The Force Field Podcast

Moovera Bridges Outdoor Wi-Fi with 3G and WiMAX Networks

September 13, 2007 by Rick

New Moovbox F Series gateway delivers Wi-Fi Internet access over carrier-class cellular backhaul.

Sittingbourne, UK (PRWEB) September 13, 2007 – Moovera Networks, a leading developer of fixed and mobile wireless broadband technology, has announced the availability of an outdoor access point and router that combines Wi-Fi access with cellular backhaul including 3G UMTS/HSPA and WiMAX. The Moovbox F Series Fixed Broadband Gateway is a compact, weatherproof device that leverages carrier-class wide area networks (WANs) for connectivity rather than wireline services such as DSL or cable. The Moovbox F Series supports a wide range of plug-and-play mobile data cards enabling quick deployment of outdoor Wi-Fi zones wherever there is high-speed carrier network coverage.

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"The Moovbox F Series takes advantage of next-generation cellular networks to deliver a truly innovative and modular Wi-Fi solution," said Jim Baker, CEO and founder of Moovera Networks. "Technologies such as HSUPA and 802.16e can deliver speeds approaching landline broadband, and the Moovbox F Series bridges these with Wi-Fi for a wide range of commercial, corporate and public sector applications."

The Moovbox F Series Fixed Broadband Gateway features a ruggedized IP-67 rated aluminum chassis that can be mounted to walls or street furniture such as lamp posts. In addition to the on-board Wi-Fi® Certified 802.11 a/b/g radio, the Moovbox accepts a single PCMCIA/CardBus or ExpressCard WAN radio from a variety of manufacturers including Option, Sierra Wireless, Huawei, IP Wireless, Kyocera, Zyxel, ZTE and Novatel. The open slot architecture ensures that the Moovbox is ready to support future wireless broadband technologies such as LTE (Long Term Evolution).

Due to its backhaul-agnostic approach, Moovera expects the Moovbox F Series to be popular in a wide variety of markets including municipal Wi-Fi and public safety. "The F Series is highly complementary to muni wireless, removing a lot of the complexity of designing mesh networks by providing dedicated backhaul to each access point," continued Baker. "As mobile providers such as Vodafone in Europe and Sprint in the US improve base station capacity and speed, flexible cellular-driven Wi-Fi access points like the Moovbox will become increasingly popular. With the installed base of Wi-Fi-enabled devices expected to exceed 250 million units by 2011 (source: ABI Research), a successful network will be a converged one that embraces Wi-Fi, 3G and WiMAX and that's exactly what the Moovbox delivers."

The Moovbox F Series F100 has a suggest list price starting at £599 (US$1,190) and is available via a network of distributors and resellers worldwide. The F Series complements the Moovbox M Series of mobile broadband routers designed for public transport and other vehicular applications. Further details can be found at http://www.moovera.com

About Moovera Networks:
Based in the United Kingdom, Moovera Networks is a privately-held manufacturer of industrial-grade fixed, mobile and portable wireless communications products that bridge Wi-Fi access with carrier-class networks including WiMAX, TD-CDMA, HC-SDMA and 3G UMTS/HSPA. Applications include commercial hotspots, municipal wireless, public safety, IP-based security and telematics, and secure corporate communications.

damaka Enables Seamless Handoff of SIP Sessions Between WiFi Networks

September 12, 2007 by Rick

damaka users while in transit can now maintain network connectivity without having to tear down and re-establish new session.

Richardson, TX (PRWEB) September 12, 2007 — damaka®, a fast-growing communications and collaboration software company, enables users to maintain P2P SIP session continuity as the user changes network from one WiFi to another WiFi network while in motion. "Maintaining un-interrupted peer-to-peer established communication connection within a company campus or educational institution has been increasingly difficult due to different WLAN network connections," states Satish Gundabathula, CTO of damaka. "damaka has taken the lead in developing an innovative patent pending solution whereby all the sessions within a damaka client will maintain its connections while the network switch happens automatically as the user transits multiple networks." Hence, the user need not worry about re-login into the client and continue the current session un-interrupted. This provides a better user experience.

