Enterainmet and Leisure

How ICT has had an impact on Leisure and Entertainment

 ICT has impacted entertainment and leisure by enhancing the different ways in which we casually spend our time. With the use of these technologies, they ways in which we can entertain ourselves has dramatically increased.
The development of these technologies has meant that many people stay inside, watch TV, play online games etc. Therefore you could say that the amount of leisure activities that people do have decreased, with respect to the wide range of entertainment technologies. 
Technology has had a colossal impact on the leisure industry and has benfited it in a variety of dfferent ways, and is still has on going improvemnets.

ICT within Sport

How does Hawk-eye work?

Hawk-eye uses multiple cameras placed around the court to track the players and the ball. These movements are then processed by computers. Hawk-eye takes ball skid and ball compression into account and is accurate to 2-3 mm.

A visual description of the Hawk-eye system (number of cameras may vary depending on setup)

It is important to note that Hawk-eye isn't entirely new; however, it has been refined over the years to such a degree that the confidence level in the system is high enough for use as an officiating aid.
The use of this tracking technology also allows for a new range of statistics to be captured and presented to the viewing audience; something that many tennis viewers may already be familiar with. In addition to calling lines, statistics that Hawk-eye can measure include speed of the ball at any point of a rally, service comparisons (i.e. service patterns, direction and depth of aces, placement of 1st and 2nd serves etc), bounce points of the ball, percentage of time a player spends in a region of the court or an approximate measure of distance that a player has run throughout the match.

Statistics from the 2005 Wimbledon Final between Roger Federer and Andy Roddick. We can see Federer targeting the Roddick backhand side on second serves. Also note the placement of Federer's aces on Roddick.

As part of this system, new video boards will be a large part of the in-stadium atmosphere on centre court for instant replay coverage, statistics, fan interaction, contests and corporate partner recognition. You may even see players sneak a peak at their stats during changeovers, in order to make in-game adjustments. The television broadcast is also enhanced by this system, primarily through the usage of the various camera vantage points around the court, and the display of statistics during the course of the match.With all this technology in place, there is always an associated cost. The system costs approximately $20,000 to $25,000 USD for a court per week (excluding the video screens in the stadium). As a result, in Toronto's Rexall Centre and Montreal's Uniprix Stadium, this system will only be set up on the main court.

Below is a video of some players opinions of the hawk eye system.





Advantages:

• If players disagree they can question the call that was originaly made.
• Gives an exact replay of where the ball would have landed within 3 millimeters of the area it was in.
• Eliminates human error.
• Prevents queries on court between players and umpires.

Disadvantages:

• Some players/people believe it loses the originality of the game.
• Its no 100% accurate, but is over 99% accurate.  

Entertainment on the iphone 4

Apple iPhone 4 is known as smart phone power house. It has many entertainment supporting features like luxurious touch screen technology, five mega pixel camera with LED flash, 720p HD video recording, GPS locator, Wi-Fi support, and built-in YouTube player, etc. iPhone 4 apps developer take advantage of these features and develop entertainment application for your iPhone 4.
iPhone 4 apps developer provides entertainment application for the following fields:

• Music
• Videos
• Movies
• Photos
• Jokes
• Games
• Cartoons and Animation

iPhone 4 apps developer can create various iPhone 4 entertainment applications like:

• Radio Stations
• Music players
• Play an instrument
• Movie Feedbacks
• Information about local events
• Cartoon Characters
• Fun and Interactive Applications

• Puzzle and Board Games

Highlights of iPhone 4 apps developer entertainment app development:

• Engaging and interesting applications
• Apps with innovative, breakthrough features
• User-friendly and easy to download/navigate
• Music players, audio/video recorders
• Networking, social media apps

Ict has had an enormous impact on entertainmetn especially on the iphone 4. It has advanced the iphone4 to a completely different level. The iphone4 now has a whole range of features which it can provide for customers. These features are Two cameras which provides two views.
iPhone 4 has two cameras: One on the front, which focuses on you. And one on the back, which focuses on everything else. FaceTime lets you switch back and forth between them at any time during a video call. All you have to do is tap a button. Multitasking, Hd Video recording, 5 Megapixel camera, games centre and many more which all provide an amazing vareity of entertainments for all users to use.

 ICT on the music industry

 ICT is having an enormous impact on the music industry – artists, recording studios,
record labels, music stores and the customers/music fans.
The use of the Internet for buying, selling and listening to music, websites for display of
public relations information, and the use of digital technology for recording and
duplicating music, adds to the variety of ways in which music products can be sold. Most
of all, ICT and digital tools give easier access to the creation of music by a broader range
of users.
MP3 – a file format the allows CDs to be reduced from typically 5-700Mb to less than
100Mb and still retain the quality. This means to main things - a lot of music can be
stored on portable devices MP3 players or transferred over the internet in a fairly
short space of time downloaded.
Digital recording – using a standard laptop or PC it is possible to create music tracks –
form scratch or by sampling other music stored digitally on the computer. Digital
recording means there is no need for instruments at all since ‘synthesizers’ can
reproduce almost any instrument. In addition it is possible to fix recordings by removing
or changing bad notes or enhancing a poor vocal track using effects.
Advertising and distribution of music is a massive part of computer use, the WWW and
the internet – from on line radio stations, record labels, artist’s sites, music sales sites,
peer to peer file transfer downloading, CD copying, converting CD to MP3. Some of
these are good for different parts of the industry, others have a bad effect.

