Need and Importance of Information Technology in Education

Need

• Education is a life long process therefore anytime anywhere access to it is the need
• Information explosion is an ever increasing phenomena therefore there is need to get access to this information
• Education should meet the needs of variety of learners and therefore IT is important in meeting this need
• It is a requirement of the society that the individuals should posses technological literacy
• We need to increase access and bring down the cost of education to meet the challenges of illiteracy and poverty-IT is the answer

IMPORTANCE

• Access to variety of learning resources
• Immediacy to information
• Anytime learning
• Anywhere learning
• Collaborative learning
• Multimedia approach to education
• Authentic and up to date information
• Access to online libraries
• Teaching of different subjects made interesting
• Educational data storage
• Distance education
• Access to the source of information
• Multiple communication channels-e-mail,chat,forum,blogs,etc.
• Access to open courseware
• Better accesses to children with disabilities
• Reduces time on many routine tasks

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Internet Governance in an Age of Cyber Insecurity

The Internet, since its debut in 1989, has revolutionized commerce, communication, military action, and governance. Much of the modern world is simply inconceivable without it. This revolution, however, has not come without a price. The annual cost of cyber crime has now climbed to more than $1 trillion, while coordinated cyberattacks have crippled Estonia, Georgia, and Kyrgyzstan and compromised critical infrastructure in countries around the world. While no fewer than six UN bodies and multiple regional and national forums have sought to build a consensus on the future of Internet governance, there has been little progress thus far. The United States has largely abstained from these discussions, instead focusing on developing its own offensive and defensive cybersecurity capabilities while entrusting the ongoing stability of the system to the expertise of the private sector.

In this Council Special Report, Robert K. Knake briefly examines the technological decisions that have enabled both the Internet's spectacular success and its troubling vulnerability to attack. Arguing that the United States can no longer cede the initiative on cyber issues to countries that do not share its interests, he outlines an agenda that the United States can pursue in concert with its allies on the international stage. This agenda, addressing cyber warfare, cyber crime, and state-sponsored espionage, should, he writes, be pursued through both technological and legal means. He urges first that the United States empower experts to confront the fundamental security issues at the heart of the Internet's design. Then he sketches the legal tools necessary to address both cyber crime and state-sponsored activities, including national prohibitions of cyber crime, multilateral mechanisms to prevent and prosecute cyberattacks, and peacetime norms protecting critical civilian systems, before describing the bureaucratic reforms the United States should make to implement effectively these changes.

Internet Governance in an Age of Cyber Insecurity is a timely contribution on an issue increasingly capturing the attention of policymakers. It presents technical ideas to the nonexpert in accessible and compelling language. The report leaves little doubt about the importance of cybersecurity to the future of both the United States and the Internet itself, and its recommendations provide a strong foundation for future action.

FOX AND GOOGLE DEBATE

REPORT FROM THE INTERNET PRIVACY WORKSHOP

It’s been a long time coming, but last week saw the publication of RFC 6462, the Report from the Internet Privacy Workshop. The workshop, which was jointly hosted by the Internet Architecture Board (IAB) and others in December 2010, brought together experts from industry and the Internet standards community to better understand the role of privacy in Internet standardization work.

The workshop report provides a useful overview of fundamental privacy design challenges that appear again and again: the increasing ease of user/device/application fingerprinting, unforeseen information leakage, difficulties in distinguishing first parties from third parties, complications arising from system dependencies, and the lack of transparency and user awareness of privacy risks and tradeoffs. The report also identifies a number of barriers to successful deployment and analysis of privacy-minded protocols and systems, including the difficulty of using generic protocols and tools to defend against context-specific threats; the tension between privacy protection and usability; and the difficulty of navigating between business, legal, and individual incentives.

