Weekly Tech Update 20 September 2012

A look at all the news from the world of technology, the internet, search engines and social media. This week topics include:
Nestle using GPS to track chocolate bars
HP announce mouse with NFC capability
Bug affects Internet Explorer
Angry Birds follow up game to be released
New meta tag from Google
Another Panda update
1 in 5 say they won’t work for company that bans social media
Facebook trialling feature allowing personal users to promote posts
Emoticons are 30

Weekly Tech Update 20 September 2012

A look at all the news from the world of technology, the internet, search engines and social media. This week topics include:
Nestle using GPS to track chocolate bars
HP announce mouse with NFC capability
Bug affects Internet Explorer
Angry Birds follow up game to be released
New meta tag from Google
Another Panda update
1 in 5 say they won’t work for company that bans social media
Facebook trialling feature allowing personal users to promote posts
Emoticons are 30

Welcome to the Weekly Tech Update with me, Mike Walmsley. It’s a look at everything that has happened in the world of technology, the Internet, Search Engines and social media over the last week.

Technology

Nestle’s the chocolate maker, bear with me this really is tech related, are running an interesting promotional campaign in the UK. They have fitted GPS devices inside the wrappers of six of their chocolate bars. When the bar is opened the GPS signal is activated and representatives of the company will track you down within 24 hours to hand over a cheque for £10 thousand. The promotion is called rather sinisterly “We Will Find You” and the devices are hidden among their Kit-Kat, Kit-Kat Chunky, peppermint Aero and Yorkie bars. Now which do you prefer, winning a golden ticket to visit Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Factory or a cheque for ten grand? I think this is a really innovative use of technology, and remember to keep hold of the srappers from your chocolate bars because you never know if you’re a winner or not.

HP has produced a mouse that includes Near Field Communication or NFC. It will be called the Touch To Pair Mouse. The mouse will be able to be paired with multiple devices, assuming that the device is NFC enabled too. Although only a small number of tablets and PC’s currently have NFC built in this is likely to increase over the next few years and being able to attach a mouse to these devices may prove very useful. The HP Touch To Pair mouse is due to be released in the States in November.

Internet

Microsoft has reported a bug that affects its Internet Explorer browser. The bug is being exploited to install the Poison Ivy Trojan. This in turn can be used to steal data from your PC or to take control of it. Microsoft have released a temporary patch and are working on a permanent fix. Here’s a link to the patch:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2757760

Are you an Angry Birds fan? Do you ever feel sorry for the pigs in the popular game from Rovio? The game’s creators have announced that they will be releasing a new game on September 27th called “Bad Piggies”. In this game you are not trying to rescue your eggs from the evil clutches of the pigs, instead you have to build vehicles that the pigs can use to go and steal more eggs. It’s bound to be popular. If you are looking forward to this new game leave me a comment and let me know.

Search Engines

Google have introduced a new meta-tag that is aimed at news publishers. The tag is called news_keywords. The idea is that news outlets will not try to stuff keywords into their article titles to gain greater rankings but instead can include all the relevant keywords in the new tag. This in turn should, in theory, result in more natural titles and therefore improve the overall quality of the output from the organisation.

Google are rolling out another Panda update. The aim of Panda is to try to ensure that only the highest quality sites emerge at the top of any Search Engine Results Page. If you do find that your rankings take a hit over the next few days then this may be the reason why. Don’t panic if you are hit, it can be managed effectively to restore your rankings. If you would like further information on this do drop me a line.

Social Media

One in five people surveyed in the UK say that they would turn down a job if the employer had banned access to social media sites such as Facebook, Google+ and Twitter. This has real resonance with me. In my professional life I have to spend a lot of time on Facebook monitoring the brand pages that I am an admin of. About a month ago I found that I was getting so many distractions from friends posting updates on Facebook that I needed to do something about it. Now obviously I couldn’t delete my account due to being an admin of so many pages, so I deleted my friends instead! I figure the people I really want to keep in touch with I can speak to on the phone and I really don’t need to see so many pictures of what people are eating for their dinner. So I can see why employers would not want their staff to access social media sites. What do you think? Should you be able to access social media at work? Leave a comment and let me know.

Facebook are trialling a new feature that allows their users to pay to have posts promoted to their friends. I am talking about personal users and not brand business pages. Brands have been able to promote their posts so that they are displayed to more of their fans for a while now. When I first heard about this trial I wondered who would want to pay to have a post promoted when they can just post for free? When you do update your Facebook status it does not necessarily appear in the newsfeed of all your friends. By paying £4.00 you can increase the number of people that see the post. This might be useful if you have a big announcement to make, such as the birth of a child or if you wanted to sell your car. I am not sure at this stage if the post shows as being promoted or not to those that see it.

Facebook is looking for new ways to monetise its services. With a user base of nearly a billion it does make sense to try to make some cash out of them rather than just trying to make brands produce the profits that Facebook needs to make. Do you think you would ever pay to have an update promoted? What kind of things do you think you might use this service for?

And finally it is time to say Happy Birthday to emoticons.  They were first used to help convey true meaning into a piece of text so that the reader was less likely to misunderstand your message. Now they seem to be everywhere. Originally they were considered quite a hip thing to drop into your message. It shows how far things have come when emoticons have almost a counter culture with a lot of young people now reversing the order of the characters. Happy birthday emoticons!