World Cup ref defends technology

Ganson will officiate in his first World Cup out in Australia St Helens-based referee Steve Ganson has defended rugby league's use of video technology as the sport makes its final preparations for the World Cup. Ganson, 38, has been confirmed as the video referee for Australia's clash with New Zealand in Sydney on Sunday. "Rugby league is the envy of other sports based on technology, I can assure you of that," Ganson told BBC Radio Merseyside. "Rugby league has made dramatic strides and the video referee has been good." Although Ganson is adamant the use of technology has benefitted the sport, he does concede there will always be incidents that raise question marks against its use. "With everything, there will always be an example or two where something goes wrong in the system," he said. "But overall the system is very successful and that has been proven. "People remember the one wrong decision, they don't remember the 98-99% of good ones."

Topics im doing in 1.2

• Entertainent and lesiure.
• Banking an shopping.
• Crime and crime prevention.
• Communication
• Employment oppurunities.            

E-Commerce

Online services for business are very varied. the main service for e-commerce is the world wide web. Sellers will set up their web stories, which are specialised websites without payment processing interfaces . The storefront is usually a set up of web pages with pictures and descriptions of the goods that will be provided for the users of the webpage, these will all be linked to a database and probably a search facility. The shopper will choose an item by transeffering it to a virtual shopping basket. When all of items the usr want have been selected they will go their shopping basket where they will go through a small process to pay and order their items to their delievery address.

Amazon

Amazon is one of the most popualr e-commerce websites. This website provides a variety of different services . The screenshot ont he side of this text shows the variety of different catergories of products that amazon provide for all the users. This website is popular to a variety of users as they are normally cheaper than other websites and can cater for everyones needs.  Like e-bay people can also sell items they no longer want. So as well as it being a business to user online retail site it is also a user to user retail site

For example this CD can be brought at the normal retail price of £5.99 but can be purhased at second hand price of £4.18. When on the home screen it provides a service that recomends people to services that are most popular, this is an effective service as people are able to shortcut to the main products that have just been realease.

When on amazon there are a variety of thigns you can do with when accessing your account. The screen shot above shows the variety of different things that you can do. Alot of people use the main feature of their account to track an order they have placed. This is very effective for the account holder as they are able to find out informationabout when there parcel will be delievered and information such as if it has been dispatched etc. There are other action you can perform with orders such as: Return items or gifts, Manage subscribe & save items, Manage magazine subscriptions, leave seller feedback, leave packaging feedback and view your emails with sellers. After placing orders you are also able to view your history of orders.

Other features you do whilst on your account is sell stuff through amazon for other buyers, change your main account settings and also edit payment methods this can help the users process when the are going to pay for products later on.

Amazon provide an effective page where they do deals of the week, this is good for people that are looking for a deal on certain preducts. Amazon will provide differnet offers each week where people can save money on prodcuts they need. On the main screen of this page they provide information for the most popular deals of the week and the prducts that have the best deals, this will help some people to find a deal on then product they are looking for quickly rather than searching for the exact product. The deals provdied are off a wide variety as shown on the left toolbar there is a wide variety of categories to find things in.

iTunes

Apple launched an update to its iTunes software for Macs and pcs. The new version 10.0.1 mostly adds bug fixes, but the most important addition is an overhaul of how you share your music with friends on ping, the musical social network that Apple released.

Now you can “Like” or “Post” a song from your library or playlists with a menu that appears next to the title of whichever song is playing, as seen in the picture above. The original version of Ping lived in its own world apart from your music library, making it kind of a pain to use. There’s also a Ping sidebar that lets you view updates from artists and friends you’re following without leaving your library. A button has been placed in the bottom right corner of the iTunes window that expands or contracts the sidebar. 

Apps on the iPhone

Every app you download from the App Store makes your iPhone do even more. And with hundreds of thousands of apps to choose from, we mean a whole lot more. Enter the App Store to shop for amazing apps in almost every category: games, lifestyle, social networking, and education, for starters. Many apps are even free. If you’re just browsing, the App Store makes it easy. You can see what’s new in Featured, check out the Top 25, and flick through a few screenshots. Find apps by doing a quick search, then download them wherever you are and start using them right away.* You can even purchase apps to send as gifts to friends and family.   

Stay up to date   

Developers are constantly improving their apps. When you visit the App Store, the Update icon shows you when an update is available for an app you have. With a tap, you can download the updates either one at a time or all at once. Then you’ll always have the latest versions.      

Recommendations

With so many apps available, you need an easy way to find new ones to enjoy. That’s where Genius comes in. With just a tap, Genius gives you personalized recommendations for apps you might like based on apps you and others have downloaded.                    

Library

Your library contains everything you’ve imported into iTunes and your iTunes Store purchases: music, movies, TV shows, podcasts, books, iPod games, apps, lectures from iTunes U, and ringtones.

The benefits of Ecommerce:

• Ecommerce allows people to carry out businesses without the barriers of time o

  Store

  One click takes you to the iTunes Store. iTunes adds everything you buy to your library. Downloading starts when you click Buy Now in the iTunes Store.

  Devices

  Your iPod, iPhone, iPad, and Apple TV appear in iTunes under the Devices section when they’re connected to your computer. CDs you’re burning or importing appear there, too. Click your device and iTunes shows you a summary of everything on it. Click a CD to check the progress of an import or a burn.