As part of the continued efforts to enable seamless connectivity especially for users in motion, damaka would shortly be introducing "true mobility" functionality wherein the application would automatically handoff communication sessions irrespective of network — 3G Data, WiFi and WiMax — based on service availability to the user.

About damaka, Inc.:
damaka® (www.damaka.com) is peer-to-peer, standards-based communication & collaboration software. damaka provides voice, video, IM, file transfer, desktop sharing, IPTV, & other features in an easy-to-use, real-time environment on both desktop/laptop and wireless devices (such as smartphones). A technology pioneer in distributed softswitching, damaka offers its white-label solution to Operators and Enterprises. The damaka platform is based on industry standards and uses patent pending technology to provide a very secure peer-to-peer environment for Internet users worldwide.

MoreBusiness.com Releases Free Sample Proposals for Small Businesses

September 12, 2007 by Rick

Entrepreneurs and small business owners can now download and edit actual sample proposals instead of writing them from scratch, making submitting proposals to potential customers fast and easy.

Rockville, MD (PRWEB) September 12, 2007 — MoreBusiness.com, a popular small business web site, introduced a free proposal resource center complete with boilerplate text of actual proposals and step-by-step recommendations to help companies write winning proposals and respond to RFP's (request for proposals). Visitors can view the sample proposals in their web browser or download a PDF or Word document that is ready for editing. MoreBusiness.com's initial release features technology-related proposals. Sample proposals for different industries will be released in the near future.

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The free library of sample proposals and related material is available at the Sample Proposal Resource Center.

It is often easier to modify an existing document than to write something new. With MoreBusiness.com's examples, visitors can integrate the language and style of successful proposals so they no longer have to start from scratch. "There are a few proposal outlines available online, but they are usually expensive and very sparse. Our goal was to provide real professional sample proposals that people can tweak quickly and easily to submit bids to potential customers," notes CEO Raj Khera.

This idea to add free sample proposals to the site came about by a staffer's futile attempts to find quality proposal examples on the web. Unable to locate anything but generic outlines, he looked through some of Khera's old business proposals and was quickly able to draft a new proposal with the detailed text he needed to include. "Looking through completed professional proposals saves a lot of time. Small businesses can really benefit from getting a jump-start by reviewing examples," commented MoreBusiness.com Senior Software Developer Kevin Kamel.

This new proposal resource center caters to the needs of the growing population of entrepreneurs looking for free resources online to help build their business. It also compliments the wealth of material already available on MoreBusiness.com, including hundreds of business plans, sample business agreements and informative "how to" articles on marketing and managing a small business.

About MoreBusiness.com:
MoreBusiness.com, an award-winning website filled with sample business plans, marketing plans, templates, sample contracts and business agreements to help entrepreneurs start and grow a small business. MoreBusiness.com is part of a series of sites run by Khera Communications, which includes email marketing service, MailerMailer, and discussion group management tool, DiscussThis.

New PC Research Findings Redefine Customer Loyalty Measurement

September 12, 2007 by Rick

Study initiated by Dr. Bob Hayes and powered by GMI develops new customer loyalty metrics designed to predict revenue growth from new and existing customers

Seattle, WA (PRWEB) September 12, 2007 — Customer satisfaction measurement expert Dr. Bob Hayes of consulting firm Business Over Broadway today released the findings of a new study on consumer attitudes toward personal computer manufacturers. The study, powered by global market intelligence solutions provider GMI (Global Market Insite, Inc.), revealed that advocacy loyalty (recommending products or services to friends) was substantially higher than purchasing loyalty (purchasing more products from the same company), thus redefining the one-dimensional measurement of customer loyalty as a leading growth indicator as we know it today. The survey polled 1,058 U.S. consumers aged 18 and older in August 2007.

