I started a project to install a file backup system for my home systems. I have Windows, Linux and Mac systems on my home network with file types ranging from small text files to huge recording sessions. I didn’t want to spend a lot (or any) money on a solution but I recognized the value of the information on my network. If you are operating a business, these same thoughts and motivations should be crossing your mind.
Several months ago, I inherited Keith’s first generation iPhone when he upgraded to the new 3G. I was quite excited! I had been wanting to get my hands on an iPhone for while. The only problem was that I was unhappy with some of the limitations that Apple put on the iPhone, the biggest being the requirement to using AT&T as my provider. So I looked into jailbreaking and unlocking my iPhone, and was successful! You too can jailbreak your iPhone to customize it more to your liking, and unlock it so you can use any mobile provider that you wish.
Jailbreaking your iPhone allows you to get around restrictions that Apple has put in place on installing apps and changing certain settings. Once done you can add ringtones, wallpaper, access the iPhone filesystem from your desktop, and install apps that have not been approved by Apple and are not available through the App Store in iTunes. This article gives several reasons why jailbreaking is useful one of which is that jailbreaking is the first step to unlocking your iPhone. Unlocking is when you change your iPhone so it will work with other mobile providers besides AT&T. So even if you don’t want to unlock your iPhone, you can jailbreak it to give it more features.
There are lots of tools out there that will jailbreak and/or unlock your iPhone. I used Pwnage and was up and running in less then half a day. And if you make a mistake, you can restore your settings and start over. Gone are the days were hacking your iPhone required you to open it up and go at it with a soldering iron!
There are some drawbacks though. The biggest is that you will need to wait to update your iPhone OS until the your jailbreaking tool is updated for the new OS as well. Another is that unlocking your iPhone 3G to go with another provider might mean giving up the 3G data speed. While the iPhone will work with T-Mobile’s EDGE network it doesn’t work with T-Mobile’s 3G network (at least for now). Other providers might have similar or worse problems regarding data access, something that you might want to research beforehand. Finally, when buying a new iPhone, you often need to get a new contract with AT&T and breaking it might cost you quite a bit of money.
So, if you got a new iPhone for the Holidays, why not look at jailbreaking it, even if you plan on staying with AT&T and not unlocking it. It will allow you to do things with your iPhone that you didn’t know were possible.
NAR’s Information Technology Services Group put together a comparison of the new BlackBerry’s. It’s a great little snapshot on comparing the two models…well, without much further to do:
Blackberry users around the globe have been waiting, with barely suppressed anticipation, for the newest generation of blackberries from RIM. Now the wait is over and two new models that are fast becoming buzz words are the Bold (Blackberry 9000) and the Storm (Blackberry 9500). Both sport the latest technology and advanced features such as 3G connectivity, GPS, Stereo Bluetooth, and much more with an emphasis on multimedia capabilities. But the question remains - Which one do I get? The Bold or the Storm?
You Decide: Bold-v-Storm
In my reading today I came across a just-released survey from the Ponemon Institute which ranks the Most Trusted Companies–while it is interesting to see that American Express and eBay top this year’s list–it is when you dig into the survey that you come up with a few chestnuts that should be interesting to the CRT community. The survey finds there is a “significant gap developing between the importance privacy holds with consumers and the sense of control they feel they have over their personal information.” It finds:
- Importance of privacy continues to rise. Seventy-three percent of consumers said the protection of their personal privacy is “important” or “very important”, up from 69 percent in 2006.
- Consumers feel they are losing control of their personal information. Only 45 percent of consumers feel they have control over their personal information, down from 56 percent in 2006.
- Identity theft is top of mind. Sixty-two percent of consumers believe that identity theft most saliently affects their perceptions about a company’s privacy, while 53 percent named data breach notification. Only 18 percent of consumers cited social networking abuse as a factor.
So….you may be wondering…what as real estate professionals are we to do? This leads me to the shameless plug portion of this blogpost. CRT has developed a data security certification program called REALTOR Secure to assist REALTORs in protecting sensitive customer data. If you haven’t already…I suggest you check it out.
When I set out to write about the RE.net, I wasn’t sure if there was a set definition for it. I was fortunate that several others are attempting to define it and writing about it. too. After conducting some research, my interpretation on what the RE.net space is: circles of influence that bring together communities of people who share interests and activities in real estate & other topics of interest. These connections are born from all types of web-based communications & interactions among and about real estate professionals. These communications include: blogs, microblogs, messge boards, videos, and pictures. Of course, the RE.net may be different for everyone - how do you define the RE.net space?
Who are the players in the RE.net space? These may ring a bell: 4realz, Real Estate Zebra, Agent Genius, Bloodhound Realty, Trulia, VAR Buzz, Inman, NAR, The Phoenix Real Estate Guy, Real Estate Shows, Center for REALTOR® Technology, NAR’s YPN, among others who actively share information & insights. Don’t mean to leave anyone out- the list is pretty extensive. To give you an idea of how many other RE.net residents there are, check out this page… Continue reading ‘RE.Net - What is it? Who is it?’
Thanks Chris for your warm welcome to the CRT blog. I am excited to join the family and share some insights, opinions and maybe a youtube video or two on technology policy issues. Readers may not know this yet but, NAR has been following a handful of technology related policy issues here in Washington for several years now. Last year, I joined the NAR government affairs team to work specifically on technology and telecommunications issues on behalf of our members.
For today’s blog I’ll just mention some of the technology related policy issues we are working on here in DC. Our portfolio includes: Broadband Access, Net Neutrality, Patent Reform and Data Privacy & Security. Over the next few weeks, I’ll dive deeper into each of these issues. I welcome comments, questions discussion.
