MANILA, Philippines — This whole business of being on the social network scene has gone past being just a craze or phase.  Now we have millions of people the world over sharing photos, favorite songs, restaurants, food and details about thelatest class reunion on MySpace, Facebook (FB), Twitter and other similar sites.

I know how this has helped bridge gaps, reunite and rekindle old friendships, flames but as soon as we are done finding lost relative, the sooner we realize that such social sights may be hazardous too.  Just think of one day opening your FB account and the close up of the man who scammed you pops up “On your wall.”

There should be a line drawn as to how open we should be on such sights.   There are a handful of personal details that you should never say if you don’t want criminals — cyber or otherwise — According to Beth Givens, executive director of the *Privacy Rights Clearing House, there are a few things to be mum about on FB.  Sure.  It’s so easy to get carried away so much more when you’re on the roll and posting away.

I’m guilty of being O.C. about documenting every little thing.  From my Keoni’s first words to what number of his baby teeth fell out last.  But really, one’s ill-advised Facebook postings increasingly can get your insurance cancelled or have you pay dramatically more for everything from auto to life insurance coverage.   How?  Did you ever think about those pics of nights out on the town and drinking sprees resulting to drunken sot poses?

Such incriminating photos could cost you a job!  Facebook and such other sites have become open house for voyeurs and the paparazzi.

You can enjoy networking and sharing pics, but know that in doing so, you put yourself on the line. Here according to Beth Givens,  are the things you should NOT SAY on Facebookor other similar sites…

Your Birth Date and Place -Say what day you were born, but don’t provide the year and where because you’ve just given identity thieves a key to stealing your financial life.

There’s  lots of cases of cyber crimes.  A study in the U.S done by Carnegie Mellon showed that a date and place of birth could be used to predict most — and sometimes all — of the numbers in your Social Security number, she said.  So please don’t be too honest about your complete birthday details.

Vacation Plans- This is like an open invite to “AkyatBahay” (this is the modus of thieves in the Philippines it means “come up the house”) or an easier way of saying,  “It’s Open house…come!”   Posting something along the lines of: “Two Days to Bangkok!” Or “Our Week on Sao Paolo starts in 4 days!”  This truly happened to an old associate.

When they got back from a 3-day holiday, they found their apartment ransacked and half empty.  Only to find out that their teen daughter’s shout out on FBwas ; “Our house will be an empty nest for 3 days starting tomorrow!”  Puhleassse!  Post photos of your vacay, but don’t open your life and invite criminals in by telling them specifically when you’ll be gone.

*Privacy Rights Clearinghouse (PRC) is a project of the Utility Consumers’ Action Network (UCAN), an American501(c)(3)non-profit consumer advocacy organization. The Privacy Rights Clearinghouse is devoted

Lemme hear from yah:

techiemommy@gmail.com

Article source: http://www.mb.com.ph/articles/348452/facebookwhen-enough-enough

MANILA, Philippines — Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd, a market leader and award-winning innovator in consumer electronics, recently  introduced the new Samsung Notebook Series 5 ULTRA, representing more than just thin and light, packing ultra performance beyond expectations.

Revealing the most secret features, the Series 5 ULTRA is powered by a 2nd generation Intel Core i5 processor; combined with ExpressCache™ system by Diskeeper and a powerful AMD Radeon™ HD graphics card, it delivers incredible experiences packed in a thin and light form factor.

“Based on in-depth market research and consumer surveys, we propose a new type of Ultrabook which will change the perception of Ultrabooks among users. Our findings strongly indicate that consumers demand more than just thin and light devices, hoping for a satisfactory level of daily performance and storage, as digital files become larger.

The Samsung Series 5 ULTRA will be the first to answer these needs,” said David Song, Senior Vice President, IT Solutions Business at Samsung Electronics. “The latest Samsung knowhow we have applied in our Series 5 ULTRA positions the device for today’s fast changing media environment by adding greater value for consumers through a more balanced product concept.”

Available in 13” and 14”, the Series 5 ULTRA reveals its performance through an Intel Core i5-2467M processor, up to 8GB memory, ExpressCache system by Diskeeper and AMD Radeon HD graphics card. As a result, the Series 5 ULTRA is able to fast boot in just 20 seconds, wake up in 2 seconds, whilst web browsing is twice as fast as the previous generation notebook PCs.