The IAB has been leading an effort within the Internet standards community to better conceptualize how privacy is addressed within Internet standards development. By exploring privacy challenges as they exist on the Internet today, the workshop report provides a foundation for this and other efforts to build on.REPRT FROM THE INTE

What every policy maker needs to know about the internet

The Internet today is a technology of freedom and innovation. In less than two
decades it has become a powerful, global platform for commerce, human
development and democratic participation. This growth did not happen in a legal
vacuum. From the outset, the Internet has been enabled by a policy framework
suited to its unique technical architecture. Misguided policies could just as easily
stifle the Internetʼs continued expansion. Increasingly, despite the Internetʼs
success, the policy principles that supported its growth are being challenged.
The successful policy framework for the Internet emphasized openness, competition,
innovation, consumer choice, and freedom of expression. For example, while ISPs
themselves were relatively unregulated, they benefited from an open platform that
was based on telecommunications policies of interconnection and non‐discrimination.
Early on, the Supreme Court ruled that the Internet was entitled to the strongest form
of First Amendment free speech protection. Congress expressly decided that Web
hosting services and ISPs should not be liable for the content created by others.
Recognizing the importance of privacy, in 1986 Congress updated laws on
government surveillance to require court orders for access to data communications,
just as they had been required for telephone taps.
In recent years, policymakers seem to have forgotten what makes the Internet
special. Increasingly, policy proposals treat the Internet as a problem to be solved
rather than a valuable resource that must be supported. Debates over objectionable
content online, protecting intellectual property, preventing terrorism, or restructuring
telecommunications policy seem to have lost sight of the Internetʼs history and its
architecture. We are seeing an increasing number of heavy‐handed policy proposals
that place the Internetʼs core characteristics at risk. Standing alone or in conjunction
with marketplace and technological changes, these policies could fundamentally alter
the very elements of the Internet that have made it so successful.