"Customer loyalty is the most important predictor of future revenue growth, but the industry is using an incomplete model," explains Hayes. "Current methods predict new customer growth, while completely ignoring existing customers. By measuring advocacy loyalty and purchasing loyalty simultaneously, companies have a complete picture of the strengths and weaknesses of their CRM strategy, allowing management to maximize potential revenue opportunities on all fronts."

Within the PC manufacturing industry, clear leaders emerge when using customer loyalty as a predictor of future revenue growth. In the research, Apple scored the highest loyalty, and is expected to experience the highest growth with both new and existing customers. HP came in second. Dell and Compaq tied for 3rd place. Dell is expected to have more new customers, but Compaq should have more repeat customers. Next came e-Machines, then Toshiba. Gateway is expected to show the slowest growth of all PC manufacturers studied.

"Leveraging online surveys and consumer panels to conduct a loyalty measurement study is a great way for a company to see how it stacks up against the competition, but that's just the first step," says Mark Houston, chief marketing officer for GMI. "The real power in this study is its ability to identify the areas most important to increasing each type of customer loyalty, so a business can allocate its resources where they will be most effective."

Other study findings include:

The key driver of customer loyalty for the PC manufacturing industry as a whole is technical support quality (responsiveness, availability, knowledge, and understanding customer needs). Improving these key areas of technical support is likely to have a substantial impact on improving customer loyalty for PC manufacturers. Key drivers differed by PC manufacturer.
Customers are more willing to sell their friends on the merits of their PC manufacturer than they are to spend more of their own money on their PC manufacturer.
88 percent of current PC owners are satisfied with their PC, with no difference between laptop owners vs. desktop owners.

Click here to download a complimentary executive summary of the study findings, and visit www.businessoverbroadway.com to learn more about the research behind Customer Loyalty 2.0.

Killer Spam: Hitman Scams on the Rise and Getting Scarier

September 12, 2007 by Rick

An alleged "Hitman" offers to cancel his attempt on your life in exchange for tens of thousands of dollars. The extortion attempt is real. But is the death threat?

Boone, NC (PRWEB) September 12, 2007 — "The Hitman Scam email, which is perhaps the scariest of all email scams, is now making the rounds again," warns Dr. Audri G. Lanford, Co-Director of ScamBusters.org, a public service website that has been helping people protect themselves from Internet scams since 1994.

"Although the extortion attempt is real, fortunately the threat on your life is a scam," says Dr. Lanford. "Your life isn't in danger, but your wallet may be if you respond to the email."

According to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the Hitman email made its debut in U.S. email boxes in December of 2006. The scammer claims to have been hired to kill you — but is willing to betray his employer if you pay him tens of thousands of dollars (or more) to go away. The scammer hopes that you'll be too frightened to notice the broken, misspelled English, or to ponder the odds that a Hitman would really be hired to "take you out."

The email threatens: "Do not contact the police or FBI." Why? Because both the FBI and your local police will tell you the same thing: it's a scam email, sent out in bulk. In fact, the emails typically don't contain any personal information about the recipient. So the only way scammers will find out anything about you is if you tell them.

"This is a hoax, so do yourself a favor and don't respond," says special agent John Hambrick, head of the F.B.I.'s Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3).

ScamBusters.org urges Internet users to protect themselves with these easy steps:

Don't panic. Hitman scam emails can be very scary — these scammers definitely know how to frighten you. Don't ever reveal personal information (name, Social Security number, bank account routing numbers, credit card account numbers) to a complete stranger. Use common sense. In the unlikely event that you receive an email threat that contains personal information about you or a family member, go to the police and FBI immediately.

Consumers can learn more about how to protect themselves from the Hitman scam by visiting ScamBusters.org.

Animetrics90 Industry’s First 2D to 3D Facial Recognition Technology

September 11, 2007 by Rick

Animetrics®, the leading developer of facial recognition technology, today announced the availability of its Animetrics90 product line, the most advanced facial recognition software currently available. Animetrics90 makes 2D to 3D facial recognition possible for the first time in the history of facial recognition.

