Detailed Terrain Map Of The World Published

1. July 2009 Kerry

One of the most detailed terrain maps of the world has been recently published, created by 1.3 million images that were provided by both NASA and the Japanese trade ministry. Theses images were taken by Japan’s Advanced Space borne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer (Aster) that are aboard the Terra satellite
The result is a map known as the Global Digital Elevation Map that covers 99 percent of the earth’s surface and will be free to download and use. The Terra satellite is usually used and committed to monitoring the earth regarding volcanic eruptions through to rapid increase of algae in aquatic systems, known as algal blooms.
For the Aster map measurements, local altitude was mapped at points just 30 m apart, Woody Turner a NASA programme scientist said ‘This is the most complete, consistent digital elevation data yet made available to the world.’ Turner has been working on the Aster mission.
‘This unique global set of data will serve users and researchers from a wide array of disciplines that need elevation and terrain information.’
Before the Aster map, the most detailed topographic map was NASA’s Shuttle Radar Topography Mission, which covered an impressive 80 percent of the earth’s surface. However that mission’s results were less accurate in areas of steep terrain and deserts.
NASA is now working to combine previous data with the new Aster results to improve the detailed map even further.

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Twitter Becomes UK Leader In Terms Of Growth

26. June 2009 James.R

The latest social networking success, Twitter is officially the fastest growing website in the UK according to Hitwise.

The internet analyst company have released their 2009 growth statistics which show the rapid growth of the micro blogging site. Currently the fifth most popular social network, Twitter has benefitted from celebrity exposure, with the likes of Stephen Fry, Lily Allen and Jimmy Carr posting, or ‘tweeting’, regularly allowing fans to keep in touch.

Twitter was ranked 84th most popular site in 2008 and has seen a huge growth in traffic in the last year, jumping 79 places up the chart - Twitter is fast becoming as cool as the iPod, Blackberry, Xbox and indeed Facebook.

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A Tweet Too Far?

22. June 2009 Kerry

A man in Arizona has recently speculated that his recent tweets on social network site Twitter, is the reason he was burgled as his burglars may have read his tweets concerning his holiday.
Israel Hyman posted to his 2,000 strong Twitter-followers that he and his wife were ‘preparing to head out of town,’ that they had ‘another ten hours of driving ahead’ and later on that they ‘had made it to Kansas City.’
When he returned from his trip Hyman found that someone had broken into his home and stolen thousands of dollars worth of video equipment that he uses for his business, which is advertised on his Twitter account.
He is quoted as saying, ‘My wife thinks it was a random thing, but I have my suspicions’ he told reporters, ‘They didn’t take any of our normal consumer electronics.’
Talking about anything personal on a social networking site can be quite risky, even having personal details such as birthdates and further information can be used for identity fraud and in Hyman’s case the advertising of his unoccupied home may have been the cause for his burglary.
All new aspects of technology are open invitations to thieves and criminals taking into account the new real-time aspect for mobile uploads. Location aware technology is also causing problems; the card in some cameras now automatically adds locations to photos uploaded, drawing a direct map to where certain people may live. You only need to photograph your friend in your living room and the online community can see your wide-screen television.
So next time you want to share everything with the online world, consider if it is at all wise, after all some things are best kept to yourself.

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Mac Versus Microsoft In Security Battle

15. June 2009 Kerry

Computer security has been hot in the headlines this week for both Mac and PC users. Although the first ever computer virus was targeted at Mac users around 25 years ago, many owners feel that the security surrounding their machines is far superior to what is offered through a PC. Microsoft is renowned for offering security systems that cost money, which many users feel are inadequate. This week however, the shoe is on the other foot as it transpired that there is a new virus out there ready to take on Mac users.

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Faster Broadband Declared Essential For Survival

9. June 2009 Kerry

It’s official, internet access has been dubbed as important as utility services such as water and electricity. Just as a certain breakdown recovery company became the 4th emergency service, broadband access is now essential for survival according to 73 per cent of UK residents. This may seem a little farfetched to believe, after all how can the need to tweet be as important as having running water? It is certainly something that people in developing countries would find hard to understand.

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Rising through the rankings - High Position

4. June 2009 admin

The UK’s largest independent web marketing company, which has recently won several new large-scale contracts including Sony, haart estate agents and Hillarys Blinds, has expanded its team by a total of 11 new staff.

High Position, which specialises in web design and search engine optimisation, now employs over 50 people. All 11 new employees have been appointed within the last three months to manage the company’s growth.

The linking team, which creates inbound links to client websites, has welcomed Jane Mace, Diana Hill and Angela Holmes, whilst the copywriting department has expanded with the addition of Ben Johnson, James Root, Craig Hindmarch and Letitia Becher.

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Bada Bing! Bada New Search Engine Boom?

2. June 2009 Kerry

Microsoft has re-launched its search engine, aiming to make searching online simpler whilst aiming to overtake Yahoo. Re-named and branded Bing.com, the search engine has gone live days earlier than Microsoft said it would. So will people now be ‘binging’ as opposed to ‘googling’?

This probably won’t happen, seeing that Google currently has more than 64 percent of the search market within the US, followed by Yahoo at 20 percent and Microsoft at a small 8.2 percent.

However, Bing does offer to make searches more relevant by understanding the meaning of searches and grouping more related information to the original query. For example, searches for products will bring up product reviews, accessories, and online shops.

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Search Battleground Intensifies As Microsoft Stakes 100 Million

27. May 2009 Tobias

The search market is worth USD 22.12 billion of revenue to Google on an annual basis and is evidently worth fighting for. It is alleged that Microsoft are investing USD 100 million into advertising for their new search engine, interestingly named, Bing; the namesake of revered television character Chandler Bing from the hit US sitcom Friends.

A leaked internal email from Microsoft earlier in the year, requesting that personnel play with the search engine and deliver feedback stated the brand name of the search engine as Kumo, however it seems they might be opting for something more catered toward the US market. After the recent launch of WolframAlpha, Google responded with a Searchology promotion, unveiling mixed media search results that looked remarkably like the ones outlined in the leaked Microsoft Kumo email earlier in the year.

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Enhance Your World With Augmented Reality

26. May 2009 Kerry

The news this week has been ablaze with a variety of stories that reflect our ever deepening need for technological immersion. My personal favourite is a new mobile phone that promises to enhance the reality around us. The new virtually virtual reality phone from Nokia will use every application at its disposal to label the world with digital features such as the height of a building, the name of passing person and even identify the stars in the sky. It is essentially a Wikipedia overlay for the world.

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Rise Of The Sentiment Software Agent

13. May 2009 Kerry

For want of a better word, internet marketing is about to get a little bit ‘matrixy’. Just as the world collectively grasps the idea of a search engine with spiders and bots that crawl pages indexing data, along comes the intelligence engine. This uses a software agent worthy of being named Smith; it is emotionally aware and scours blogs, articles, tweets for sentiment data in online banter.

A social media consultancy called Sentimine based in the United States has developed a content analysis tool to follow trends related to a certain keyword and label them as favourable, unfavourable or neutral. This is being used to gather information about brand opinions so manufacturers and PR companies can determine whether the attitude towards a product is positive or negative.

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