Rashidi Yekini: THE LEGEND IS DEAD

THE death on May 4 of Nigeria's foremost striker, Rashidi Yekini, struck his fans hollow. On the social networking site, facebook, many subscribers had announced the obituary of the lethal striker and so triggered sporadic enquiries across the world.
As usual, Nigerians home and abroad felt the most credible medium to ascertain the authenticity of the story was the sports desk of Tribune titles.
Apart from sharing spatial proximity with Yekini, Tribune sports crew lent a hand in lifting the gangly forward from the obscurity of UNTL FC of Kaduna to the stardom of legendary individual honour of being the first Nigerian to be named African Footballer of the Year in 1993.
Many Nigerians were not happy with the way football authorities neglected Yekini after his international retirement but those who were close to him realise, very sadly, how the famous player rebuffed all attempts made to recognise him as a shining ambassador of the beautiful game.
Many private interests and corporate outfits sought endorsement fruitlessly from Yekini to have the player as brand model.
The player was simply contented with living a recluse life, devoid of second-person influence.
The news on the demise of Rashidi Yekini was indeed a big challenge for the sports crew of Tribune who are condemned ''to be the first to know'' about Yekini.
The crew had written an extensive feature on the strange disposition to life of Yekini in 2010 but certain colleagues of his felt that the report was actionable because it did not portray the true situation.
Meanwhile, football authorities, following Tribunesports report, sought to wade in and rescue Yekini but either got the player's cold shoulder or were stealthily dribbled.
As fans kept calling, the agitation to know the true situation became a mixture of momentary madness and occasional composure among the crew.
As cold as Yekini appeared, he had his associates who could never get it wrong as far as his private affairs are concerned.
A particular friend of his who kept his company at the Olubadan Stadium told Tribunesports:''It is not true, you know I should be the first person to know if Rashidi is dead,'' he proudly said on Friday night around 8pm.
Another source who actually played with Yekini and one of the very few confidants of the late player was more audacious.
''I ve seen the report on facebook. Ignore it. Rashidi is very much alive, quote me. If such a thing happened, his family members would have told me.''
Another of his friend informed us that he actually saw Yekini hale and hearty a couple of days ago and that busy bodies had a way of misinforming the public on the medium of face book.
Riddles and puzzles. Uncertainties and suspense.
The sports crew deployed some of its men to Sabongari Area of Ibadan, Oyo State, where Yekini had his regular suya with his pals from the Northern part of the country as others were detailed to his abode in Ibadan.
His neighbours confirmed that truly, Yekini, was 'bundled' out of his home by family members with the motive of seeking a permanent therapy of ocassional disorder the player suffered in the closing days of his life.
''He is not dead, his people had taken him to find solution to his problems, those carrying the rumour must have been deceived by the atmosphere of his house and the circumstances of his departure for therapy.''
The concern of Nigerians about Yekini was massive. Professional colleagues, former players, sports administrators kept on ringing the sports desk.
Then, the crew put on its thinking cap and decided to call Yekini's family members in Offa and Ilorin in Kwara State. That was the breakthrough.
''If the news had been on facebook before noon as we were told, and Yekini being a muslim, whose burial must not be delayed, then by 9p.m, they would have known if it was true that he was actually dead, reasoned a member of the desk.
A cousin of Yekini and Kwara State's Commissioner for Information, Tunji Moronfoye, confirmed to us by 10.08 pm on that Yekini was actually dead.
One of the women in Yekini's life who actually bore him a child also confirmed that the goal-king was no more.
The dramatic aspect of his death is that Yekini breathed his last in Ibadan but none of those who dropped 'exclusives' had any idea of his condition.
Like he did on the pitch against his opponents, Yekini really beat the attention of his friends flatly as he departed the world.
Yekini played for 14 different clubs in Nigeria, Europe, Asia, the Middle East and in North Africa.
Itinerant Yekini played for United Nigeria Textile Limited, UNTL Kaduna, the Shooting Stars of Ibadan, Abiola Babes, Africa Sports of Abidjan, Vitoria Setubal of Portugal, Olympiakos of Greece and Sporting Gijon of Spain.
He returned to Setubal and also played for FC Zurich, Switzerland, AC Bizerte of Tunisia, Al Shabab of Saudi Arabia, and returned to Africa Sport.
In 2002, he returned home and joined Julius Berger and Gateway FC of Abeokuta.
After he quit football, Yekini avoided the spotlight and concentrated on grassroots football and personal training either at the Obafemi Awolowo Stadium, Railway fields or Saint Luke's College, Molete Ibadan.
However, the poser that comes to mind is how could such a widely-travelled man lived an introverted life after retirement?
How was he able to relate with coaches and teammates to the extent that he left an impressive goal scoring record for each of the teams he starred for?
A man adored by fans worldwide and with many accolades suffering neurological conditions raises a question difficult to resolve.

Yekini lived an eventful life and made Nigerians happy with crucial goals in moments of critical importance. He is a stalwart of Nigeria's golden age of the early 90's. Today, he is the reference point in marksmanship and sharp shooting.

Intel overestimated consumers' willingness to pay top dollar for sleek laptops: AMD CEO

SAN FRANCISCO: PC chipmaker AMD's chief executive is betting that its larger rival Intel has overestimated consumers' willingness to pay top dollar for a new category of premium laptops.

Riding the coat-tails of Intel's most expensive marketing push in a decade, new processors from AMD have been chosen for a handful of upcoming laptops in a wave of sleek personal computers with features like "instant on" made popular by tablets.

Targeting mainstream shoppers, thin laptops with AMD's chips, previously code named Trinity, are set to sell in the $600 range, similar to many of the bulkier laptops now on the market and significantly cheaper than the high-end, Intel-powered ones increasingly appearing in stores.

"It seems like an opportunity to steal the bacon and go in there and capture this huge opportunity that someone else generated," AMD Chief Executive Rory Read told Reuters in an interview. "They missed where the sweet spot of the market was."

Intel has coined "Ultrabooks" to refer to svelte laptops using its processors, with high-quality features like solid-state drives and metal cases.

AMD, always struggling to keep up with its much larger competitor, has been referring more generically to ultrathin laptops.

