who might not attend and how the conference is breaking down.

Secondly, why is it that there has been such a breakdown between Barack Obama and the organisers? There have been rumours swirling for weeks that he may not attend. He has not come out and dispelled this myth and nor have any officials from the conference. Surely both Obama and the conference organisers realise how damaging this has been for the conference. Since September the image of the conference has changed from a landmark event to solve the biggest problem facing the planet to just another global conference, already destined to fail. Why have Obama’s spokespeople and the conference spokespeople not put up a united front in their messaging? Instead there has been division, which has made Obama, who has put tackling climate change at the centre of his promises, seem hypocritical and has made the conference seem impotent.

It is a tragic failure that a fantastic event such as the Copenhagen conference seems to have fallen because of communications failings. Even though there may still be successful resolutions coming out of Copenhagen, I think the negotiations will be all the harder with such an intense media glare waiting for the conference to fail. In fact this negative pre-conference atmosphere might scupper this magnificent opportunity for global dialogue on climate change and cast Copenhagen into the vast pile of what if? moments in history.

Let me know what you think. Should the UN have tried harder to commit world leaders to attend Copenhagen?

I’ve just read a really poignant piece by Paul Carr over at TechCrunch on the dangers of citizen journalism and how ego-fuelled reporting does not equal the truth:

“…the cameraman was not a professional reporter, but rather an ordinary person, just like the victim. And what did he do when he saw a young girl bleeding to death? Did he run for help, or try to assist in stemming the bleeding? No he didn’t.

Instead he pointed his camera at her and recorded her suffering, moving in closer to her face for her agonising final seconds. For all of our talk of citizen journalism, and getting the truth out, the last thing that terrified girl saw before she closed her eyes for the final time was some guy pointing a cameraphone at her. “Look at me, looking at her, looking back at me.”

I wrote a post a while back on digital rubbernecking and James Governor captured the feeling for me then in his comment.

With the widespread availability of technology for reporting is the race to capture “the” footage making us lose our humanity? Could you watch a girl die to be the first to capture a story or would you run for help? I know what I’d do.

Cross posted with my personal blog