Earlier this year Obama announced new regulations that ease the US’s longtime travel ban to Cuba. Under this new law Americans must travel for an approved reason, including professional, educational, or government purposes, but no longer do they need to obtain a government license. There are, in totality, twelve different reasons that US citizens could fly to Cuba: A lot of you at this point might be thinking, sure I can rationalize one of those twelve reasons; why would I need a travel agency to get me there?...

Thousands of technology companies are competing to transform the world. How can you beat them? For your technology to matter, it must fill a void or create a need. Take Uber, for example: Too few people could flag down a cab, and the ride-sharing app was born. Things change quickly in the modern age, putting a premium on technological adaptability. The iPod revolutionized music storage, but it was absorbed by the iPhone because communication was a greater need....

Loosely defined requirements An internal audit of your processes, preferably undertaken by a team of stakeholders with a clear understanding of your business’s day-to-day operations, is an absolute necessity in order to determine which type of ERP system you should implement. While SaaS ERP packages such as NetSuite are fully comprehensive and offer a wide range of cloud-based functionalities, many of them are impractical for smaller organizations, so make sure you work closely with your ERP vendor or consultant to develop a well-defined list of requirements....

Oculus builds virtual reality technology, most notably the Oculus Rift headset. Users who put it on are warped into an immersive, computer-generated environment like something out of a sci-fi movie. They have optimized this technology in accordance with their mission to enable humans to experience the impossible. And that’s where Facebook comes in to this otherwise atypical acquisition. Oculus VR considers virtual reality the next bit step with regard to a connected world, and according to their blog post, Zuckerberg and the Facebook crew understand the potential for virtual reality as well....

For small businesses, keeping up with social media trends can feel like running on a never-ending information treadmill. Social platforms are constantly adding new features to help users share real content that connects people in meaningful ways and helps users make an impact when building a brand. Facebook Live Facebook is still considered the “most credible platform because it acts as your home base,” according to both BrandFire content and strategy director, Casey Hochberg, and BrandFire partner and executive creative director, Bryan Black....

Learning Visual Intelligence Li started the discussion off by discussing the importance of vision when it comes to general intelligence. Going back more than 500 million years, she explained that there was no bigger evolutionary expansion than the development of one particular body part: the eyes. As she explains: Flashing forward a few million millennia, Li touched on how technology has struggled to keep up with the human brain in terms of its ability to learn and see the way we do....

Flickr is currently set to start enforcing a few changes to how the service works on May 17,th 2022. The biggest update is that all free Flickr accounts with more than 50 non-public photos will have those non-public photos deleted. It’s the latest reminder that not only will nothing on the internet last forever, but a lot of it won’t even last much longer than a few decades. Flickr’s Upcoming Photo Deletions Flickr is issuing two swaths of updates this May....

SixThirty, Jim McKelvey’s financial tech accelerator in St. Louis, has leveraged the financial identity of the city to their advantage for some time and to great ends. Today they announced that Atul Kamra, former the Head of Advice for Wells Fargo Advisors, will be joining SixThirty as a new Managing Partner. During his time at Wells Fargo Kamra oversaw the firm’s investment strategy, research services, discretionary portfolio management, and advice quality functions....

One night in May, Sami fell asleep with the lights on and woke up to his mother scolding him about wasting electricity. Instead of getting defensive like many teenagers might, he decided to do something about it. Since then, he’s been teaching himself about programming, engineering, and electricity so he can build Ottomate, a gadget that lets you control your appliances and lights with your smartphone. You just plug them into Ottomate and plug Ottomate into the wall – or add it to your light switches – and voila....

General Assembly is an education company that specializes in the most in-demand skills across data, tech, design, and business, which then later pairs students with local employers. One of the goals for the company is to support both demand and growth outside Silicon Valley, improving accessibility to education for those seeking in-demand digital skills. Upcoming General Assembly Campuses Before the year’s end, General Assembly plans to launch new campuses in the following cities....

The decision comes in response to a controversial upcoming May 15 terms of service update that gives Facebook more data access than ever. This update would allow WhatsApp users’ details — including phone numbers and transaction information — to be available across other Facebook operations for the first time, in a reversal of WhatsApp’s previous policy. Germany’s Regulatory Response The regulator, the Hamburg Commissioner for Data Protection and Freedom of Information, opened emergency proceedings against Facebook last month....

There are a lot of competitors in the space for a reason. Social planning can become disorganized and complicated, given the quantity of events and diversity of friend groups. Companies like Doodle are growing fast, helping make it easier to get people together. The future/intent space is open for the taking. At the same time, advertisers have a growing desire for more sophisticated targeting regarding user intent. Understanding “where users will be” could become powerful for advertisers....

The collaboration will likely focus on integrating Zagat data into Google Maps and Google search, which means better tips for diners on their mobile phones. Sites like Yelp, Urbanspoon, and even Foursquare rely on user-generated content for restaurant recommendations, but Google clearly wants the authority of an established organization like Zagat, which is “instantly recognized and trusted,” wrote Marissa Mayer, Google VP of Local, Maps and Location Services. And lest we forget, Zagat doesn’t just rate restaurants....

The tech giant says the software tweak is a way to help workers know when it’s the best time to reach out to colleagues. The change also introduces another metric that bosses can use to track their employee productivity — at least for certain definitions of productivity. Google Workspace is competing with a host of other popular workplace tools, and with the overall increase in remote work over the past few years, remote tracking functionality is one big way a communication software can stand out from the pack....

The History of Music Production World Wars I and II were largely responsible for what we consider the modern music industry. Radios became commercially available to families, and it wasn’t long before they were the predominant entertainment source. By 1923 the first radio advertisement had been broadcast, and after WWII, music became popular on radios and thus an industry began where music could be paid for by the radio stations with advertising money....

So how can these modern technologies find their place in what is arguably the most functional room in any household? Many would argue that innovative bathroom technology should focus more on the plumbing and eradicating germs, but the seeds of the so-called bathroom technology of the future has actually been available for a while. Intelligent Toilets Smart toilets have theoretically been on the market since the early eighties, at least in Japan; the Washlet, found in over two thirds of the country’s bathrooms, is controlled by a remote and features a self-opening, auto-heated seat, and a bidet-style cleaning system which “reduces paper consumption....

Let us have a look at how technology has brought new trends in the jewelry industry and is shaping the way we think about diamonds and jewelry in general. Wearable Technology Today most consumers like to wear jewelry which would be more than just an accessory that goes along with their outfit. Since the last few years, jewelry makers around the world have been designing their products so that these can be used along with gadgets....

According to Gartner, up to 8.4 billion “things” will be connected to the IoT in 2017. While the consumer segment accounts for the majority of this figure, up to 57 percent of the overall IoT spending is represented by businesses. However, most of the IoT deployments thus far only applied to simple workflows, such as data tracking, asset management, and communications. The Verizon’s State of the Market: Internet of Things 2017 report shows that the top 3 deployment objectives for IoT are as follows:...

It is important to understand that a Bitcoin wallet doesn’t actually store the coins themselves. Actually, the coins are stored on the blockchain, a giant public ledger of every Bitcoin transaction in history. A wallet allows you to access your coins using private and public keys. The public key is used to receive Bitcoins and can be published anywhere without security concern. The private key is used to send coins, and like a password must be guarded to protect your wallet’s security....

Fear no more, because the folks at StudyWeb created this handy infographic that will guide you through the process in baby steps. From choosing a domain name to populating your WordPress site with content, here’s everything you need to know in order to get up and running in about an hour.