Hewlett Packard last week unveiled a new "Sleekbook" lineup, with thin models using chips from both AMD and Intel.

All three companies are counting on thin laptops to energize PC sales dulled by a growing preference for tablets.

Intel, whose processors are used in 80 percent of the world's PCs, has invested $300 million in an investment fund to help smaller companies develop technology to use in future Ultrabooks.

The chipmaker's executives last week said that by the holiday season, Ultrabooks will account for 40 percent of all consumer laptop sales.

AMD's Read said prices for Ultrabooks would be too high for Intel to hit that target.

"You get up to those premium price points in a Windows type environment and there isn't the scale to do that. But if you get into mainstream, there's a big opportunity," Read said.

TOP DOLLAR Intel executives told analysts at their annual meeting last Thursday that PC and component manufacturers in recent years focused too much on bringing down prices and forgot to add improved features to keep laptops exciting.

Intel Vice President Kirk Skaugen, leading the Ultrabook push, said consumers would pay more for laptops with premium features, which next year will include touch displays.

"We think the experience we're delivering, people are going to be willing to pay for and it only gets better in 2013," he told investors.

Apple's MacBook Air, seen by many consumers as the creme de la creme of laptops, sells for $999 and up. Analysts have speculated the Cupertino, California, company may drop the prices of future models in response to the Ultrabook push.

While AMD stakes out territory at the low end of the price range for ultrathin laptops, analysts believe Intel may have trouble persuading consumers to spend extra on Microsoft Windows-based computers that lack the Apple brand.

"It ultimately comes down to whether Intel is going to be able to enable the supply chain to develop an Ultrabook that is competitive with the MacBook Air at whatever new low price they're going to be selling at," said Patrick Wang, an analyst at Evercore Partners.

EFFECT OF TECHNOLOGY

Empirical studies on information communication technologies (ICT) typically aggregate the "information" and "communication" components together. We show theoretically and empirically that these have very different effects on the empowerment of employees, and by extension on wage inequality. If managerial hierarchies are devices to acquire and transmit knowledge and information, technologies that reduce information costs enable agents to acquire more knowledge and 'empower' lower level agents. Conversely, technologies reducing communication costs substitute agent's knowledge for directions from their managers, and lead to centralization. Using an original dataset of firms in the US and seven European countries we study the impact of ICT on worker autonomy, plant manager autonomy and spans of control. Consistently with the theory we find that better information technologies (Enterprise Resource Planning for plant managers and CAD/CAM for production workers) are associated with more autonomy and a wider span of control. By contrast, communication technologies (like data networks) decrease autonomy for both workers and plant managers. Our findings are robust to using exogenous variation in cross-country telecommunication costs arising from differential regulatory regimes.

DATA CAPS AREN'T PERFECT, BUT THAT'S OK

Last year, The New York Times criticized usage-based broadband pricing, noting that “Moving an extra gigabyte of data at off-peak times costs virtually nothing.” More recently, a report by the advocacy group Public Knowledge suggested that broadband data caps, a form of usage-based pricing, are an inefficient way to manage congestion. These claims are correct: while monthly caps may help control congestion if they impose binding constraints on high-volume users, pricing models truly aimed at congestion would target times and areas of congestion directly. That’s why the DC Metro system…

How to buy one share of Facebook stock

Facebook's IPO documents included this rendering of what its paper stock certificate will look like.

NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- The typical way to buy stock in a publicly traded firm is to open a brokerage account and place an order. But for those who want to own just one ceremonial share of a company, there's an easier, if sometimes pricier, way: You can buy through websites that specialize in "one share" transactions.

The operators of those sites say they expect Facebook to become one of their most popular stocks once it begins trading publicly. That's currently on track to happen this Friday.

"It interests people who are not ordinarily interested in the stock market," says Rick Roman, the founder of GiveAShare.com. "We've been getting people asking about it for a year."