Finally, I’ll leave you with my favorite School House Rock video just to get us started.I\’m Just a Bill
As Chris posted last week, one of the big topics at this months RESO meeting was the upcoming June 2009 deadline for RETS certification. For those that are still unaware, in the 2007 Annual Meeting in Las Vegas, the Multiple Listing Policy committee created a new policy that all member owned MLSs needed to be RETS compliant by June 2009. Here is the full text of the policy:
“The integrity of data is a foundation to the orderly Real Estate market. The Real Estate Transaction Standards (RETS) provides a vendor-neutral, secure approach to exchanging listing information between the broker and the MLS. In order to ensure that the goal of maintaining an orderly marketplace is maintained, and to further establish REALTOR® information as the trusted data source, MLS organizations owned and operated by associations of REALTOR® will comply with the RETS standards by June 2009, and keep current with the standard’s new versions by implementing new releases of RETS within one year
from ratification.”
This new policy will help drive adoption of the RETS standard, and make it easier for brokers and the MLS to share data between themselves and third parties.
To support the process of certifying MLSs as RETS complaint, CRT has been working with Hitachi to build to the compliance tester that will drive this certification process, and it is scheduled to be publicly available in the third week of January. We are entering a beta testing period on December 17th, if you would like to be a beta tester, please email me at atillman@crt.realtors.org
So those of you that were in Orlando this year and visited the Blogger’s Lounge probably noticed that the CRT has a couple of new laptops. That’s pretty insignificant until you actually look at the size of these things. For those who don’t know or haven’t seen one yet, the EEE PC is a pretty popular and extremely portable laptop or “netbook.”
I had the chance to use one of these netbooks while in Orlando this year. I was there for a week and I got a pretty good idea of what this piece of equipment can do. Here’s my take:
Pros:
- Portability. It’s lightweight and very small, with a screen size of 8.9 inches. At 2.18 pounds with the battery attached, the EEE PC is a computer you can literally take anywhere.
- Full Windows XP. The model I used was the 900 series with Windows XP (this model is also offered with Linux). Having a full version of Windows XP in a piece of hardware this portable is excellent for all business functions.
- Built in wireless. Although this is a standard function of most laptops these days, it is still a great addition.
- Multi-touch trackpad and a good keyboard. The trackpad allows users to scroll and zoom in a web browser using just 2 fingers. I forgot to bring a mouse with me, so the trackpad got a lot of use. Also, I expected with a computer as small as this one I would have trouble using the keyboard. However, the keyboard is actually pretty well spaced out and I didn’t have much difficulty adjusting.
- All of the inputs. Built into this EEE PC are 3 USB 2.0 ports, an SD card reader, 3.5mm headphone jack, microphone jack, Ethernet port, and a VGA port. While the portability of this computer is the greatest feature, if you need extra functionality, it’s easy to bring some more gadgets to plug in.
- Solid State Drive. With a 16 GB solid state drive, Asus has made this laptop even more portable and stable. A solid state drive in the most simplistic terms means the computer can take a bit more abuse than hard drives with moving parts that can easily be jostled.
Cons:
- Processor speed. This computer is dreadfully slow. Mine had a measly 900mhz processor and although the boot was fairly quick, any application takes a long time to load.
- Multitasking. When attempting to run multiple applications, things get a little difficult. This goes along with the processor speed, but specifically multitasking with any graphic intensive applications.
- Battery Life. A full charge of the battery lasts about 2-3 hours depending upon use. For me, this isn’t that big of a deal because this isn’t a desktop replacement, so I didn’t have any reason to use it for more than an hour or so at a time.
- Screen Size. The screen size is actually not that bad, but it is sometimes annoying when reading a lot of information. The zoom ability of the trackpad helped a lot by making text in my web browser bigger.
So there are the pros and cons I found when using the EEE PC. I can definitely say that I have not come across a more portable device that has all of the functions of a full PC. That said, the processor is very slow. I think these netbooks have been successful as an extension of a desktop used as a travel computer for presentations (easy with a built in VGA-out) or for web browsing.
Visit the Asus website for more information about the EEE PC line.
So much is going on here in CRT. New projects, New Positions, new ideas - you name it.
This past week, I did a little CRT roadshow to our NAR DC Family. Made a lot of great connections, got a lot of great ideas. Really excited for 2009. One of the major items coming out of these talks is finding a new voice for the CRT Blog.
I would like to be the first to introduce Melanie Wyne to the blogging crew. Melanie will add a great new dynamic and perspective to the blog. Not only is she up on the latest and greatest techno-wizardry, she also knows how technology is impacting the folks on the ‘The Hill’. I’m excited to hear her take on these issues, and how they translate over to affecting our Members.
Please take a moment to shout out a welcome for Melanie!
Melanie Wyne
Senior Technology Policy Representative
National Association of Realtors
Melanie has been a technology policy advocate for nearly a decade. At NAR Melanie’s policy portfolio includes telecommunications/internet policy, data privacy and security and intellectual property issues. Prior to joining NAR, Melanie was the Director of public policy for a global technology trade association where she lobbied in Washington and in foreign capitals for the technology industry. She has also been a policy advocate for Bank of America where she handled the Bank’s technology portfolio including data privacy and security issues. Melanie‘s professional background also includes stints as a software startup executive and a commercial litigation attorney.
Have you ever been surfing the net and found a site that just blew you away? Sure you have.
When I find myself that position, the next question I ask is “How did they do that?”. I have been doing alot of DOM programming lately which sparked my interest in AJAX-based frameworks. Sure, you could “view source” and inspect the script tags, but as you all know, technical types are lazy.
I thought you might appreciate the WTFramework because it inspects and identifies the underlying framework with a single click. The project is actively supported and the list of libraries it can detect is impressive. Here are a few:
Now I can spend more time learning from the expert users of these frameworks!