  Shared

  Look under Shared to see music, video, podcasts, audiobooks, and other media in the iTunes libraries of computers on your local network. With Home Sharing enabled, you can import movies, music, TV shows, apps, books, and more from up to five authorized computers in your home.

  Genius

  Genius playlists and Genius Mixes appear under Genius. Whenever you create and save a Genius playlist, this is where you’ll find it. Genius Mixes automatically appear here, too. And you can play them all with a click.

  Playlists

  All the playlists you create appear here — standard playlists as well as your Smart Playlists. iTunes DJ also appears under Playlists.
  
  r distance. One can log on to the Internet at any point of time, be it day or night and purchase or sell anything one desires at a single click of the mouse.
• The direct cost-of-sale for an order taken from a web site is lower than through traditional means (retail, paper based), as there is no human interaction during the on-line electronic purchase order process. Also, electronic selling virtually eliminates processing errors, as well as being faster and more convenient for the visitor.
• Ecommerce is ideal for niche products. Customers for such products are usually few. But in the vast market place i.e. the Internet, even niche products could generate viable volumes.
• Another important benefit of Ecommerce is that it is the cheapest means of doing business.
• The day-to-day pressures of the marketplace have played their part in reducing the opportunities for companies to invest in improving their competitive position. A mature market, increased competitions have all reduced the amount of money available to invest. If the selling price cannot be increased and the manufactured cost cannot be decreased then the difference can be in the way the business is carried out. Ecommerce has provided the solution by decimating the costs, which are incurred.
• From the buyer’s perspective also ecommerce offers a lot of tangible advantages.
  
  1. Reduction in buyer’s sorting out time.
  2. Better buyer descisions
  3. Less time is spent in resolving invoice and order discrepancies.
  4. Increased opportunities for buying alternative products.
• The strategic benefit of making a business ‘ecommerce enabled’, is that it helps reduce the delivery time, labour cost and the cost incurred in the following areas:
1. Document preparation
2. Error detection and correction
3. Reconciliation
4. Mail preparation
5. Telephone calling
6. Data entry
7. Overtime
8. Supervision expenses
• Operational benefits of e commerce include reducing both the time and personnel required to complete business processes, and reducing strain on other resources. It’s because of all these advantages that one can harness the power of ecommerce and convert a business to ebusiness by using powerful turnkey ecommerce solutions made available by ebusiness solution providers.

Disadvantages

One of the major disadvantages of online shopping is the necessity to have a personal computer or at least access to one and, of course, the ability to master its use sufficiently well to make use of the internet shopping market. Although members of the public who come within one or other of these categories is definitely in the minority, it remains a disadvantage of this means of shopping.

When you shop in a real market, you are able to see, feel and even try out the goods that you are buying. No such facility exists when you buy online. The most you will be able to achieve is to see a picture of the goods that you are interested in acquiring. Whilst invariably this will provide and accurate representation of the product, the fact remains that, contrary to the popular saying - the camera does occasionally lie!

There can sometimes be a significant delay in receiving your goods that have been acquired on the internet, whereas, of course, you have immediate access to those that have been purchased in a store. You also have to organise your personal schedule to be at home whenever the goods are actually delivered. Additionally, there are sometimes some quite significant delivery costs involved, which do not apply if you collect the goods yourself from a real store.

The major disadvantage is the scope for compromise of your personal financial information. Whilst this risk has clearly been reduced by the development of SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) encryption to protect the integrity of your personal financial details, it remains essential that a purchaser uses great care in divulging financial information online, particularly to a site that he is not familiar with. The concern about releasing personal financial information on the internet remains the single most cited reason, anecdotally, for people avoiding online shopping, despite all its apparent benefits.

Another example of E- commerce is ebay, this is different from normal e commerce websites as the products that are being sold on ebay are from anyone user with an account and not from a company like a normally website.

  



   

 This is a screenshot of the homepage of ebay This is has a search bar which allows people to search for the product the are looking for. It also has  adrop down menu this has a variety of different catagories which people can choose from.

Ebay contains an auto-bidding system. This is where a person states the maximum amount of money they are willing to bid for an item. A computer program then places a bid only a small amount above the current price. If another person places a higher bid the auto bidding computer system then increases the bid. This continues until on of the people reach their max bid. When this happens the computer stops bidding for that person. This is useful as it means that people will not have to constantly watch the item they are bidding on. It also means that people will pay the lowest possible price. They also provide a system where people can buy the gifts straight away this alows the seller to get the price they wish to sell at. Another way is that the seller can put a reserve price on this is a minimum buying price that has to be exceeded in order for the product to sell.
As anyone can sell stuff on ebay there is a risk that the product may be damaged. People also have to be careful of what they buy. Although by law people have to accurately describe the product in the description box, sometimes people only read a bit of the description and focus more on the picture which can lead to them buying something they do not want. An example of this was when somebody took a photo of their car and turned it into a poster. He then put the poster up on Ebay . In the description box he described all the features of the actual car. Halfway throughthe description he mentioned it was a poster. However many people did not read this part and proceded to bid ridiculously high amounts of money. The person could not get prosecuted as he had said that e was selling a poster.
However an advantage of anyone being able to sell objects can result in people being able to find rare or limited edition items that can not be brought from a company.
Ebay uses a feature called pay-pal. This is were you tell the compnay pay-pal your credit card information. This is so that you can make payments through pay-pal and not directly. This is very useful becuase it dramatically reduces the risk of someone illegally gaining your credit card information, which they can work out if you pay them directly. The only concern is that pay-pal may use your credit card. However pay-pal is a professional company so it is very unlikely for that to happen.

