Page 4,290«..1020..4,2894,2904,2914,292..4,3004,310..»

Blockchain’s Got No ‘Killer App’ Yet, Says Morgan Stanley, Even as Bitcoin Soars – Barron’s


Barron's
Blockchain's Got No 'Killer App' Yet, Says Morgan Stanley, Even as Bitcoin Soars
Barron's
Morgan Stanley writes that Blockchain, the technology for an open, verifiable general ledger, is still in a "proof of concept" phase, and it may be several years before it is used in everyday practice for financial settlements. They see incumbents such ...
Morgan Stanley Says Bitcoin Needs Regulation to Keep RisingBloomberg

all 3 news articles »

Read more here:
Blockchain's Got No 'Killer App' Yet, Says Morgan Stanley, Even as Bitcoin Soars - Barron's

Read More..

A cryptocurrency for weed is sending Dennis Rodman back to North Korea – The Verge

Dennis Rodman is back in North Korea, the former NBA star announced this week, with help from a marijuana cryptocurrency startup. Rodman, who has made several controversial visits to North Korea, tweeted a photo of himself holding an airline ticket for the state-owned Air Koryo on Tuesday. In a subsequent tweet, he thanked PotCoin, a digital currency for buying and selling weed, for sponsoring my mission.

The purpose of Rodmans visit remains unclear, though it comes amid heightened tensions between the US and North Korea over Pyongyangs nuclear program. Four Americans are also currently detained in North Korea.

In a press release announcing the visit, PotCoin said Rodman will provide more details about his historic trip upon returning to the US. The weed startup also described him as having long-time friendships with both President Donald Trump and Kim Jong Un, the autocratic leader of North Korea. Rodman has previously appeared on the Trump-hosted reality show The Apprentice, and endorsed Trump during the 2016 presidential campaign. He also described Kim as a friend for life after visiting North Korea in 2013, and has drawn criticism for his public appearances alongside the dictator.

Speaking to CNN before boarding his flight, Rodman said hopes to do something that's pretty positive during his trip, though he said he did not intend to bring up the detained Americans during any discussions with North Korean leaders. Well that's not my purpose right now... My purpose is to go over there and try to see if I can keep bringing sports to North Korea," the former Chicago Bulls forward told CNN.

Rodman, wearing a PotCoin-branded t-shirt and baseball cap, said in a short video released Tuesday that the trip is all about peace. One of Rodmans previous trips to North Korea was sponsored by an Irish betting company. The value of PotCoin surged following Rodmans announcement early Tuesday.

Speaking to reporters in Tokyo, Under Secretary of State Thomas Shannon said that the US was aware of Rodmans visit, and that he is traveling as a private citizen. We are aware of his visit. We wish him well, Shannon said, as reported by Reuters. But we have issued travel warnings to Americans and suggested they not travel to North Korea for their own safety.

View original post here:
A cryptocurrency for weed is sending Dennis Rodman back to North Korea - The Verge

Read More..

Google Adsense Drops Cryptocurrency Faucet Operators – The Merkle

Some interesting things are happening in the world of cryptocurrency faucets. Up until a few weeks ago, anyone running a faucet could earn a lot of money by showing Google Adsense advertisements on the website. If the traffic is high enough, this could have been quite a lucrative business. However, it appears Google has made some drastic changes, which makes faucet owners earn a lot less money.

Over the past few years, many people have opted to run a Bitcoin faucet website in the hopes of making some good money for displaying banner advertisements. Since faucets are visited by thousands of people every day, there is a good chance to make decent money from a faucet website. Unfortunately, that is no longer the case, as Googles Adsense program has undergone some big changes regarding what types of sites can display advertisements in the first place.

To be more specific, the Google Adsense program now prevents faucet websites and other platforms not focusing on unique content from showing advertisements. Even if people do so, they will earn a lot less money from doing so. In a way, this chance was only a matter of time. Faucet sites present nothing unique in the world, as they all revolve around letting users click a few buttons to collect small amounts of Bitcoin or other cryptocurrencies.