Baltimore (PRWEB) September 11, 2007 – Animetrics®, the leading developer of facial recognition technology, today announced the availability of its Animetrics90 product line, the most advanced facial recognition software currently available. Animetrics90 makes 2D to 3D facial recognition possible for the first time in the history of facial recognition.

Animetrics90 consists of five separate modules that give companies the power to accurately analyze and identify uncontrolled imagery. Using proprietary FACEngine® technology, Animetrics90 can detect and identify faces with up to 45 degrees head rotation – an industry first. In addition, the technology normalizes facial imagery, converting it to 3D geometry, thus making it possible to normalize, process and identify all facial imagery.

Animetrics90 is currently being tested by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) for future use in military operations. "The accuracy results we have seen tested under a DARPA project proves this to be viable for use in military field operations where the uncontrolled environment yields the most difficult conditions under which to process facial imagery," said Paul Schuepp, Animetrics president and CEO.

Traditional facial identification systems cannot process uncontrolled imagery or match them to images stored in a database. Animetrics90 employs a powerful array of complex algorithms that help the technology identify any image, including those taken on less than ideal photographic equipment such as cell phones and other PDA devices.

"This technology will allow companies, governments and global law enforcement personnel to take low quality images and match them to a watch list. Until now, this could not be accomplished using today's technology," said Animetrics founder Dr. Michael Miller.

In addition to processing uncontrolled imagery, Animetrics90 offers a set of SDKs (Software Development Kits) for those organizations that want to take advantage of the powerful FACEngine® technology for applications such as surveillance, access control and database searches. This will allow professional programmers and Animetrics VARs to develop additional tools and applications for the industry.

About Animetrics
Animetrics Inc. is a leading developer of 3D imaging for facial biometric systems. Utilizing breakthrough technology, Animetrics products solve critical issues associated with facial recognition including variations in pose and lighting. Powered by Animetrics FACEngine® technology the company's core algorithms are comprised of five patent-pending technologies forming the basis for next-generation 3-dimensional facial recognition applications. Given the accuracy of its patented 3D imaging technology, Animetrics is driving market acceptance of facial recognition biometrics in government, homeland security and law enforcement applications. Animetrics is headquartered in Conway, N.H. For more information visit www.animetrics.com

IBM Joins OpenOffice.org Community

September 10, 2007 by Rick

The OpenOffice.org community – responsible for the leading free software alternative to Microsoft Office – today welcomed IBM as a community member. IBM has announced immediate code contributions and ongoing engineering support to the community, and will leverage OpenOffice.org technology in its own products.

Edinburgh, UK (PRWEB) September 10, 2007 — The OpenOffice.org community today announced that IBM will be joining the community to collaborate on the development of OpenOffice.org software. IBM will be making initial code contributions that it has been developing as part of its Lotus Notes product, including accessibility enhancements, and will be making ongoing contributions to the feature richness and code quality of OpenOffice.org. Besides working with the community on the free productivity suite's software, IBM will also leverage OpenOffice.org technology in its products.

"This is great news for the tens of millions of users of OpenOffice.org and the thousands of individual members of the community", said John McCreesh, OpenOffice.org Marketing Project Lead. "We welcome IBM's contributions to further enhancing the OpenOffice.org product. But equally important is IBM's future commitment to package and distribute new works that leverage OpenOffice.org technology supporting the ISO OpenDocument Format standard. ODF is a once in a generation opportunity for the IT industry to unify round a standard, and deliver lasting benefit to all users of desktop technology."

"In the seven years since Sun founded the project, OpenOffice.org has fueled and filled the need for document data and productivity tools that are open and free. Open source software and ODF are having a profound impact around the world, with numerous communities and organizations coming together to support these initiatives and governments, corporations and schools standardizing on the software. We look forward to working with IBM and the other members of OpenOffice.org to ensure that this momentum continues. We invite others to join us in the community and participate in building the future as OpenOffice.org and ODF continue to gain popularity across the planet," said Rich Green, Executive Vice President, Software at Sun Microsystems, Inc.