Performance alone is insufficient without enough space to store your data. Due to the development of digital image devices and various media platforms, files are getting larger every day, increasing the need for bigger user storage. Despite the recent trend of cloud storage, local storage is still preferred among users on a daily basis. Not to compromise these needs the Series 5 ULTRA 14” offers up to 1TB ultra storage capacity ensuring that users never need to carry a peripheral storage device with them.

The performance has been further enhanced by the extended battery life. The Samsung Series 5 ULTRA delivers up to 6.4 hours of battery life on a single charge, to make sure users enjoy the ultra features throughout the day. The Samsung Battery Life Plus is a true anti-aging battery technology which keeps 80 percent of the cell’s original capacity in a life cycle lasting up to 1,500 charging cycles / three years. This ensures that the battery can last up to five times longer than other notebooks.

To meet the concept of being the true companion of consumers, the Samsung Series 5 ULTRA will be offered in 13” and 14”.

Article source: http://www.mb.com.ph/articles/348453/samsung-series-5-ultra-first-go-beyond-thin-light

MANILA, Philippines — Every night before going to bed, you can usually find me reading the book I have chosen for the time being. Aside from the book, I also find myself checking out some short pieces on websites like articles and blog posts on my Android. It was during one of these recent sessions that I came across something interesting but quite disturbing. I decided it will be the subject of my article today.

The article I read was from the website Cracked.com and it was about last resort surgeries that actually worked. One of the entries in the article really struck me because it had something to do with the eyes, since I have vision problems myself.

But it also struck me because of how innovative, strange and disturbing the solution was. It gave me one of those “I didn’t know that was possible” feelings.

When one thinks about eye surgery, we usually think of the usual things like laser surgery and corneal transplants. The most radical we could probably think of transplanting devices to stand in for something in the eye that doesn’t work. If I told you to think about teeth being used for eye surgery, you’ll probably think I’m nuts.

That’s exactly what I thought when I read the article. But back in 2009, that’s exactly what doctors in Florida did to restore vision to woman named Shannon Thornton who became blind due to a rare condition named Stevens-Johnson Syndrome that left the surface of her eye completely damaged.

This tooth in eye surgery is officially called Modified Osteo-odonto-keratoprosthesis or MOOKP for short. Without going into too much detail, this procedure involves extracting the patient’s own tooth and drilling a hole in it so that a prosthetic lens could be placed into it.

The tooth with the lens would then be inserted into the eye and then dental tissue is used to as the new cornea while tissue from the cheek would serve as the mucus tissue around the pupils.

The advantage of using the patient’s own tooth and tissue from the mouth is that there’s less chance that the tooth will be rejected by the immune system while it’s within the eye.

I know a lot of you are probably grossed out by now but remember that the woman can now see because of this radical procedure. This is a great example of several fields of science coming together to solve problems.

We have the field of medicine and biology merging with the field of optics (responsible for all our cameras today) to make an eye work again. You’ve heard of the saying “an eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth” but now you can say you’ve heard about a tooth in the eye!

Article source: http://www.mb.com.ph/articles/348234/a-tooth-eye

MANILA, Philippines — Noire – the French word for “black”is befitting for the title of Team Bondi’s breakthrough game, LA Noire.  No this is not a movie, but a somewhat creative crossover of the good things about a detective/crime movie, and the thrills and joy of a video game.

Players play as detective Cole Phelps, and his job is to clean the merry city of 1946 Los Angeles from arsonists, murderers, frauds, and other law offenders. The story itself is fast-paced and compelling leaving players on the edge of their seats. Pitched into the game are also elements of gunfighting, car chases, and fistfights. But the cream of this game is how it approaches storytelling and how it immerses the player in a virtual world filled with realistic emotions and visuals.

As a detective, you go around the city of Los Angeles together with your partner to gather and solve cases. For some parts, you may feel of playing Grand Theft Auto in WWII as the city is alive and free to be explored in a sandbox environment. Gunfights are also present in-game as not all criminals are expected be prancing about willingly giving themselves.

LA Noire is one of those games that feature unforgettable faces and memorable emotions. It’s a video game that has amazingly and shockingly intricate depictions of the faces of the actors that portray the characters.