Any website displaying advertisements without providing quality content should not make as much money from Google Adsense as people who work hard to make their site stand out. That is only the normal way of doing business. Faucets get a lot of visitors, but the traffic itself is quantity-oriented, rather than focusing on quality. Anyone clicking ads on faucet websites has no real interest in the advertisement itself but mainly do so due to a misclick.

It is only normal faucet operators will see their Google Adsense earnings go down dramatically. Google Adsense is a tool designed for content creators and not people who copy-paste an existing faucet script linked to a cheap domain name. Making money with online advertisements requires time, dedication, and effort. None of those traits can be associated with cryptocurrency faucets, even though some operators put a fair amount of work into designing a unique layout.

The bigger question is whether or not there is any intrinsic value to cryptocurrency faucets these days. These platforms used to be quite valuable in the early days of Bitcoin, but their success has tapered off in recent years. Moreover, faucet operators will only pay out small amounts of Bitcoin due to their site earnings being even lower. It is evident something will need to change, and faucet operators will need to start looking for alternative solutions to make money. Adding a news section with unique content to a faucet, for example, could do wonders.

It appears to be only a matter of time until faucet operators will be put out of business entirely. That is, unless their business models evolve accordingly. There are no easy ways to make money these days, and cryptocurrency faucets are slowly losing their appeal. It is good to see Google take such an aggressive measure where their Adsense program is concerned, that much is certain. Rest assured a lot of faucet operators will not be too happy about this decision.

If you liked this article, follow us on Twitter @themerklenews and make sure to subscribe to our newsletter to receive the latest bitcoin, cryptocurrency, and technology news.

Here is the original post:
Google Adsense Drops Cryptocurrency Faucet Operators - The Merkle

Read More..

Video: Coindash CEO Talks Cryptocurrency, Social Trading and ICOs – Finance Magnates

Judging by the massive numberof inquiries we are getting about blockchain crowdfunding, it appears that everyone wants to know how to join an ICO (initial coin offering). However, this field is brand new for most established investors from outside the crypto space, and hard to understand fully as it is rapidly developing.

The London Summit 2017 is coming, get involved!

For this purpose, Finance Magnates conducted an interview earlier today withAlon Muroch, theCEO and co-founder ofCoindash.The interview was broadcast live and a video recording is available here:

Among the topics we discussed arehow blockchain token crowdsales are disrupting the VC (venture capital) business; howthey can be used todemocratize IPO investments for everyone; the differences between copy trading in the online trading industry and the blockchain ecosystem; how to join your first ICO using Ethereum; and how to keep your funds safe from hackers and scammers.

Coindash is a blockchain startup focusing on cryptocurrency social trading and portfolio management.

Like popular social trading services in the forex and CFDs space, the Coindash platform will enable cryptocurrency investors to manage and analyze their portfolios, share insights about the market and display achievements, as well as copy-trade and receive trading signals.

Coindashs current partners include CryptoCompare, Smith & Crown and RSK Labs, WINGS, ethere.camp, Antshares and HyperChain Capital. Most recentlyCoinsilium Group Limited (NEX:COIN), the London-based blockchain venture investment fund, confirmed that it has completed its investment of $75,000 inCoindash.

See more here:
Video: Coindash CEO Talks Cryptocurrency, Social Trading and ICOs - Finance Magnates

Read More..

Pure Storage Aims For The Enterprise, Cloud Storage Business With Major Software Updates – CRN

All-flash storage vendor Pure Storage Tuesday expanded the software that accompanies its high-performance hardware with advanced clustering and quality-of-service capabilities.

The company also used its Pure//Accelerate 2017 conference, held this week in San Francisco, to unveil a number of hardware updates to its all-flash storage arrays.

The changes come as innovation in the software capabilities of all-flash storage has struggled to keep up with improvements in the sheer performance of the hardware, said Matt Kixmoeller, vice president of products for the Mountain View, Calif.-based vendor.

[Related: CRN Exclusive: Pure Storage CEO Dietzen On Pure's Software Focus, Profitability Goals And HCI Views]

"Tier-one storage offers the highest flexibility and performance, but not the fastest innovation," Kixmoeller told CRN. "We want to end the compromise. We're bringing in technology to close the gap."

