Living the Miles We Travel, with an E-concierge App?

By guest author Swarna Ellison of PlayyIt

When you first started traveling for work, do you remember how exciting the prospect of traveling to and exploring new places was?  It was a chance to explore these places, expand your horizons, and meet new people. But for most of us, work travel has become tedious. Planning for personal time while on business trips is difficult in part because of lack of time, but also because of business networking demands on our personal time. >>>

Catching Up On Readings: Cloud Computing Roundup

We’ve covered a wide range of cloud computing endeavors this year in both the Thought Leaders in Cloud Computing series and in Tech Stocks and other themed series. From CCSi, which is dedicated solely to the cloud computing needs of the U.S. government, to Cornerstone OnDemand, which serves businesses and people in 179 countries, these companies are changing the way we accomplish tasks, organize our work, store and access information, and communicate with each other. See all of our cloud computing posts here. Click on the paragraph link for the rest of this week’s posts. >>>

Cookie Marenco’s World of Music

Cookie Marenco knows the music industry inside out. She started her career at the age of 14 as a piano teacher. In 1982, she bootstrapped her recording studio with a partner and received Grammy nominations and two Gold Records. In 1987, she joined Windham Hill Records as a producer. Here she learned how a record label operates, the legal issues of music, relationship development, and the intricacies and problems of music distribution and branding. In 1997, Cookie became the chief engineer for Liquid Audio, one of the first online music download companies. Part of her job was bringing indie labels to the company. >>>

Catching Up On Readings: New Year’s Roundtable Challenge

After the 150^th roundtable celebration last week, we’re back to regular business! During this week’s roundtable, we had five entrepreneurs pitch.

Before I talk about them, I’d like to encourage all entrepreneurs who want to apply for the 1M/1M New Year Challenge to submit completed applications. We have received a large number of incomplete applications, and quite possibly, you are working on honing your material to present the most compelling front. That’s fine. You have time, until December 20, 2012. In case you are looking for the application guidelines, please check the official rules for the contest. There, you will find comprehensive instructions on what questions need to be answered to qualify for the voting round that begins on December 21, 2012. Click on the paragraph link for the rest of this week’s posts. >>>

Thought Leaders in Cloud Computing: A Second Conversation with Mark Settle, CIO of BMC (Part 6)

Sramana Mitra: Could you summarize BMC’s philosophy in terms of your product roadmap in the area of the cloud?

Mark Settle: We have a SaaS offering for one of our principal offers, our remedy service staff solution. Now customers can implement that on campus, as they have done in the past. They basically have access to two versions. One is a hosted solution we call “Remedy on demand,” and the second is a version of remedy that has been written on a Force.com platform called “Remedy Force.” As you mentioned before, there are a lot of IT people or shops who want to come out of the IT business and who don’t want to worry about the hardware or the DR capability. >>>

Catching Up On Readings: Deep Learning

As background to our new series on big data and machine learning, which will be published later this week, readers may want to check out this VentureBeat article on “deep learning,” a field still in the early stages of development even though products like Google Street View incorporate it. Click on the paragraph link for the rest of this week’s posts. >>>

Catching Up On Readings: New Philosophies On Internet Security

A recent Wired article by Mat Honan argues that protecting accounts with robust passwords is no longer a viable strategy to Internet security. Honan’s article comes in response to a New York Times piece on protecting yourself against hackers. With data and identity theft increasingly common, it’s a welcome debate. How can individuals best protect themselves, and how do various corporations accept their share of the responsibility? Click on the paragraph link for the rest of this week’s posts. >>>

Seed Capital Using Crowdfunding: Korstiaan Zandvliet, CEO of Symbid, Amsterdam (Part 3)

Sramana Mitra: For investors with zero or limited experience in pre-seed or seed investment, what do you do to mitigate their risks? Of course, this is a highly risky business. How do you recommend or help your investors evaluate deals?

Korstiaan Zandvliet: I think the second part of the interview addresses risk analysis and risk management from an investors’ side. From the side of Symbid, the reference to risk is mentioned in the How-It-Works-section on the website and in the Terms & Conditions one has to agree with before making an investment. Also, the opportunity to retract shares and reinvest them in another idea is one way to mitigate risk to a certain amount. However, it remains so that with any form of investing, risk is part of the deal. It is up to the investor how much he or she is willing to risk losing. >>>