Topics im coverning in unit1.1

• Blogs
• Microblogging
• chat and instant messaging
• Entertainment
• download services
• E-commerce

Running Start FAIL

Entertainment

Online Entertainment:

There are many different types of entertainment online and this keeps on growing as new things are being used in lots of different ways to provide people with a service to allow them to watch entertainment online. A very popular service these days is bbc i player, this allows people to watch shows that where on the bbc and they have missed, this is popular as alot of people can catch up on programs that they have missed.



BBC i Player

"BBC iPlayer, commonly shortened to iPlayer, is an internet television and radio service, developed by the BBC to extend its former RealPlayer-based and other streamed video clip content to include whole TV shows. BBC iPlayer left Beta and went live on 25 December 2007. On 25 June 2008, a new-look iPlayer was launched, originally as a beta-test version alongside the earlier version.The site tagline is "Catch up on the last 7 days of BBC TV & Radio", reflecting that programmes are unavailable on iPlayer after this time (with some exceptions). The BBC state on their website this is due to copyright reasons. In May 2010 the site was updated again, to include a recommendations feature and a "social makeover".

BBC iPlayer is our free service that lets you catch up with radio and television programmes from the past week. If you are in the UK and connected to the internet you can, view and listen to programmes including HD programmes from the previous seven days instantly on the website by clicking on them to play.You can either watch or listen to a current show as it is transmitted live the On Now facility or catch up with a programme after broadcast -normally up to seven days, though due to rights reasons some programmes, such as Crimewatch, have a shorter availabilty. This works on computers, games consoles and and mobile phones, this is effective as alot of people will acces it frrom their mobille internet whilst they are travelling or would like to catch up on a cerain programe without going onto their computer.
Listen to a radio programme from the past seven days or to a current radio broadcast as it is transmitted live the On Now facility. The option of a pop-out player allows you to continue listening while you browse other web pages.

YouTube is a video-sharing website on which users can upload, share, and view videos. Three former PayPal employees created YouTube in February 2005. The name and logo of the company are an allusion to the cathode ray tube, a display device used since the early days of electronic television.The company is based in San Bruno, California, and uses Adobe Flash Video technology to display a wide variety of user-generated video content, including movie clips, tv clips, and music videos, as well as amateur content such as video blogging and short original videos. Most of the content on YouTube has been uploaded by individuals, although media corporations including cbs, bbc, vevo and other organizations offer some of their material via the site, as part of the YouTube partnership program.Unregistered users can watch the videos, while registered users are permitted to upload an unlimited number of videos. Videos that are considered to contain potentially offensive content are available only to registered users 18 and older. Youtube has 4 main catagories: 'Music' 'Film' 'Videos' & 'Shows' which is why the site is so popular with a variety of people as it provides such a wide variety of videos. If you set up your own account you have an 'inbox' where you can keep in contact with other people with an account, there is 'my favourties' which will be videos you have starred as your favourite so you can view these videos quickly, 'My channel' which is your own profile on youtube which you can change your settings for your account and design your own page for when people view your page. There is also the option to 'subscribe' to other peoples pages whose videos you like this work s as shortcut for when they upload a video it will be shown on your home-screen so its easily accessible. The video posted above is an example of entertainment that is provided by youtube.

Other types of entertainment services are 'love film' this service provides very effective movie scheme to allow to order films or other types of entertainment. This website allows users to rent movies, xbox games and computer games or pre owned games. This is usefl for alot of people as its a way in which they can try products out to see if they like it, they can also rent movies that have recently been filmed this is an advantage to many people as they are available to order the films and which at home as some people don't have the time or apathay towards going to cinema. There is a start up trial aswell so that people can see wether they like the service of being able to rent dvds and games this trial last for 14 days. Although you have to pay to rent the games, there is a start up fee of when you pay £3.99 a month you will recieve 2 free movie rentals a month but you can order additional movies at a small fee. Another advantage for this srvice is that you dont get charged extra if the product is returned late, this saves alot of hassle for people as they are giving the chance to spend more time watching the films.

Key facts

• LOVEFiLM UK carries over 65,000 unique titles including games
• LOVEFiLM is Europe's leading online DVD rental subscription service with over one million members and operates in the UK, Sweden, Norway, Denmark and Germany
• In just over five years, LOVEFiLM has grown to become the UK’s third largest home entertainment subscription service and was ranked number one Entertainment & Movies Website in the Hitwise 2008 data
• LOVEFiLM UK customers have generated over 72 million film ratings and over 780,000 member reviews
• The LOVEFiLM UK weekly newsletter reaches 850,000 members
• LOVEFiLM UK has won: British Video Association's award for the UK's Best Rental Service in 2005, 2006, 2007 and 2008, the fast-growing media company Media Momentum award in 2005, 2007 and 2008, UK technology – Innovation & Growth award for Mediatech Impact of the Year 2008, Home Entertainment Week awards for Rentailer of the Year 2008 and 2007, the 2008 Fast Growth Business Award for Retail/Leisure business of the Year, awarded 2nd place in The Sunday Times Top 100 Fastest Growing Private Tech Companies 2008 – (5th in 2007), The Sunday Times Tech Track 100 2007 – Best Management Team Award and was recently a finalist in the National Customer Service Awards 2008 – Finalist Retail Week awards 2009, awarded 5th place in the Deloitte Fast 50 UK 2009, awarded 22nd place in the Deloitte Fast 500 EMEA fastest growing public and private technology companies and named Company Of The Year at the Growing Business Awards 2009
• The group currently works with major partners in the UK including Tesco, easy Group, CD Wow, Guardian News Media, WHSmith, Odeon and Vue Cinemas, some of whom offer a fully white-labelled service.