The lifelike faces are done through the use of a technology called MotionScan. It features 32 high definition cameras, the same cameras used to shoot space shuttle launches, to capture the movements of the actors. Think of it as actor Andy Serkis playing Gollum in the LOTR movies. (Yes, he is an actor, not just some CGI character)

Armed with that technology, the road opens for thecreation of the main part of the game— interrogation and evidence gathering. As a detective, players have to acquire a number of proofs and statements to nail or to acquit suspects of the crime. Gathering statements takes place with the player guessing if the witness or defendant is bluffing or telling the truth.

In an interrogation scene, the player is given three options on how to approach a subject, these are: truth, lie, and doubt. Truth is more in believing the statement made. Choosing doubt is pressing on the subject and insisting on the falsification of some facts.

Lastly, the lie option is insisting on the truth by presenting cold hard evidence in front of the subject. Doing things right would net the player additional information which could easily close the case. Doing otherwise would lengthen the game, and may even spell a game over for the player.

Playing as Cole Phelps is comparable to playing out your own noir movie. The story is so compelling and is somewhatcomparable to reading a novel, or watching a movie, yet you have control of what is taking place in the game.

Team Bondi did a fantastic job in immersing the players with the lifelike presentation of characters, complete with the acting, sneers, and cheers. LA Noire is one of those games that make you feel that you’re not playing a video game. Having won numerous awards this past year, maybe it’s ripe to have it part of your gaming shelves.  Definitely, it will keep you wanting for more.

Article source: http://www.mb.com.ph/articles/348235/la-noire

MANILA, Philippines — It was one of a series of unfortunate events that happened during the usual wet month of December, my iPhone got wet. It was ironic that it was not rain, but rather my own clumsiness of letting it fall into a pool of water (not the toilet BTW).

A blogger friend of mine, Abe, once shared how traumatic it was for him to lose his iPhone, and I can somewhat relate to the experience.  I have never been this attached to a mobile device since my Palm Pilot, which then featured the first PDA and phone in one.   Such a nifty device and worked well for me.

Now my iPhone is undergoing a recovery of sorts, spending time in a Ziploc with uncooked rice, which according to the web is one of the best way to get the moisture out and save your wet iPhone.

I am keeping my fingers crossed, that it will eventually dry up and function as normally as before.  But the prospects of owning an iPhone 4S seem as hopeful.

Personal Trials. So while I am iPhoneless, I went around during the Christmas break looking for something I can use.  After sorting through the choices and considering a less expensive option, I ended up getting a Sony Ericsson WT19i Walkman Phone.

A strong affinity to the original Walkman (the portable audio cassette player) made it a simpler choice.  Also, I am still under the belief that my iPhone will still come alive, and investing in a more robust and expensive phone is not a smart idea.

Like going through a new toy, I started going through Sony Ericsson’s WT19i and quite naturally I tried the Walkman feature.  It did not disappoint, but I found it a bit strange that the speakers are located at the back of the phone.  The sound quality though is pretty impressive and it does become better with the use of the earphones,which I guess is how it is suppose to be used.

Scrolling through the UI is amusing; you can go through different apps and phone functionalities with ease.  Texting using the QWERTY keypad can be rather difficult, and it is a good thing that it provides predictive text.  Still watch out and proof read your messages, you might end up sending ‘aroused’ when you meant ‘around’ – as in see you around and not see you aroused, which can be embarrassing.

I tried other functionalities, but allow me to focus in on what I usually use with the iPhone only to have a better comparison.

Web browsing seems seamless and with the Google search/address bar right in the middle of the user interface, makes it easy to navigate.  The speed of the browser however, is not as impressive, but it still gets the work done.  The display does have the usual bells and whistles, like pitching or double tap to zoom in and out but the display screen size can be rather challenging.

Setting up the email facility is simple enough even if you are using your own domain and hosting facilities,and not the free services like Gmail and Yahoo.  But like the experience browsing, the speed is an issue.

I also tried the Maps app on the phone, and this one I feel is superior to any of the other map apps I tried.  Looking for places, like restaurants, bars and even bank ATM locations, which are near you is indeed an impressive experience.

Overall, for its affordable price, Sony Ericsson WT19i will not disappoint the music lover and is a decent phone to have.  It can also have a FM tuner that completes its music delivery capability.

But if you are considering for a more robust web browsing and email experience, this phone may be off key. So what I learned before the year ended, clumsiness can carry a hefty price!

For your comments and opinions, you can reach me at jpv.groovetech@gmail.com.

Article source: http://www.mb.com.ph/articles/348236/its-a-wet-december-affair