Sites like GiveAShare.com and OneShare.com are careful not to market themselves as places for serious investors. Stocks are risky, and any gains on a single share are likely to be tiny.

Instead, the sites cater to more casual fans of the companies' brands. They also offer something traditional brokerages rarely do: paper stock certificates, suitable for framing and showing off.

Companies aren't required to offer paper stock certificates, and a shrinking number of them do. Apple, for example, stopped issuing paper certificates in late 2010.

Roman says he was surprised and delighted when Facebook, which will trade under the ticker (FB), revealed in its IPO paperwork that it will make paper certificates available. (Citing pre-IPO "quiet period" regulations, a Facebook representative declined to comment on the company's decision to issue paper shares.)

Both GiveAShare.com and OneShare.com plan to begin offering Facebook shares for sale as soon as the stock starts trading. Like other retail investors, they'll be buying shares at whatever the market price is, which is likely to be much higher than the offering price.

Roman, who typically updates the stock prices on his site just once a week, says he expects to adjust Facebook's price several times on its first trading day.

Buying through a one-share site is generally more expensive for customers than buying through a broker. Both GiveAShare.com and OneShare.com charge a $39 fee for their services, which include buying the share and procuring the paper stock certificate.

Take Disney as an example. It's by far the most popular stock on both sites, thanks to its brand recognition and its colorful, cartoon-filled stock certificate. A single share of Disney (DIS, Fortune 500) cost $45.56 at market close on Friday. Buying one through GiveAShare.com currently costs $82, or $84.28 through OneShare.com.

Neither site prices its shares in real-time, so their price is typically slightly out of sync with current market prices.

"We think of ourselves as selling a product, not a stock," Roman said. "If the current share price is a few dollars higher than ours, we'll eat the difference."

The stock customers receive is a fully legal share with all the attached rights. An investor can attend shareholder meetings, and if companies pay a dividend, they'll get regular checks for the earnings (often just pennies) on their single share.

They'll also get a paper stock certificate, though that takes a few weeks to process and ship.

The cheapest option is to stick with a bare-bones cardboard frame for your certificate, but almost no one does that. OneShare.com CEO Lance Lee says that around three-quarters of his customers upgrade to a fancier package.

GiveAShare is introducing a "new, improved" frame -- "it's larger and shows off the certificate better," Roman says -- specifically for Facebook shares. Customers can customize it with messages like "MARK ZUCKERBERG WORKS FOR ME! OFFICIAL FACEBOOK SHAREHOLDER

INFO WORLD

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  California moves to stop employers demanding Facebook passwords

  The move is part of a wave of legislative activity to block the practice... more

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  Microsoft Bing revamp spotlights interactive social sidebar

  Three-column interface also includes a 'snapshot' for more direct interaction with products and places... more

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  Apple patches 36 bugs in OS X, fixes encryption password goof

  Update includes fixes to FileVault in Lion and Snow Leopard, as well as QuickTime bugs... more

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  New HP thin client cuts the power cord

  Hewlett-Packard's new t410 system, a 13-watt PC, draws power via Ethernet cable, no electrical cord needed... more

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  C keeps lead over Java, but index's accuracy is questioned

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• Cloud Computing »

  HP expands cloud computing services beta

  Organizations can now try out HP's soon-to-be commercialized compute, storage, and content delivery cloud services... more

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• Virtualization »

  Citrix boosts VDI offerings for cloud-based mobile-centric world

  Announces Project Avalon, which will eventually will allow enterprises to run any Windows application or desktop on any device in a cloud... more

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• Security »

  APT attackers are increasingly using booby-trapped RTF documents

  Security experts say Microsoft Officer RTF parsing vulnerabilities are a common target for attackers who distribute advanced persistent threats... more

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• ICANN targets May 22 for reopening gTLD application system

  If the system is up as targeted, ICANN expects it would remain open for five business days and close on May 30... more

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  SAP gets tough on violation of software use terms

  Software giant is seeking huge back-fees from companies for claimed indirect access violations, analysts say...