Pure Storage is doing just that with the introduction of its Purity//FA 5.0 software, the latest version of the company's software for managing data and services with its all-flash hardware, Kixmoeller said.

The biggest addition to the Purity//FA software is ActiveCluster, a new active-active metro stretch cluster capability that allows an application to run synchronously in two data centers up to 150 miles apart, or on separate racks within the same data center, Kixmoeller said.

For example, he said, a customer running Oracle Real Application Clusters on eight servers could have four of the servers in one data center and four in another. "If there's a disruption in one data center, the application keeps running in the other," he said.

Purity//FA 5.0's ActiveCluster deploys quickly with only four commands and does not require the addition of a third-party server or cloud to mediate between the two parts of the clusters.

"This is the last of the high-end resiliency services that we have not had before at Pure Storage," he said.

The quality-of-service capability of Purity//FA 5.0 can now be assigned on a per-volume basis, Kixmoeller said.

See the rest here:
Pure Storage Aims For The Enterprise, Cloud Storage Business With Major Software Updates - CRN

Read More..

Converged data protection in the cloud provides benefits, challenges – TechTarget

Converged data protection vendors, such as leaders Cohesity and Rubrik, are increasingly emphasizing the ways in which their platforms take advantage of the public cloud. While there is little question that the public cloud can greatly improve an organization's disaster recovery capabilities, data protection in the cloud is not right for all use cases.

Whats the difference between data backups and archives? Can tapes be used for archives? Should I use disk for archives? In this free guide, the experts from SearchDataBackup.com answer these common, but nevertheless important questions to help you construct the right data protection strategy for your organization.

By submitting your personal information, you agree that TechTarget and its partners may contact you regarding relevant content, products and special offers.

You also agree that your personal information may be transferred and processed in the United States, and that you have read and agree to the Terms of Use and the Privacy Policy.

Cohesity's approach to data protection involves using a physical appliance both as a backup target and as a platform for hosting virtual machines when an instant recovery operation is required.

Cohesity is using the public cloud as a way to overcome the storage limitations that exist within a physical appliance. By allowing customers to expand their storage capacity to the cloud, Cohesity has enabled three very useful capabilities:

Rubrik is another leader in converged data protection, and the company has recently introduced cloud backup capabilities. Rubrik focuses on providing data protection to native cloud applications.

Rubrik's approach involves creating a backup fabric that spans both the on-premises environment and the public cloud. Standard backup and recovery functionality is available across the entire fabric, as are functions such as replication, search and archiving. While this approach allows for backup data to be replicated to the cloud, it also allows for protection of native cloud apps and data that resides natively in the cloud. Furthermore, Rubrik supports application-consistent backups of cloud instances of Microsoft Exchange Server, SharePoint, SQL Server, Active Directory and Oracle Database.

Converged data protection products, such as those offered by Cohesity and Rubrik, tend to work well for organizations that need to extend data protection in the cloud.

Overall, Rubrik's goal for data protection in the cloud seems to be simplicity. By including public cloud resources into the same backup fabric that serves the organization's on-premises resources, Rubrik can give its customers a single set of tools that are largely location-agnostic. The result is not just centralized management, but data portability.

Rubrik places significant emphasis on policy-based automation within the backup fabric. Custom policies can easily be mapped to an organization's service-level agreements or to its compliance requirements to achieve the required degree of protection.

There are a number of challenges to using converged data protection in the cloud:

Converged data protection products, such as those offered by Cohesity and Rubrik, tend to work well for organizations that need to extend data protection in the cloud. At the same time, issues such as vendor lock-in, cost and the impact on the organization's available bandwidth must be considered prior to implementation.

Icelandic service provider deploys Cohesity secondary storage

Rubrik cloud platform enhances Amazon, Azure support

Benefits and challenges of converging backup and archiving

Link:
Converged data protection in the cloud provides benefits, challenges - TechTarget

Read More..