Advantages:

• The immediacy of watching the program. 
• You are guarantee vast variety of programs/games etc.
• Also with online radio stations you will be able to find a staggering amount, and wont be limited to and geographical area.
• Can watch it on demand.
• Flexible when watching programs as you don't have to watch these programs at set times.
• Can do other things whilst the radio is playing in the background.

Disadvantages:

• Sometimes the picture can be of a poor quality. 
• On legal sites you might not be able to watch the film/programme that you wanted.
• Most laptops don't have the same sound system as televisions so wont give off the same effect. 

Budget Information

• Up to £250k per hour for shows that play in the heart of the Saturday night schedule
• Up to £175K per hour for Saturday early evening ideas.
• Up to £150k per hour for factual entertainment formats.

Radio

Digital radio services are now being produced using the same form of streaming technology as downloading videos. There is a huge variety of radio stations to choose from such as Heart, Radio one, Radio 1xtra etc. By listening to the radio, you are not limited to any geographic bandwidth, it is possible to listen to a radio station in high quality from a different area around the world.

Heart

Heart also known as Heart FM and Heart Radio is a network of independent stations in central & southern England and north Wales. Each station broadcasts local breakfast and drive time shows. By living in Southend, Heart is our main radio station, offering not only music, but also competitions, advertising and a call in option for a conversation with the hosts. This radio station is very friendly with its listeners allowing them to become part of the radio station.

Radio 1

There other radio stations such as radio which is more national rather than county/borough based. It is generally hosted by more well known radio hosts such as Chris Moyles, Reggie Yates and Fearne Cotton. Radio 1 is supported by the BBC so it will involve more formal types of radio shows but still involving different age groups and music styles. Radio 1 also has many sister-stations such as BBC 1xtra, which is based around garage and grime music for more of a specific music audience. This type of music is played at set times with set dj's.

In 2011/12 there are opportunities within the in-house guarantee, the WoCC and the independent quota.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/commissioning/tv/network/genres/entertainment_detail.shtml

The number of people illegally downloading copyrighted tracks from the internet has risen after a six-month slump.


http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/music/3402349.stm

Chat and instant messaging

What is instant messaging and chat
Instant messaging is a type of communications service that enables you to create a kind of private chat room with another individual in order to communicate in real time over the Internet. This can be Abbreviated as 'IM' , This is analagous to a telephone conversation but using text-based, not voice-based, communication. Typically, the instant messaging system alerts you whenever somebody on your private list is online. You can then initiate a chat session with that particular individual.

Chat/Instant Messaging Features:

Windows live messenger

Each instant messaging network provider creates its own instant messaging software. These applications are free and are usually designed only to connect to one instant messaging network.

One of the key features that windows live messenger provide is organising you contacts. This feature will allow people to different contacts into different groups as shown in the screenshot to the right. The brackets (0/6) is telling the user that 0 out of the 6 people are offline, by doing this you can access your friends easier and quicker. By structuring the groups accordingly you can clearly see the contacts that you talk to the most.

Sharing folders:

Sharing Folders will be a new and simple way for people to share personal photos, documents, and files with their Messenger contacts. You can create a Sharing Folder by simply dragging files onto a contact name in Messenger. This will create an exact copy of the files on both you and your contact's computers, and create a Sharing Folder that can be accessed from Messenger, and on the desktop. 

Voice calling:

This feature will let users who sign up for Windows Live phone call (provided by a Microsoft partner) to easily call landline and mobile phones. You will be able to set up a Windows Live Call account through the Messenger interface and start making calls within minutes. You will be able to purchase minutes upfront, then add minutes when your balance runs low. One of the great things about this will be that you will be able to use it to make really affordable domestic and international calls. You will be able to make PC-to-PC calls for free, with no need to sign up for a Windows Live phone call account, so long as you and your Messenger contact both have compatible speakers and microphones (or headsets).

Offline messaging:

You will be able to send messages to your contacts even when they're offline. They will receive the message as soon as they sign in again.

DBabble

DBabble is a powerful instant messaging and discussion / chat server and client which allows users to send instant messages and attachments, have private conversations, and create/participate in private or public meeting rooms and discussions in real time Faster and easier than Email, the DBabble communications solution is ideal for Internet Service Providers and large or small companies wanting to deliver the benefits of real time communications to their organization and users. DBabble is easily customizable, does not require direct internet access, and can be run stand alone on a small company network or integrated into large scale internet services provided by ISP's or corporations. 

Features:

• Translate to any language, customize every piece of English text, or use one of our supplied translations for Spanish, German, French, Italian, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Russian, Portuguese, and Danish.
• Chat rooms that can be optionally moderated
• Customize the Windows client to have any name other than DBabble, use whatever background image, font, and color scheme you want and change every piece of text visible to users.
• Hide features you don't use so that your users are not overwhelmed with too many features. Option to allow users to show the hidden features if they want to.
• Private conversation feature, where users can see text as the other user is typing it - even in the web browser interface.
• A very customizable interface. There are many user preferences to change the layout of the interface to best suit the way in which each person uses DBabble.
• Send text messages to mobile phones.

