The glitzy, interactive abilities of Web 2.0 have led to a profusion of new applications, but the technology also is bringing a new era of security vulnerabilities, a security researcher warned Wednesday.”Security was a challenge to begin with, but if anything it’s getting harder in the Web 2.0 world,” said Jacob West, manager of the security research group at Fortify, a company that helps companies make sure their software is secure. He made his comments during a talk at the Web 2.0 Expo in San Francisco here.

A big culprit is JavaScript, a language that’s widely used to control Web browsers and enable more sophisticated operations. JavaScript has been around for more than a decade, but new risks are emerging since it’s a major component of Ajax, a Web 2.0 technology used to build richly interactive sites. Read more…..компютри втора употреба

Here are some Knowledge Links for today,

Five Best Instant Messangers

Figure out why an Application hangs

Forget Facebook everyone’s a Twitter

Protect your Privacy while Downloading

yahoo-puts-all-the-chips-on-the-table-time-for-somebody-to-fold

Open Social goes live on Orkut

Socialtext makes Wikis social Announce People and Dashboard

Product Pulse: Baidu Startpages, Sina Space And Community Search

Pageflakes Acquired By Live Universe

MindMeister - Collaborative Mind Mapping

AOL and Yahoo plan to strike a deal, Microsoft retaliates

It is useful to define the commonly used concepts associated with the rise of the Internet over the past decade in order to clarify key distinctions in the business realities they represent. These concepts are e-commerce, e-business, m-business, and m-commerce. E-commerce simply refers to the buying and selling of products and services over the web. The larger concept of e-business represents all the technological applications and business processes that enable a company to service an e-commerce transaction. In addition to encompassing e-commerce, e-business includes both the front- and back-office applications (e.g., ERP, CRM, supply chain management, and e-procurement) that form the core engine driving contemporary business transactions. In the broadest sense, e-business is the overall strategy of redefining old business models, with the aid of technology, to maximize customer value and profits.

Nearly all e-commerce and e-business applications envisioned and developed so far assume fixed or stationary users with wired infrastructure. This paradigm of fixed e-commerce is being rethought with the emergence and widespread adoption of wireless data networks for mobile commerce. M-commerce refers to business transactions conducted while on the move. Its growth is due to users seeking to conduct business, communicate, and share information while they are away from their desktop computers.

M-commerce is not possible without its partner m-business, which is the application infrastructure required to maintain business relationships and sell information, services, and commodities via mobile devices. Think of m-commerce as the façade and m-business as everything that happens behind the scenes. M-business, the logical extension of e-business, is creating new customer channels and addressing return on investment (ROI) of enterprise applications. Note that m-commerce can take place even if devices are offline.

Web 2.0 seems to be the new holy grail for all entrepreneurs and marketers, and while many experts sing its praises, an equal number do predict its demise into enterprise ether. The truth, as always, lies somewhere in-between. But one business area where Web 2.0 certainly has had a major impact is in branding and marketing. This cannot be denied.

Web 2.0 is a broad term that covers all aspects of Web usage or technologies that facilitate collaboration, sharing, online conversations, user-generated content or social networking of some kind. For example, there are over 100 million blogs today and no matter what area of business you are in, someone has probably created a blog about it and someone else is actually reading that blog. (Blog stands for Web Log or Journal or Site that a Web user creates themselves on any subject of their choosing.)

As a brand builder or marketer, ignoring Web 2.0 is ignoring some of the best tools you can find in managing your 360 degree (touching every touch point in your marketing matrix with an appropriate relationship) marketing strategy and your reputation online. Understanding your customer’s buying habits and interests, mapping current trends, getting free feedback and reviews, testing out new concepts on focus groups for free, managing your brand’s reputation through proper message management, distributing viral messages and ideas quickly – what else can a marketer ask for. This is the promise of Web 2.0. However, remember – the opposite can hold true as well – so use these tools carefully. Here are some ideas to help you along:

Idea #1: Spruce up your Website – improve the customer experience on your site: Add a blog-type news desk (Wordpress provides some very good tools for free) so visitors can comment and more. Add a customer assistance tool (like LivePerson or an Avatar - see SitePal or Oddcast), if you are an online retailer add user recommendations and suggestions (use intelligent tools like Cleverset.) And make sure you use some serious Analytics tools to help you measure performance of your site, drop off rates and more (Google Analytics is free and very good but you could try Webtrends for some really advanced reports.) Make sure you set up a team in-house to run your site so it is not an after-thought.

Idea #2: Get Blogging – yes, there are 100 million blogs out there, so before you take the plunge and launch another one of your own (Blogger, Wordpress or TypePad are your best bets) in that vast pool – ask yourself a few questions. How will this benefit my customers? Which blogs exist that already talk to my customers and how can I connect with them? How will I get my customers or target market to ready my blog regularly and become aware of its existence? Also consider using new technologies for announcing and broadcasting messages and news like Twitter and InMail at Linkedin.

Idea #3: Use Social Networks and Forums – This is a great way to test new ideas or get good feedback from people using your products or services. By reaching out to your core base via networks and forums, you will build a relationship with core constituents who will shape the opinion of others about your brand. Build a page on Linkedin (your profile), Facebook, Orkut, Ibibo, BigAdda, or Fropper. Manage this well as your reputation may count on it. If your market does not already have an active network then consider starting your own (have a look at Ning or Community Server – very nice open source social networks and forums you can start on your own.)

Idea #4: Use Email to build relationships and get messages out - Though not officially considered Web 2.0 – managing emails well is critical in your brand thinking for the Web 2.0 future. You already have an Email list - your current list of clients, customers, staff, friends , associates and vendors is your email list. Learning to use this wisely and then grow it is an art and will take some work. Set up newsletters, announcements and new desks so that you can keep your core targets informed regularly and automatically – there are some great email and list management services that are really cheap and let you create beautiful emails in minutes (see Constant Contact and iContact which both are Spam proof and approved.) Allow people to sign up for these on your site. Also consider growing your list in key markets by purchasing or renting lists. This will take some more research and effort on your part but may well be worth it.

To achieve the main cost saving advantage many companies are outsourcing their IT related work. Companies are outsourcing the project work either onshore or offshore or combination of both. According to many surveys in 2006 India is the top outsourcing destination and will remain on top position at least for next few years.

Companies try to slash the development work and time by outsourcing the complete or part of the project work. Cost saving is the key consideration besides all other factors. But some companies are now outsourcing the work more strategically. This would be beneficial for outsourcing companies in long future run.

All the surveys like outsourcing survey from diamond consultancy 75% of the companies participated in the survey are outsourcing their work to India. From overall buyers 79% buyers are satisfied with their decision of outsourcing and they are not thinking to stop their outsourcing work in future.

The work mainly outsourced to low cost countries is software development, maintenance, Quality assurance, software testing, and software architecture work.

China is main competitor to India for outsourcing work. According to study many companies are also willing to enter into Chinese market by any means. Chinese strict government policies and their leaned attitude towards the local companies is the main concern for global investors in china.

India is also facing some challenging of increasing employee wages, affecting the overall work cost. Strong Rupee value against Dollar will also be a main concern of Indian companies. But if the Indian engineers are costlier then they must be putting their efforts more for quality work.

So in future top 5 outsourcing destinations could be India, China, US, Brazil and Russia.

In future the outsourcing trend will continue to soar. Companies outsourcing their work need to build strong strategies for more benefits in terms of productivity and profits. Before taking outsourcing decisions if they do a little study of risks and benefits of each country they can get more benefits.