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Twitter To Tweet Ad Placement on Public Timeline

Posted by on Wednesday, 3 November, 2010
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Twitter Advertising Timeline News

After 3 years of continued development, finally Twitter have decided that placing adverts on a public timeline within a whole bunch of tweets will work.

It was not surprising considering that earlier this year, the techno developments at Twitter Inc. started to place advertising tweets in the search results displayed by the search engines, plus on the trending topics tab on the right hand side of your home page.

Don’t get me wrong, but I think Twitter does have it’s place for many people – but when I signed up to test the social stream, all I ended up with wa a million and one people trying to sell some dumb internet marketing programme in a get rich quick scheme.

OK, Stephen Fry may be one of the most popular users over President Obama, and Google displays his ‘tweets’ within search results – but what use is 140 characters to explain anything when you have to include a webpage to promote your thoughts?

Anyway, for Twitter this is a big thing and they need to start looking at ‘commercial’ intent for the debt busting platform. And this comes as no surprise to the world with business models like Facebook making an absolute killing from a free platform and paid advertising.

This had to happen sometime because let’s face it, how many ‘Venture Capital’ businesses do you know that will put hundreds of million into a loss making product, not to see a return in 3 years?

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Did Google Take Your Private Data?

Posted by on Friday, 29 October, 2010
Google Wearing The Dunce Hat

If the cap fits....

It is now perfectly clear that Google has admitted that they have breached security in the UK by removing personal data through wi-fi connections as they were taking images ready for it’s live map database.

Earlier in the year, Google said that “NO” significant data had been collected’- which now appears to be complete utter lies.

Among some of the data taken included private email details and passwords, along with lots more private and obviously, insecure information which was allowed to be sucked through the air at the bat of an eye lid. According to Google’s PR, they claim it was “a mistake” and that they are working to delete the data.

The office of ‘The Information Commissioner’  of th eprivacy watchdog has said that they are going to look into it again and see exactly what it was that Google had extracted, including why and how.

What I find to be completely unbelievable is a company who are obviously so big and knowledgeable as Google, can map millions of addresses with personal email addresses, passwords and other personal data – all through vehicle’s with wi-fi, claim that they did not know it was happening and didn’t want the data either!

I must admit, I will be following this one pretty closely, because I can’t think for one minute they will use the excuse that they were experiencing poor 3G connection and couldn’t upload the images quick enough, like we experience every day?

But, what if it was me or you that got arrested for doing something like this, and we had the personal data of millions of people from accross the country – what would happen to us?

Prison!

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Sexy Swindler or Hot Hacker

Posted by on Wednesday, 13 October, 2010

Sexy Internet Fraudster to Appear in Court

Would She Cost You More Than Just A Few Drinks?

Picture this, you are out with the boys and having a whale of a time in a bar in Manhattan – when your eye’s get tangled up with a 5ft 6inch brunette standing across the room, and you offer to buy her a drink thinking she is just being a little flirtatious.

You talk for a while, exchange contact details and wait to see who makes the next move.

The following day you get an email from her asking to meet again, but what you don’t know is that attached to the email is a virus which is taking your passwords and login details for any of your bank accounts, credit cards and other financial online services.

Well, that is just one of the tricks used by a group of eastern European girls who were set up by a gang of ‘internet fraudsters’ – to gain access to account information so they could drain you of any finance you ever had.

Kristina Svechinskaya, a 21 year old student from Russia was one of those ‘temptresses’ who would catch you out, and suck you dry.

Not only did she work for the eastern European gang to swindle unsuspecting prey, but she also opened accounts with different banks in a multitude of names so that she could retain around 10% of whatever was taken from the heist as her reward.

Svechinskaya was arrested earlier this month in New York – along with another 37 people who were part of the gang. She will appear in court tomorrow charged with conspiracy to commit bank fraud, and the false use of a passport.

The estimated ‘internet heist’ was calculated at nearly £2 million, with Svechinskaya allegedly making around $45,000 for her part.

Preet Bharara, who is a US Attorney based in Manhattan said: “The modern, hi-tech bank heist does not require a gun, a mask, a note, or a getaway car. It requires only the internet and ingenuity and can be accomplished in the blink of an eye, with just a click of the mouse.”

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House Prices Fall For A Third Month Running

Posted by on Monday, 27 September, 2010

House Prices Fall for 3rd MonthThe cost of housing has fallen again for a third month on the run. But, is this a sign of a possible double dip recession?

With nearly 0.5%, the average price of a house in the UK now stands at just over £157,500 according to industry specialists, which is now taking the prices back to what they were nearly 8 months ago.

What is more concerning is that industry specialists, Hometrack said:’Market expectations are now based upon the belief that there will be a period of continued house price falls.’

As well as the price dip, it was also noted that the amount of people looking to buy new homes also fell by 2.9% – which matches the same decrease month on month, matching the picture being set by the housing prices.

Richard Donnell, who is the director of research at Hometrack UK said: “Growing concerns over the economic outlook and public spending cuts are weighing heavily on would-be purchasers-Anecdotally, agents report that there are fewer purchasers and that those looking to buy are both cautious and choosy.”

The Council for Mortgage Lenders claims that this is a clear and evedential picture of a potential mortgage famine, predicting further falls within the industry.

There was no major difference around the country, with London even seeing a slump in prices and people who are looking to buy.