"IBM is very pleased to be joining the OpenOffice.org community. We are very optimistic that IBM's contribution of technology and engineering resources will provide tangible benefits to the community membership and to users of OpenOffice.org technology around the world," said Mike Rhodin, General Manager of IBM's Lotus division. "We're particularly pleased to be teaming with the community to accelerate the rate of innovation in the office productivity marketplace. We believe that this relationship will improve our ability to deliver innovative value to users of IBM products and services. We also believe that the collaboration will lead to an even broader range of ODF-supporting applications (ISO 26300) and solutions that draw from the OpenOffice.org technology."

Others involved in the project or distributing the code were equally enthusiastic about IBM's step.

Mark Shuttleworth, founder of Ubuntu, a leading Linux distribution, said: "We are excited about IBM joining Sun and other contributors to the OpenOffice.org community in pushing development of OpenOffice.org and the OpenDocument Format. We are firmly committed to help set, drive and promote open standards like the ODF world-wide to free all users from any dependency on single vendors and proprietary software. The OpenOffice.org community is showing that it is possible for large, competing companies to collaborate and deliver extraordinary value to all of their users." OpenOffice.org is distributed with Ubuntu.

And Hu Caiyong, CEO of Beijing's Redflag Chinese 2000 Software Co., Ltd., whose company contributes significant resources to OpenOffice.org, stated: "We acclaim IBM as a welcome contributor to the OpenOffice.org community! It's great to have such a strong partner on our side, one which, with its extraordinary technical expertise and marketing power, will help drive this project so important to free software and open standards. We are looking forward to a truly productive partnership and harmonious collaboration with IBM, Sun and other contributors on OpenOffice.org."

Scott Crenshaw, Red Hat's Vice President of Enterprise Linux, agreed: "IBM continues to show their commitment to the proliferation of open-source software and we applaud them on joining the OpenOffice.org community. We look forward to continuing our strong relationship with IBM as we work toward a common goal of bringing value to our customers and fostering the adoption of open standards and ODF."

OpenOffice.org® is the leading open-source productivity suite. It includes word processing, spreadsheet, presentation, drawing, database, and other modules; it uses the ODF as its native file format as well as fully supporting other common file formats (including Microsoft Office). The software runs on all major platforms, including Microsoft Windows (including Vista), GNU/Linux, Solaris, and Mac OS X, and is available in over 100 languages. OpenOffice.org is fully interoperable with other popular suites and may be used free of charge for any purpose, private or commercial; the license is LGPL.

Since the project's creation by Sun Microsystems in 2000, nearly 100 million have downloaded the product; thousands contribute to it. As an international team of volunteer and sponsored contributors, the OpenOffice.org community has created what is widely regarded as the most important open source project in the world today. The OpenOffice.org community acknowledges generous sponsorship from a number of companies, including Sun Microsystems, the founder and primary contributor.

www.openoffice.org

WinRAR 3.71 Beta 1 Released

September 9, 2007 by Rick

Latest version of WinRAR takes this leading compression software yet another step ahead for making it the most complete archiving tool on the market.

Berlin, Germany (PRWEB) September 9, 2007 — win.rar GmbH and RARLAB announced the first beta version of the new WinRAR 3.71.

Highlights of the 3.71 (beta 1) release are:

Now archive names in rar.log error log file would always include the full path.

In addition, the WinRAR tray icon has been made compatible with high DPI display modes.

Further, while modifying a file in archive with encrypted names using an external editor, WinRAR will not ask for archive password again when prompting to update a file. It will use a password which was entered while opening an archive.

Finally some bugs have been fixed with the release of this latest version like: WinRAR could crash when decompressing some of corrupt RAR archives; WinRAR could fail to unpack an individual file from subfolder of ACE archive using the drag and drop.