Although these two are well known instant messaging services there are other networks that provide a chat service such as social networks like Facebook.

Facebook provides a chat option as shown on the screenshot on the right. This allows people to talk to people via chat who are online at the time. It is free to use the chat service but to use this you need to have a Facebook account and can only to talk to people that are your confirmed friends and online at the time. When people are online and available to talk there will be a green circle next to their name this makes people aware that they are there to talk to. If they haven't spoken to anyone in a while there will be a grey crescent next to there name, this means that they are online but haven't been talking.

Advantages & Disadvantages of instant messaging

Advantages:

• Easy to use.
• Its real Time, fast and instant responses. 
• You can speak to the people you want to (creating your own buddy list). 
• Free to send messages don't have to pay to people like you would via phone calls or text messaging.
• Instant messaging systems offer a safer environment than chat rooms.
• It is possible to talk to more than one person at once.

Disadvantages:

• Security risks such as: Message interception, virus via file transfer (bypasses virus scanning).
• Privacy concerns.
• Can be distracting for many people. 
• Lack administration.
• Messages can intercepted. 
• Always need a computer and network connection. 

"Messaging programs bring instant risk"

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/3378647.stm

"Online child safety drive launched"

"The aim is to stop paedophiles "grooming" youngsters online."

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/2629611.stm

Chat


Internet chat rooms allow you to communicate with different kinds of people from all over the world. They allow you to meet different kinds of people who share similar interests, goals, hobbies and desires. Internet chats can also be a great learning center ( e.g. chatting forums) where people can ask questions and receive answers on products and services, computer troubleshooting and more.
Single chat rooms are probably the most common chats on the internet. They managed and run by dating websites. Video/Webcam chats are also common forms of chatting because they allow you to view your contact as you chat. While video chatting is the most interactive form of chatting, they are also the most dangerous. Other Internet chats include business chat rooms which allow speedy exchange of trade stock tips and business related information. Christian chat rooms are other popular chats which users turn to for fellowship and good conversation.


Features

•Internet chats not only allow you to send and receive instant messages, they also allow you to share pictures, and files. Some Internet chat rooms include emoticons which are smiley faces used to describe what your present emotion is. Some Internet chats include sound effects which range from serious to silly and allow you to. Other chat rooms allow you to change color combinations to create a theme or background that works for you as you are chatting.

Warnings

•Do not provide strangers with personal information when using Internet chat rooms. In this day and age when identity theft and fraud are of great concerns, it is important to protect personal information at all costs. If you have children who use chat rooms, monitor the conversations and the people they communicates with. There are many Internet predators, pedophiles and sex offenders who send explicit information and pictures to underage children. Always read the rules and regulations before using chat rooms.

Yahoo Messenger Features

With Yahoo Messenger features, Yahoo gives you options beyond the basics of instant messaging. You can set Yahoo Messenger to alert you of incoming messages or e-mail. You can protect your privacy, personalize with IMVironments and avatars or add webcam features. Here's more about each of these features.
Alerts
Alerts let you know when you receive an IM, when someone on your messenger list comes on or goes offline, when you receive e-mail, or when your calendar shows an upcoming event. To set an alert:

• Go to the Messenger menu, select "Preferences," click "Alerts" and select "Enable Alert Sounds."
• Pick when you want an alert, using the Event menu.
• Choose the type of alert you want for each event. This can be a sound from the menu or one you add yourself.
• Close the window to finish.

Privacy
By using stealth settings and ignoring unwanted contacts, you can help ensure your privacy and security. Stealth settings allow you to appear offline to some contacts and online to others. To set this, start by right-clicking on the group name or contact. Select "Stealth Settings," and choose online, offline or permanently offline. Click "OK" to finish. You'll know you appear offline to a certain contact or group if their name is in italics in your messenger list.
You can block messages from a single contact or up to 100 by ignoring them. You'll always appear to be offline to them. First, though, you have to delete the contact from your messenger list. Here's how you can block, or ignore, someone.

• Click on the Messenger menu, select "Preferences" and then "Ignore List." Choose "Ignore only the people below."
• Click on "Add" and enter the Yahoo ID of the person you want to ignore.
• To finish, click "Ignore" and "OK."
• To later stop ignoring the person, enter the contact's ID and click "Remove."

Personalizing
Avatars, audibles and IMVironments (themed IM window backgrounds) let you make Yahoo Messenger your own. An avatar is a character that you can personalize by changing its physical appearance, clothes, accessories and backgrounds and then show as your personal icon on Yahoo Messenger.

Image courtesy of Yahoo Yahoo Messenger extras like imvironments allow users to customize the appearance of their messenger screens.

To create and customize your avatar, go to http://avatars.yahoo.com/. To display the avatar in IMs and the messenger list, follow these steps:
Go to the Messenger menu, select "Preferences" and click on "Display Image." Click the Avatar box to show your avatar, and select "Enable display images everywhere" to see pictures and avatars from your contacts.
Audibles are talking animated characters you can send in an IM to comment or make a joke. Click the lips icon below the conversation window to access the audibles. Click the Send button above the one you want to send. Click "More Audibles" to see them all.
An IMVironment (IMV) is a themed conversation window that you select. You and your contacts can see your IMV every time you IM. Your messages print over IMVs like Fishtank, which is animated with swimming fish. The Doodle IMV lets you and your contact draw in color on the same canvas, while other IMVs let you play interactive games together.
Webcams
Webcam capabilities let you view a contact's webcam video or send your own. Viewing someone else's webcam is easy. Just click "Contact" in the IM window and select "Contact Options" and "View Webcam." Sending your own is more complicated. For specific requirements, see Yahoo Messenger's Webcam Help section.

