Author Archives: Matt Kapko

Many modern IT leaders are fascinated with virtual reality (VR), but they’re also cautious about investing resources too early. Marketing opportunities in VR could speed up the timeline, however, and put pressure on CIOs to ensure they are leading the charge to blend marketing and VR with proficient technical underpinnings.

“CIOs can help marketers anticipate the implications of the technology,” says Thomas Husson, vice president and principal analyst at Forrester Research. IT professionals will be indispensable to determining standards around VR, how marketers should capture content in VR-ready mode, and when marketers should work with IT to build their own VR systems, according to Husson. 

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SAN FRANCISCO — Apple’s new iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus have a number of new features, including a force-sensitive home button (no more clicking), water- and dust-resistant enclosure, better camera, brighter display, stereo speakers, faster processor and improved graphics performance. However, one key feature is missing: the 3.5mm audio port.

The move wasn’t a surprise. Reports surfaced months ago about an iPhone without an audio jack. However, during its annual product showcase, Apple explained why it decided to remove the standard port. Phil Schiller, senior vice president of worldwide marketing at Apple, said it was a necessary change to improve audio clarity and controls, free up space for better internal components and to make the device water and dust resistant.

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Apple is cleaning up the App Store as it prepares to release iOS 10, a new generation of iPhones and an updated Apple Watch at its annual product showcase on Sept. 7. The company says it will begin to enforce stricter guidelines and a more comprehensive review process for software in the App Store. Apps that have been abandoned by their developers or “no longer function as intended” will be removed from the shop, according to Apple. 

“We are implementing an ongoing process of evaluating apps for these issues, notifying their developers, and removing problematic and abandoned apps from the App Store,” Apple wrote in an email distributed to iOS developers. “We know that many of you work hard to build innovative apps and update your apps on the App Store with new content and features. However, there are also apps on the App Store that no longer function as intended or follow current review guidelines, and others which have not been supported with compatibility updates for a long time.” 

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Ten years ago, less than three years after Google upended the email space with Gmail, the company took on Microsoft and other business software vendors and launched Google Apps, its own flavor of cloud-based tools for productivity, collaboration and communication. Today more than five million businesses use its Google for Work business apps, including Google Drive, Docs, Sheets and Slides. 

A wide range of related training tools are available for Google Apps users and IT professionals interested in gaining new skills or becoming certified administrators. Basic training classes and interactive in-app tutorials can help you learn the ins and outs of Google Apps, and IT staff can do the necessary coursework to earn Google Apps Administrator certification.

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Google appears to finally be trying to clarify its strategies for communication and messaging. However, the company determined it needs more messaging apps — not fewer apps. 

By the end of this year, Google will maintain at least eight different messaging apps, including Hangouts, Google Messenger, Google Chat, Google Voice, the Jibe rich communication services (RCS) app for carriers, Allo, Duo and the Spaces group-sharing app. Following the early August release of Duo, a new one-to-one video calling app, and the complementary messaging app Allo, which is expected to launch before summer’s end, Google says it plans to reposition Hangouts as an enterprise service.

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LinkedIn today unveiled a new marketplace designed to help freelance professionals find consumers and small businesses in need of their services. LinkedIn ProFinder aims to deliver similar value for independent workers to what full-time professionals get on the social network. 

“The freelance economy is on the rise,” wrote Vaibhav Goel, group product manager at LinkedIn, in a blog post. “The number of freelancers on LinkedIn has grown by nearly 50 percent in just the past five years. As the workforce evolves, we, too, are evolving to ensure we’re creating opportunity for the expanding sector of professionals looking for independent, project-based work in place of the typical 9 to 5 profession.”

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General Electric’s (GE) CIO isn’t interested in picking a winner or loser when it comes to collaboration apps. Nor does he want to preclude any of GE’s 333,000 employees from using the collaboration tools that work best for them. “Collaboration is a noisy space right now because there are so many different tools,” Jim Fowler said during an interview this week at CIO.com’s CIO 100 event in Rancho Palos Verdes, Calif. “I’m not going to get in the middle of it. I’d like to see how it works itself out on its own.” 

In the fight against shadow IT, CIOs have faced for more significant challenges than modern consumer messaging apps. And the popularity of apps such as WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, iMessage and Google Hangouts has, in many cases, led to a more open IT approach to consumer communication tools in enterprise. 

When IT leaders let employees use their personal devices for work, it’s a safe assumption that multiple consumer messaging apps will also come into play. The onus is on the CIO and the IT team to mitigate potential problems that could come from the careless use of such apps at work, according to Adam Preset, research director at Gartner. CIOs should realize consumer messaging apps can increase staff efficiency, but they should also try to empower workers to make choices that don’t threaten their organizations, he says. 

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