These are just some of the features that were added or improved. More information on all of other improved items can be found here:

http://www.win-rar.com/whatsnew.html

Of course, as always, the upgrade to 3.71 is absolutely FREE for all registered users. Upgrading is quick and easy. Users only need to download and install it. No complicated uninstalling of the previous version is necessary.

About WinRAR

WinRAR is a 32-bit Windows version of RAR Archiver, the powerful archiver and archive manager. RAR files can usually compress content up to 30 percent better than ZIP files. WinRAR's main features are very strong general and multimedia compression, processing of non-RARarchives, long filename support, programmable self-extracting archives(SFX), damaged archive repair, authenticity verification, embedded file comments, and encryption. WinRAR is available in over 45 different languages and runs on Windows 95/98/NT/2000/ME/XP/Vista. The command line version RAR is available for Linux, DOS, OS/2, FreeBSD and MAC OS X. Pocket RAR, the free WinRAR version for Pocket PCs and the new WinRAR for U3 complete the compression product range. So WinRAR simply is "The Size Solution".

About win.rar GmbH

win.rar GmbH is the official publisher for WinRAR and RARLAB products since February 2002 and handles all support, marketing and sales related to WinRAR & rarlab.com. win.rar GmbH is located in Germany and is represented globally through its local partners on 6 continents and in more than 80 countries. The company is dedicated to offering the highest level of quality support to its customers, and to constantly improving its software according to their needs and feedback. For more information about WinRAR and win.rar GmbH please visit www.win-rar.com.

LightScribe Enhances CD, DVD Labeling Quality

September 9, 2007 by Rick

Enhancements to LightScribe's system software markedly improve the look of CD and DVD labels.

Corvallis, Oregon (PRWEB) September 5, 2007 — LightScribe Direct Disc Labeling today announced enhancements that reduce graininess and improve fine detail reproduction for LightScribe's DVD / CD labeling. The stunning results are instantly visible on photos, graphics and text on LightScribe CDs and DVDs. The enhanced image quality is available immediately through a free upgrade of the LightScribe system software and requires no additional changes to customers' systems or new hardware and media. LightScribe customers will experience the image quality improvement when they update to the latest version of the LightScribe system software, available for download on www.lightscribe.com.

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The LightScribe system software will also be preloaded on LightScribe-enabled personal computers and included with DVD writers. The new enhancements do not impact LightScribe labeling time and work with all LightScribe media — CDs, DVDs, and color background CDs.

"Enhancing image quality demonstrates LightScribe's ongoing commitment to improving the customer experience," said Kent Henscheid, marketing manager for LightScribe. "With the new system software enhancements, customers can now burn LightScribe CDs and DVDs with even better results."

LightScribe — a laser DVD / CD label burning technology found in many popular brands of disc burners, laptops and PCs — gives people the ability to easily burn silkscreen-quality photos, graphics, images and text directly onto LightScribe CDs and DVDs. A simple title printed in normal mode will typically take a couple of minutes. A fuller disc image will take approximately 15-20 minutes. LightScribe CDs are available in original gold, red, orange, yellow, blue and green.

LightScribe-enabled CDs, DVDs, software, desktops, notebooks, aftermarket optical disc drives and duplicator systems are available at major retailers worldwide, as well as through most leading brands online.

About LightScribe:
LightScribe Direct Disc Labeling offers consumers and businesses a simple, no-hassle way to burn professional-looking, silkscreen-quality labels on their CDs and DVDs. LightScribe extends optical media, recorders and software through an integrated system of media with special laser-sensitive coating, laser control and imaging drive modifications, and labeling software enhancements. LightScribe uses the same laser that burns data in the disc drive to create precise, iridescent labels. LightScribe technology was developed and patented by HP. A business unit of HP, LightScribe licenses its technology to optical industry leaders in drive and media manufacturing and to hardware, media and software brands. Additional information about LightScribe is available at www.lightscribe.com.