Show and tell: A brief guide to explainer videos
Whether you have a story to tell or product to sell, there are multiple benefits to Explainer Videos. Producing short films for online audiences allow you to showcase your wares and expertise, offering an affordable, snappy and entertaining route toward grabbing attention, boosting conversion rates and increasing sales.
With recent research predicting that 79 percent of global consumer Internet traffic will be video by 2018, it’s little wonder that marketers the world over are focusing on the medium of moving pictures and investing in explainer videos, confident of the potential for generating healthy returns.
New ransomware targets Office 365 users
A new zero-day malware has been discovered in Australia that affects all of Microsoft’s Office 365 products including Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook.
The malware was discovered by the cyber security company Check Point and comes in the form of an invoice sent by email. The attack is designed to catch unsuspecting victims according to security analyst Raymond Schippers who said: "The email sent to Office 365 users via Outlook gives the appearance of an invoice in the form of an Office document. When they go to open it, a message will appear telling people the document was created with a previous version of the software, so they will need to click something to enable the content".
Identify edited JPEGs with JPEGSnoop
It’s been a few years since we last looked at JPEGSnoop, a low-level tool for investigating images. Is it still useful today? Let’s take a look. The program is as convenient to use as ever. No installation, no adware, just unzip the download and run the single executable.
The interface is basic, a tiny toolbar and a few menus, but the first step is simple enough to understand: hit Open and choose an image.
Foxit Reader 8.0 introduces ConnectedPDF collaboration, adds Touch Mode support
Foxit Software has unveiled Foxit Reader 8.0, the latest version of its PDF viewer and creator for Windows PCs. The reader, renowned for its lightweight and speedy nature, introduces support for Foxit’s new online ConnectedPDF Document Management System.
The new release also adds support for Touch Mode on supported models as well as Dropbox integration. Users also gain a handy new auto-save PDF option to protect against crashes or power failures.
Businesses get used equipment and third-party maintenance
More than half of IT decision makers opt to go for third-party maintenance (TPM) and pre-owned equipment, to cut costs and take advantage of improved support independent maintenance providers offer. It was also said they’ve had a "positive experience" with prior-generation hardware.
The news was published by Curvature, an IT infrastructure solutions provider, which polled 500 IT decision makers. Out of the 500 respondents, 60 percent use TPM, and 53 percent decide to purchase pre-owned equipment.
Find out more about the world below your flight path with Flyover Country
It sounds much like any other mapping app: enter a starting point and destination, see the route and points of interest along the way. Flyover Country won’t give you driving directions, local hotels or someone’s random picture of a lake, though. It’s a geoscience app from the University of Minnesota, and these points of interest are more about geologic maps, data, fossil information, georeferenced Wikipedia articles and more.
Setup is easy enough. Tap two or more points on the map to define your route, select "Load Path", and watch as Flyover Country finds data associated with that journey.
Chrome flaw makes it possible to copy DRM video streams such as Netflix
Security researchers from Ben-Gurion University Cyber Security Research Center (CSRC) have unearthed a vulnerability in Google Chrome that can be exploited to make copies of DRM-protected video streams. The problem affects all Chromium-based browsers, and makes it possible to circumvent Widevine encryption technology Google uses to secure streams.
Widevine has been used in Chrome for a while, after Google acquired it back in 2010. It has been used to prevent piracy of premium YouTube channels, and is also used to protect Amazon Prime and Netflix streams. Google was informed about the problem back in May, but is yet to issue a patch.
Post-Brexit, an online campaign for a second UK referendum gains huge support
The UK may not yet have introduced online voting -- nor is it likely to any time soon -- but it does have a website that can be used to raise petitions for debate. The House of Commons website is home to a huge number of such petitions, and any that gain 100,000 signatures will be raised in Parliament.
