Opinion

LinkedIn Tip: Digitize Business Cards with CardMunch

LinkedIn is re-launching CardMunch, an iPhone app that scans business cards and turns them into contacts you can connect with on LinkedIn. Here’s how it works, along with some new features.

Explorers, Servants, and Players

Continuing our exploration of CEO types from last week, here are three more – explorers, servants, and players – to help you figure out who you’re really working for and how they think.

How to Achieve Global ERP

IFS North America CTO Rick Veague explores why companies aim to achieve global ERP and the challenges and benefits of attaining that goal.

4G Promises: Are Wireless Carriers Pulling a Fast One?

Verizon LTE wins speed tests, but the download speed of your “4G” phone, no matter what carrier, depends on wireless standards and location more than you think.

Android’s Success Makes It a Malware Magnet

Google’s smartphone OS is now a much bigger security risk than Apple’s iPhone

Poll: What Does the Future Hold for Windows Phone?

Do the sunny forecasts for Windows Phone hold water or is Microsoft’s mobile OS just dead in the water?

Robocall Hell: Debt Collectors and Marketers Want Your Cell Number

A bill sneaking through Congress would make it easier for bottom-feeding businesses to make robocalls to your cell phone. Don’t let them.

Google Ad Accidentally Shows What’s Wrong with Passwords

Google’s marketing push around online safety would be more impressive if its example of a good password wasn’t so bad.

Poll: Do You Care If Your Gadget Maker is “Green”?

Vote in our poll to let us know what role electronics makers’ environmental friendliness efforts play in your decision to purchase new gadgets, if any.

The IT Consumerization Grief Process

IT groups must go through a “grief process” when they are pushed by users to adopt a consumer product, and IT has to recognize that there’s really no choice–and that the end result is almost always the same.

More CFOs Become ‘Chief Sustainability Officers’

The CFO’s responsibilities are ever-increasing — with finance chiefs sometimes overseeing everything from IT to corporate counsel to HR. Now, add the sustainability effort to their workload at more and more corporations.

Company Docs in the Cloud: the Risks and Rewards

DropBox, GoogleDocs, Microsoft Office 365, SkyDox … the field of companies urging you to put your documents in the cloud is growing by the minute. Appealing as this concept might seem, CFOs and IT teams have to take a step back and evaluate the ben

iPad Invasion: Get Ready or Get Out of the Way

Is Microsoft Too Big to Fail?

As long as Microsoft keeps bringing home the bacon from its business software and investing in the right markets (cloud, phones, tablets) its victories will edge out its screw-ups.

“Face Unlock” Feature Another Android Security Risk

The “Face Unlock” feature in Google’s new Android 4.0 “Ice Cream Sandwich” OS can reportedly be “tricked” into unlocking a user’s device with an image of the device owner’s face.

BlackBerry Sure Ain’t “Green”: RIM Blasted by Greenpeace

Greenpeace included BlackBerry-maker RIM for the first time in its Guide to Greener Electronics, which ranks electronics manufacturers on a variety of sustainability efforts. Unfortunately, RIM took the last slot out of 15 leading gadget makers, sign

How to Reevaluate Outsourcing Contracts Best Practices

In order to effectively address contractual protections for threats existing in today’s environment Forrester urges sourcing professionals to consider variations on time-honored outsourcing contractual best practices.

Firefox 8 Upgrade: Mostly Ho Hum

Mozilla keeps cranking out new versions of its browser. Firefox 8 won’t knock your socks off, but it has a few new features that make it worth the upgrade.

iPad at Work, Kindle Fire at Play

Despite some overlap, the Apple iPad and Amazon Kindle Fire are very different devices: One travels in a backpack or briefcase, the other sits nicely on a nightstand.

Facebook Updates News Feed; Tests New Buttons

Facebook users will soon be able to revert to the old News Feed design, which shows most recent stories first instead of top stories. In addition, users may notice new “Read” and “Listen” buttons appearing in the Ticker. Here’s what you need to know

Competitors, mechanics, referees, and economists

Different types of business executive have very different goals, which depend on what angle they view their world from. As an IT leader, you have to know which type you’re dealing with.

AutoDesk Brings 3D Printing to Your Desktop

AutoDesk has launched two impressive desktop apps that allow you to convert pictures into a digital file that can be printed as a plastic or metal model, and also convert a computer model into a three-dimensional jigsaw puzzle.

Making Mobile Manageable: What You Need to Ask

If you’re not looking for an enterprise mobile device management (MDM) solution already, you’re behind the curve. Here are six key questions to consider when searching for an MDM provider, from CIO.com blogger Mark Gibbs.

Strategies for Pruning Data in the Cloud

In terrestrial systems, you don’t think about disk space. In the clouds, you have to, if you don’t it will cost you.

U.S. Admits Its Cyber Security Sucks and Hopes White Hat Hackers Will Ride to Its Aid

DARPA seeks expert public help to blunt attacks from Russia, China and others

iPhone Dev Sneaks Malware Into Apple App Store, Feels Swift Wrath of Cupertino

An iOS security researcher who submitted a tainted iPhone application meant to expose a weakness in Apple’s App Store security process has been suspended from Apple’s developer program. And rightly so—he violated clear terms of service. But what

Cloud Computing and the Truth About SLAs

SLAs don’t provide much protection against cloud-related outages, writes CIO.com blogger Bernard Golden. They merely credit customers against the cost of a service. To prevent outages, IT departments would better spend their time planning applicatio

Time for some LIP (Leadership Intervention Points, that is)

When business leaders need to improve how their organizations run, they have surprisingly little leverage. If they don’t understand the leverage they have, it’s even worse.

Microsoft’s ‘Family’ TV Ads Show the Power of Syncing Data

Microsoft gets its act together in new TV spots, conveying clearly and with humor how its Windows-based devices work together with the cloud to get stuff done.

Lenovo’s X220 vs. Apple’s MacBook Air: Which Is Better?

If you’re looking for a powerful, lightweight laptop that costs less than $1000, two systems standout: Apple’s MacBook Air and Lenovo’s X220.