Storage Made Easy Enterprise File Fabric enhances its cloud collaboration features to incorporate multi-cloud … – PR Newswire (press release)

Storage Made Easy provides a File Fabric solution that unifies corporate data sets, working with a company's existing on-premises and/or on-cloud data. It enables enterprises to securely collaborate on files, wherever they are stored, and from any device.

SME's rich collaboration features make their Enterprise File Fabric software especially attractive to enterprises. All collaboration features work equally well, whether the organisation is using S3, OpenStack Swift, Ceph, Microsoft Azure, Scality, an internal SAN, or any other Object Storage or cloud storage solution on the market.

The SME File Fabric also incorporates security and governance features inclusive of powerful policy controls to ensure that companies can control who has access to corporate data, when they have access, and how they have access. Access events are also audited and logged which make the solution a good fit for companies preparing for the forthcoming GDPR legislation.

James Norman, Storage Made Easy UK engineering manager said, "Simple and complex workflows are engrained within all of our organisations, but many tools these days fail to accommodate this. With the SME Enterprise File Fabric, it's excellent to see many organisations now model their business workflows, helping them achieve better colleague collaboration and increased business productivity."

ABOUT STORAGE MADE EASY (SME)

The Storage Made Easy Enterprise File Share and Sync Fabric enables IT to regain control of "cloud data sprawl" to unify on-premises and on-cloud files into a single easily managed converged infrastructure with policy-based controls for governance, audit and security.

The File Fabric solution provides a "blanket" enterprises wrap around all their data: on premises, within public and public clouds, as well as on third-party software vendor clouds (SharePoint Online and SalesForce for example).

Customers use the SME File Fabric product to unify corporate data to enable workgroup collaboration with universal controls for security, encryption, audit, and data access.

Storage Made Easy is the trading name of Vehera LTD.

Follow us on Twitter @SMEStorage and visit us at http://www.StorageMadeEasy.com to learn more.

Photo(s): https://www.prlog.org/12645694

Press release distributed by PRLog

To view the original version on PR Newswire, visit:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/storage-made-easy-enterprise-file-fabric-enhances-its-cloud-collaboration-features-to-incorporate-multi-cloud-workflow-approvals-300472570.html

SOURCE Storage Made Easy

http://www.StorageMadeEasy.com

See the original post here:
Storage Made Easy Enterprise File Fabric enhances its cloud collaboration features to incorporate multi-cloud ... - PR Newswire (press release)

Read More..

3 killer cloud skills that will get you hired today – InfoWorld

Thank you

Your message has been sent.

There was an error emailing this page.

One of the most common questions that Im asked is: "What cloud skills do I need that will get me hired quickly?"

First, keep in mind that this is an emerging area, so what employers are looking for is constantly shifting. Second, even if they do hire you for a specific skill, youll be asked to retrain and retool as the cloud technology matures.

Still, here are three skills that should get you hired right now:

Any Amazon Web Services certification. My advice to people leaving college is always the same: Get AWS-certified. It does not matter if you take the developer or architect path for AWS skills; companies are focused on all those AWS certifications.

Youll hear people dismiss such certifications as not really demonstrating any ability on the part of those who get them. But viewpoint misses the fact that companies really are not qualified to vet cloud talent themselves, so they need shortcuts these days to staff up. Certifications are an easy way to validate if an applicant has some degree of talent. So, get real about hiring works and get your AWS certs.

Internet of things and cloud. Companies have two technology pushes right now. First, moving to the cloud. Second, having all machines talk to all other machines and to people. Combine the two, and you have cloud-based IoT.

AWS has a strong offering here, but dont limit yourself to gaining just AWS cloud IoT skills. Microsoft and Google matter in this area as well, so get skilled in at least one of those two as well. Many employers are looking for people who understand multiple public clouds, and most IoT systems are on those clouds.

Serverless or container anything. Both serverless computing and containers have achieved buzzword status, despite being truly practical technologies. So, theres high demand for people skilled in these new areas, even if hiring companies dont really understand them or know what they would do with them.