After the UK referendum on EU membership saw the country narrowly voting in favor of Brexit (even if they didn’t know what this meant), a petition calling for a second referendum has been signed more than 3 million times. Ironically, the petition was set up by a pro-Brexit, anti-EU politics student a month before the referendum actually took place. His plan was to call for a re-run in the event of a narrow vote to remain in the EU, but his wording is such that it could (although it's unlikely) backfire on him.
Report: YouTube and Facebook are now using automated tools to remove extremist content
With the likes of ISIS understanding the power of social media, Facebook and other online services find themselves under increasing pressure to counter terrorist and other extremist content. A report by Reuters says that a number of online companies are using automated tools to remove videos that violate terms of use.
Such tools have previously been used to prevent the spread of copyright videos online, but now it seems that they have been put to a new task. While automation can do little, if anything, to prevent the initial appearance of extremist videos, social networks can use them to stem the flow of republishing.
Microsoft to kill off Surface 3 in December
If you're in the market for a Surface 3, now is the time to buy one. Microsoft says that production of the Surface 3 will come to an end in December this year, and warns that stocks are already starting to run low.
It's not yet clear whether the end of production for the cheapest Surface device signals the end of Microsoft's Atom-based devices. But it certainly seems as though the company is keen to focus its attention on the Pro range as well as the Surface Book.
Take control of Windows files and folders with RunAsTrustedInstaller
If a Windows program doesn’t have the rights to access a file, Registry key, or carry out some other task, running it as an administrator might solve the problem -- but this won't always be the case.
RunAsTrustedInstaller runs programs with the same privileges as TrustedInstaller, an even more powerful account, giving you extra control over many system objects.
EU-US Privacy Shield: White House promises not to spy on European data
The replacement for data protection arrangement Safe Harbour, the EU-US Privacy Shield, has undergone final amendments. Safe Harbour has already been deemed invalid, and frantic talks have been underway to finalize its successor.
Despite gaining the backing of Microsoft, EU-US Privacy Shield has faced a great deal of criticism. In the wake of the Brexit vote in the UK referendum on EU membership, the UK may be forced to comply with the rules even though it is in the process of exiting the Union. One of the most significant changes to come about -- and one that will be welcomed by privacy advocates -- is a promise from the White House not to engage in indiscriminate bulk data collection of European data.
There's a fix on the way to address OnePlus 3 memory management and color calibration issues
The OnePlus 3 is the first 'flagship killer' that has been available to buy without an invite. Reviews (and we'll have one written up soon) have been overwhelmingly positive, but a couple of issues have surfaced.
Some users have been disappointed to find that their handset does not take full advantage of its 6GB of RAM, while others bemoan poor color calibration of the Optic AMOLED screen. We've already shown you how to manually tweak memory settings, but an official update is on the way to address not only memory and color issues, but also to increase performance of the OnePlus 3.
UK votes to leave the EU, but Google searches show people don’t understand Brexit
It was a vote that was down to the wire much of the way, but the result of the UK referendum on membership of the European Union took many -- including bookies -- by surprise. 48.1 percent of voters indicated a preference to remain, while 51.9 percent said they wanted to go it alone. The fallout has been dramatic.
Prime Minister David Cameron is stepping down, a second referendum on Scottish independence is now on the cards, and the financial markets have been in turmoil all day. But one of the more interesting side effects of the 'leave' vote is that Google search data reveals that voters don’t know what is meant by Brexit (that horrific portmanteau signifying a British Exit), or what the full ramifications will be.
Germany says -- yet again -- that adblocking is legal
Countless numbers of web users are completely in love with adblocking, but there are those who have tried to have it deemed illegal. Adblock Plus has been in court over this before, and today a German court has ruled, once again, that its operations are entirely legal.
Publishing house Axel Springer sued Adblock Plus, saying that no company should be able to interfere with the display of ads. Axel Springer lost its case last year, but decided to appeal. Using a recent law to attack Adblock Plus' Acceptable Ads program, Axel Springer tried to get the adblocker banned. This failed, but Adblock Plus has been forced to offer free whitelisting to the publisher.
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