Facebook mobile app to offer free, limited Internet in Zambia

(Reuters) - Facebook Inc is launching a mobile app that gives users in Zambia free access to a handful of online services on mobile phones, broadening an effort to boost Internet usage in underdeveloped countries.
The Internet.org app will offer, in partnership with wireless operator Airtel , more than a dozen services including online encyclopedia Wikipedia, websites devoted to weather, job listings and health information, as well as Facebook's own social network and messaging service. More

Hackers can tap USB devices in new attacks, researcher warns

(Reuters) - USB devices such as mice, keyboards and thumb-drives can be used to hack into personal computers in a potential new class of attacks that evade all known security protections, a top computer researcher revealed on Thursday. ...

The finding shows that bugs in software used to run tiny electronics components that are invisible to the average computer user can be extremely dangerous when hackers figure out how to exploit them. Security researchers have increasingly turned their attention to uncovering such flaws. MORE

BlackBerry Passport: Fat, weird, but CrackBerry addicts might love it

The Passport is BlackBerry's attempt to veer away from the norm with a peculiar design that instantly stands out. Imagine a phablet -- one of those oversized smartphones with jumbo displays -- squished so it almost looks like a square. It's wider than most phablets, and is nearly twice as wide as the iPhone 5S.
The smartphone won't be for everyone. BlackBerry's head of global enterprise services said the device will find its use in certain industries, such as healthcare or finance. You can see someone who types emails all day at least consider the Passport. For fans of the old-school BlackBerry look, there's the BlackBerry Classic (formerly known as the Q20). More

Potato power: the spuds that could light the world

For the past few years, researcher Rabinowitch and colleagues have been pushing the idea of “potato power” to deliver energy to people cut off from electricity grids. Hook up a spud to a couple of cheap metal plates, wires and LED bulbs, they argue, and it could provide lighting to remote towns and villages around the world.
They’ve also discovered a simple but ingenious trick to make potatoes particularly good at producing energy. “A single potato can power enough LED lamps for a room for 40 days,” claims Rabinowitch, who is based at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. More

Benefits of hosting application on Private Cloud.

Cloud computing has been proving beneficial to lot of users and the different cloud solutions are being  utilized for serving various purposes such as hosting websites, providing software as a service and now application hosting.

Traditionally, a dedicated server or a VPS was the preferred choice of developers to host and test their applications. But with the introduction of cloud solution the use of a private cloud for hosting applications has been growing. The main reason for this being quick turnaround time for making applications live and improvements in performance. More

Apple refreshes MacBook Pro line with minor upgrades, same prices

The rumors of Apple's updated MacBook Pro line were true -- after a brief downtime, the Apple Store's back up with new MacBook Pros.
Unlike the previous two years, Apple didn't make any Mac hardware announcements at its WWDC keynote this year, which left users eagerly waiting for news of new Pros. Fans of the aluminum-clad laptops may be a little disappointed, however, as Apple has given the new MacBooks only a minor speed boost. More

New Waves of Tech Innovation Could Boost Economy

The U.S. and other developed countries are struggling with slow growth, leading to stagnant living standards and large pools of unemployed and underemployed workers. But as in the past, new waves of technological innovation have the potential to lift growth. One such innovation wave is the Internet of Everything. More

Innovation, Technology and the 21st Century Global Economy By Christine Lagarde Managing Director, International Monetary Fund Stanford University, February 25, 2014

Technology and the economy:
  Let me begin with the interlinkages between technology and the economy. Innovation is pushing ahead at warp speed. You know this. You live it. You even drive it. We are certainly living through one of the most exciting periods in human history. We can feel the air hum with virtual activity and reality transform before our very eyes. The pace of change is so fast that even the technology of five years ago seems prehistoric. Those of you who are students probably do not even remember a time when phones were not smart, when cameras contained film, when texts meant school books, and when wireless referred to an old-fashioned radio! More