On top of all this, the banking mortgage lending system crashed heavily last month, which again is a prediction trigger for the future of the property market and how good, or bad it may be.

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$503 Million Fine for French Banks

Posted by on Tuesday, 21 September, 2010

French Banks Fined
The French competitions authority have fined 11 of the countries top banking groups for colluding to fix the price of clearing cheques electronically, with a $503 million fines. (£330 million)

The Autorité de la Concurrence issued one of the biggest fines ever impossed on a retail banking group, Crédit Agricole which is France’s largest bank by retail branches with a total fine of €103.9m – and the next in line was BPCE, the mutual bank and second-largest retail lender with €90.9m to pay.

The countries leading bank in way of sales, BNP Paribas, was issued with a fine tital of €63.3m, and Société Générale and its Crédit du Nord sub were fined €60.5m.

One of the smallest fines issued was to The Banque de France, which is the states banking system – who were fined only €350,000 in relation to it’s retail activities.

Since the introduction of electronic clearance between banking services, the cost of “cheque clearing” has been reduced significantly. And, instead of passing on these savings to the customers, they began to charge a flat fee of 4.3cents per cheque to clear.

In the UK, this could well open up an old wound – which is clearing times for cheques. Whilst some banks will show cheques cleared the same day (because it is electronic and communicates daily) whilst others take anything from 3 to 5 days to do exactly the same job.

Personally, I have put this to test and walked in to a Lloyds TSB branch in my local town of Cheltenham, and requested a cheque be expressed. The member of staff told me that “by expressing a cheque does not actually clear it any faster.”

On a seperate ooccassion, I tried the same theory with a puppy look on my face saying that I needed the funds ceared to instruct payments from my account the same day. Within miniutes and, at a click of the button, I was told that the “cheque was clear.”

So, if it is that easy, why doesn’t it happen like that as standard?

Oh of course, it would mean that the banking system would probably lose millions in the process, and we would get ‘our’ money into ‘our’ accounts faster, leaving the bank without the 3 days play time to make money on stocks and shares… and we wouldn’t want that, would we?

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Bank of England Interest Rates Stay at 0.5% Again

Posted by on Friday, 10 September, 2010

Bank of England
No Change For Interest Rates For Period 3
With the economic growth not showing any major signs of improvement, The Bank of England has decided to show some extra support by keeping the base rate of interest at 0.5% for now, in hope that this will improve sales and trust on the build up to Christmas.

First Six Months
At the turn of the year, there was a very bleak outlook on how things would pan out with the first quarter of the year well below what was anticipated. The second quarter was a different story completely, with retail sales on the up and a growth of 1.2%.

Since then, the early stats being bumbled around are not so good, with data pointing to a not so sharp increase compared to what happened in period two.

Recently a survey was constructed within the manufacturing and and services sectors, and these figures have pointed towards a certain point in the wrong direction.

This means that the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) which is constructed of a nine strong personel, have left the rates unchanged since March 2009 when the historic low was first witnessed.

Although this doesn’t paint an extremely pretty picture, indicators are still suggesting that the UK economy is still perfectly on track even though it may seem a little bumpy and spazmodic.

Will this mean that they place the Monetary Policy on the back burner for a while longer, or take us by complete surprise and start to rain in the changes earlier than later to avoid any extra sudden problems in the future?

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Will Bankers Give Businesses The Bonuses They Need?

Posted by on Friday, 3 September, 2010

Small Business Finance
To the naked eye, a double dip recesion was just something talked about by people in the finance world. But, as house prices fall again, it looks like it could be a reality check for not only homeowners, but small businesses too.

Many banks that were threatened by the government to rein in their behaviour or be punished, have not only fallen short of the promise but come no where close to hitting the mark.

Just this week, Credit Suisse has announced that it will be paying a special mid-year bonus to all of it’s hard working executives – a completely understanding gesture considering it now avoids the bonus tax set by Alistair Darling which expired in April 2010.

Much like most Professional Bankers, the system has been brushed under the carpet as they weave their way around it making Alistair Darling admit that he had got the bank tax completely wrong.

So, now that we have been drowned in the pit which was created by the banking industry, they are laughing all the way to their bonuses.

And whilst these “fat” cats eat cheese and drink port till the cows come home, the small businesses have to fight even harder to keep themselves above water.

Some things never change!

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Pakistan Aid Relief Boost By IMF And World Bank

Posted by on Thursday, 2 September, 2010

Pakistan Aid Relief
It was announced today that the IMF and the World Bank are to step in and help the Pakistan Aid Relief, as the country witnesses the largest humanitarian disaster. The IMF will provide around 450 million dollars as emergency financing to Pakistan to help rebuild and resolve the aftermath of the devastating floods which have affected well in excess of 18 million people.

Talks have been continuing in Washington between the IMF and Pakistan Officials for more than a week after Islamabad warned they would not be able to meet key IMF targets on inflation and budget deficit levels.

Originally, Pakistan had agreed to the terms in 2008 in return for a 11-billion-dollar “stand-by” finance package, 7.3 billion dollars of which had already been pledged.

IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn made the aid announcement after meeting with Pakistan’s finance minister Abdul Hafeez Shaikh.

The World Bank said independantly it would increase its flood-related efforts to one billion dollars from 900 million dollars, and the money would come from the bank’s fund for the poorest and third world countries and the loans are concessional and carry no interest payments.

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