Yahoo Messenger also offers tools to simplify instant messaging -- and make it more fun.

Email

Define Email

The word 'email' is short for 'electronic mail,' the transmission of messages over communications networks. The messages can be notes entered from the keyboard or electronic files stored on disk. Most mainframes, minicomputers, and computer networks have an e-mail system. Some electronic-mail systems are confined to a single computer system or network, but others have gateways to other computer systems, enabling users to send electronic mail anywhere in the world. Companies that are fully computerized make extensive use of    e-mail because it is fast, flexible, and reliable.

Explain the features of 2 services

G mail priority inbox find the important messages you recieve and sorts them for you.


At the top of the email it will bring the important emails to the top of the list, and the rest will go near the bottom of the list.

It has a star feature with this you can put emails you want in this folder this will allow you to come back to them in the future easily.

Gmail is a better service for organising emails where as hotmail will have all the emails together and give you problems when trying to find emails.

Gmail has filters which can automatically put a star on emails from spersific people this will allow you to access this emails straigh away.

Gmail has a great spam filter which can sort emails which will be good for you, this will be a excellent feature for people that use there mail frequently. This will allow the person to acces there important emails that will be at the top of he inbox and the less improtant emails will be at the bottom of inbox's. This will develop when frequently using your email.

It records which emails are important are for you it will then sort it out into a prioroity listing, it also records the emails that you reply to the most this will go down as more important and emails and be higher in the inbox and the emails that arent as important will be at the bottom of the inbox.

You can also manually input emails to the top/bottom of list.

For a system like g mail to work efficently you will have to give it a period of time depending on how often you use the mail features as at first it wont be aware of which emials are important and which are spam.

The end result will be better as you will be able to access the emails you need quicker.

Gmail have also added a very effective feature such as chat. Thsi will allow people to talk via chat when they are both online, this will save time and be quicker than emialing majority of the time. You can also call people directly from g mail this feature will cost people to use, to use it you buy credits fro your account which you use up when calling someone. This is effective as it can be used when out and about gmail phone. This is another feature that the server provides this allows people to view the mail from any phone that has an internet service, this will help mainly business workers as they can access there mail on there commute to work. Another popular feature of g mail is 'buzz' this feature allows you to locate where people are that are sending emails. This feature also allows you to send updates, videos and share status's where you can also have conversations with friends/ contacts on your g mail account. Although the buzz location feature will be good to locate friends, there are disadvantages to this as people from anywhere in your local area can locate where abouts you live and the road name, this is prime for burglary to occur, but this features isn't activated until you turn the feature on. 

Yahoo mail

Yahoo mail has a variety of different features  one feature allows you download a variety of different applications as shown in the screenshot on the right. The applications that you download are free of charge this will be good for many people as when accessing their mail they can easily access away from the page by using these application. Another good feature yahoo mail provide is 'Auto check for messages' this will provide you with emails as they come in the page will automatically show the email without you needing to refresh the page. This will save time as some people may easily forget to refresh the page this will show them their emails as they come through.

One very good feature is the 'spam and security', this automatically puts spam emails into a separate folder this helps to keep your original inbox organised and so that you can see your important emails from contacts first. A good thing they provide is an anti-virus software for all emails and attachments, this reduces the risk of gaining a virus from emails incoming. 

Benefits and problems about email


Benefits:

• Email is easy to use and free of charge to whichever country you are emailing to or receiving from. 
• The person you are emailing will receive it very quickly. 
• Easy to prioritize: Since the mails have subject lines, it is easy to prioritize them and ignore unwanted mails.
• Reliable and secure: Constant efforts are being taken to improve the security in emails.
• Environment friendly: Postal mails use paper as a medium to send letters. Electronic mail this, saves a lot of trees from being axed. It also saves fuel needed in transportation.
• Informal and conversational: The language used in e-mails is generally simple and this makes the communication informal. Sending and receiving e-mails takes less time, so it can be used as a tool for interaction.
• Advertising tool: Many individuals and companies are using e-mails to advertise their products, services, etc.

Problems:

• Viruses: These are computer programs having the potential to harm a computer system. These programs copy themselves and further infect the computer. The recipient needs to scan the mails, as viruses are transmitted through them and have the potential to harm computer systems.
• Spam: E-mails when used to send unsolicited messages and unwanted advertisements create nuisance and is termed as Spam. Checking and deleting these unwanted mails can unnecessarily consume a lot of time, and it has become necessary to block or filter the unwanted e-mails by means of spam filters. 
• Hacking: The act of breaking into computer security is termed as hacking. After the e-mail is sent and before it is received by the desired recipient, it "bounces" between servers located in different parts of the world. Hence, the e-mail can be hacked by a professional hacker.
• Misinterpretation: One has to be careful while posting any kind of content through an e-mail. If typed in a hurry, the matter could be misinterpreted.
• Lengthy mails: If the mail is too long and not properly presented the reader may lose interest in reading it.
• Not suitable for business: Since the content posted via e-mails is considered informal, there is a chance of business documents going unnoticed. Thus, urgent transactions and especially those requiring signatures are not managed through e-mails.
• rowded inbox: Over a period of time, the e-mail inbox may get crowded with mails. It becomes difficult for the user to manage such a huge chunk of mails.

