The new version of Camtasia is out and it is packing a very useful punch.  Camtasia is a full motion screen recording software that can allow you to record presentations, narrate a recorded presentation, provide a training video or a mobile training video in an MP3 file.   Camtasia 4 is the latest version of this software from TechSmith the same company that has also created the very popular SnagIt screen capture software.

Camtasia Studio 4 is now designed for mobile sharing.  You can rapidly make a screencast presentation and distribute it to mobile players including MP3 players and iPods.  Its even integrated with Screencast.com’s hoting service, which can provide built in RSS and ITunes subscriptions capabilities.

You can create essentially a subscription link for your workers or students to subscribe to lectures or training videos and watch those videos from the internet or from their Video iPod.  It also provides integration into Flash Projects for easy web deployment of videos on your website.

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Early next year Cingular cellular customers are going to benefit from a great new service.  Mobile subscribers will be able to do a great deal of their banking on their mobile phone.

They will be able to check balances, pay bills, even transfer money.  The service is supposed to work in a very similar manner to online bill payment services managed via a computer.

Cingular is hoping that this new service will attract new customers and give their existing customers added flexibility while they are traveling or on vacation.

Cingular is currently in talks with banking institutions to attempt to complete the program.  Banks will have to agree to allow Cingular to download information from their systems, which is no small request.  The current estimate is that the service could be available by early 2007, but will probably have a limited roll out with only a few banks signing up initially with others following on later as their own time allows.

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If you are looking to catch up on the concept of RFID (Radio Frequency IDentification ), there is a fairly straight forward rfid training video at RFIDent.org.

In general if you are not sure why you should understand this technology consider that barcodes could be replaced and will be replaced in phases in many retail stores and warehouses across the country.  Wal-Mart, Home Depot, Lowe’s and many other retailers already have plans in place to convert from barcodes to RFID.

Below is a picture of a RFID chip.

These little wafer sized chips can be taped inside a book, inside a package, even sewn into your clothing.  My local library already uses RFID to scan and checkout books.

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The ban on Wikipedia in China has lifted and new accounts and new postings are lifting rapidly.

New accounts according to the WSJ have increased by 3-400% and new daily posting have increased by 75%.  The Chinese language version of Wikipedia appears to be a renewed success.  The service had been banned for a year in English and in Chinese, and before that had been banned on and off again over the years.

It would appear that China’s need for access to information has surpassed its need to suppress access to information.  China has benefited significantly over the last 25 years from importing technology and know how and Wikipedia is a vast open source resource of technology and know how.

It might be a tool for subversion but its merits as a tool for the growth of China and the Chinese economy are significantly greater as reflected in Beijing’s decision.

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Acorn Systems provides a Enterprise Profit System with a next generation Activity Based Costing system.  Such systems used to make accountants salivate, but these days these systems are providing accurate and timely information to many divergent departments and individuals in the organization. 

Anyone that understands the business dynamics of their company can learn to speak the language of these systems as they become easier and easier for non-IT professions to interface with results about the business, the books, the inventory and the data warehouses IT systems themselves. 

These same tools will wipe out many of the low level accounting and analysis positions that historically have churned the same report over and over again, passing it up the chain for further churning and analysis and consolidation.  These systems can provide answers in real time that previously took a month or better to determine when handled in manual spreadsheets.

Acorn Systems recent press release describes their consulting methodology that applies corporate performance management techniques to help the team adapt and learn how to use the systems necessary to succeed.  Acorn can help companies build or rebuild a  solid foundation and outline concrete and measurable goals and metrics.  This process should involve the entire business, supply chain, sales force or customer support group depending on the scope of the project.  Companies that make these investments will be capable of continuing to increase their productivity and increase the likelihood of providing accurate and responsive customer support, even providing more accurate estimates, request for proposals and government or other contracting bids.

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