Windows Live Mail 

Windows Live Mail, the latest email client from Microsoft Corporation has many added features and utilities absent from its predecessors - Outlook Express and Windows Mail (on Vista). These include Photo email, enhanced security for scanning incoming messages, RSS right in your inbox, Quick views, custom layout of the interface to tune the software to your requirements and, yes, multiple email account configuration including Hotmail, Gmail and Yahoo!Mail. (For Yahoo!Mail, you need to hold a premium account at Yahoo!).

Photo email

The Photo email feature of Windows Live Mail is a neat way of sending high resolution photographs to friends and family over email. So why is this so cool? Well, ordinarily, you would attach the large file size high resolution photograph to the email. Sending several such photos would result in oversized email messages which your recipients or might not like to download and store in the inbox. Large sized emails may also be returned to you (bounced back) if the recipient's email account is running short on space or if there is a size limit on the attachments. Photo email sends just the thumbnails (smaller versions) of your photos. The recipients can choose to view the larger version by clicking on the thumbnail - the larger versions are displayed from a private web location. Additionally, you control the layout of the thumbnails in the email message. Photo email also allows for basic photo editing including adding borders.
Read send photos over email for a detailed article on Windows Live Mail Photo email feature.

Enhanced security

The popular Outlook Express email client was notoriously insecure and vulnerable to viruses and worms. The security issue was addressed first on Windows Mail by the introduction of an automated junk email filter. The same has also been included on Windows Live Mail.
The filter scans all incoming emails and suspected spam and phishing messages are moved to the "Junk e-mail" folder automatically. You also have control over the level of security you want and you can configure several options such as Safe Senders List etc.
The automated filtering for spam and phishing emails in Windows Live Mail is far from perfect. I had some legitimate messages thrown into the Junk e-mail folder with the default settings, but, I guess, like any other automated tool, this too requires some amount of tweaking and will "learn" over time.
On the whole, I appreciate Microsoft's inclusion of this feature in their new email client.

Multiple email accounts

Just like the earlier email clients, you can have multiple email accounts in Windows Live Mail including Gmail, Hotmail and Yahoo!Mail. Sometime back Microsoft had stopped supporting Hotmail on Outlook Express, however, it's now available on the new program. And, obviously, you can configure the POP3 email accounts of your web sites on Windows Live Mail.
Access to Yahoo!Mail from Windows Live Mail requires you to have a premium account at Yahoo!
For step by step instructions with screenshots, please refer Windows Live Mail setup for email accounts, Gmail account on Windows Live Mail and add Hotmail in Windows Live Mail.

Custom layouts and Quick views

Though Windows Live Mail has a simple interface, you can change it to suit your needs. You can change colors, move columns and modify the layout to get only what you want to see and thus save time.
Quick views show you specific categories from your email and news accounts.

RSS in your inbox

No need for a separate feeds reader. With Windows Live Mail, you can subscribe to RSS feeds from different web sites and blogs and have them delivered to you inbox.

Blogging directly from Windows Live Mail

This program is definitely much more than an email and news client. A non-descript icon found at the very end of the row opens a cool blogging tool for Windows Live Spaces. In order to blog from Windows Live Mail, you need to create an account at Windows Live Spaces which takes a couple of minutes.

News stories on emailing

"Online auction house eBay has confirmed reports that some of its users have been hit by spam e-mails that may be able to gain their account details."

eBay said the problem was industry-wide, and that its sites were as secure as possible.

The scam targets eBay users with infected spam or mail-shot e-mails.

If the e-mails are opened, they can record what keys the user types and send the details back to the criminals behind the spam mail shots.

How the scam works

The method, known as 'key logging', allows the fraudsters to find the eBay user's exact password, the National Hi-Tech Crime Unit (NHTCU) has confirmed.

Internet fraud is an industry-wide issue and we would encourage everyone to regularly update their virus detection software  eBay spokeswoman

A spokeswoman for the NHTCU said the agency would not be making any further comment.

Once they have gained access to users' accounts, the criminals can steal from them in a number of ways.

Firstly, they can pretend to be a seller and inform the eBay users that one of their specific recent failed bids has, after all, been successful, and ask for payment.

The goods in question obviously never appear.

Fraudsters can also use an eBay user's account to buy an item put up for sale by one of their criminal associates.

The way for users to avoid getting trapped by key logging is to ensure their computer's virus protection software is up to date.

In addition to infectious spam e-mails including the 'key logging' software, more simple e-mail scams have also been targeting eBay customers.

These generally work by the using fake e-mails purporting to be from eBay which ask for users to reconfirm their log-in details.

Popularity brings problems

"Internet fraud is an industry-wide issue and we would encourage everyone to regularly update their virus detection software," said an eBay spokeswoman.

"As part of eBay's on-going commitment to trust and safety, we work extensively with official online fraud experts such as the NHTCU to fight internet fraud."

The spokeswoman added that eBay has an entire section of its site dedicated to informing users about best safety practice.

A number of banks and credit card customers have already been targeted by both fake emails and key-logging infections, but criminals are believed to have moved on to target eBay because of the auction house's giant popularity. It lists two million auctions every day.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/4181897.stm

Hackers send hoax e-mail from MP

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/hampshire/7461409.stm