The funny thing about these skills is that youre likely to get hired for possessing them, but you may not use them right away. Companies are looking to move to serverless, containers, or bothbut they have not really done much to move the ball in that direction. Still, they are hiring now in anticipation of that day.

Good luck in your job hunt!

David S. Linthicum is a consultant at Cloud Technology Partners and an internationally recognized industry expert and thought leader. Dave has authored 13 books on computing and also writes regularly for HPE Software's TechBeacon site.

Sponsored Links

Excerpt from:
3 killer cloud skills that will get you hired today - InfoWorld

Read More..

Why Is Cloud Computing The Most Disruptive Force – CXOToday.com

Cloud computing is one of the most disruptive forces facing the Information Technology sector. This statement is not without justification. Lets cast a glance at the enormity of the phenomenon. According to the Bain & Company research report The Changing Faces of the Cloud, globally, the cloud IT market revenue is projected to increase to $390 billion in 2020 from $180 billion, translating into a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of around 17%.

The report also points out that cloud demand accounted for 70% of related IT market growth in 2015. Moreover, 48 out of Fortune Global 50 companies have announced plans for cloud adoption for a range of IT applications. The cloud market will continue to gain momentum as businesses shift from legacy systems to cloud-based ones, with an increasingly higher number of organizations pursuing digital business strategies.

Cloud computing represents the biggest IT industry disruptions in several years. CIOs will need to put their heads together in order to aid their company successfully and safely navigate the cloud journey, says Shashank Dixit, CEO, Deskera, a global leader in cloud tech.

While premise-based IT software and tools have their own advantages, the global trend is for cloud based applications since they offer more connectivity and functionalities than legacy systems. Moreover, enterprises are naturally gravitating towards it as the technology is reasonably reliable, affordable, and provides them access to other new and emergent technologies as well as high end skills. The cloud boom is also propelled by the fact that enterprises are trying to improve performance and productivity over the long term. Looking at the tremendous response for cloud services, several IT companies are designing applications meant solely for pure cloud play.

The overall global public cloud market will mature, and its growth rate will slightly slow down from 17.2% in 2016 to a 15.2% increase in 2020, says Sid Nag, research director at Gartner. While Brexit and other growth challenges exist, some segments such as financial SaaS applications and the PaaS user markets will still see strong growth through 2020. As buyers intensify and increase IaaS activity, they will be getting more for their investment: ongoing enhancement of performance, more memory, more storage for the same money (which will drive increases in consumptions) and increased automation in traditional IT outsourcing (ITO) delivery, added Nag.

In this fast paced world of technology, enterprises must leverage technology to stay ahead of competition. And they must choose wisely. There is a huge market that needs to be explored particularly since the reach of the Internet (including both 3G and 4G services) and the levels of automation and digitization rise exponentially.

[Disclaimer:The views expressed in this article are solely those of theauthors and do not necessarily represent or reflect the views ofTrivone MediaNetwork's or that of CXOToday's.]

View post:
Why Is Cloud Computing The Most Disruptive Force - CXOToday.com

Read More..

Cloud security spending to hit $3.5bn by 2021, says Forrester – Cloud Tech

Cloud security spending is set to hit $3.5 billion (2.74bn) by 2021 at a 28% annual growth rate, according to a new report from Forrester Research.

The report, authored by analysts Jennifer Adams and Andras Cser, discusses a variety of trends, from cloud security risk, to traditional security tools.

According to the figures, cloud security gateways will continue to be the primary route of global spending, contributing to $1.6bn or 45% - of the overall figure by 2021. Native infrastructure as a service (IaaS) and platform as a service (PaaS) will come in to the tune of $1.1bn, while hypervisor security and centralised cloud workload security management are at $0.5bn and $0.3bn respectively.

Financial services represent the larger market for cloud services today and will continue to do so until at least 2021, the report adds. This marks an interesting point the report rightly points out that the idea of cloud-based services in financial would be controversial and radical just a few years ago but the industry is embracing it today to reduce costs and stay competitive. The report also earmarked retail, government, and professional services such as consultants, law firms, and advertising agencies as industries to look out for.

Writing in a blog post, Adams noted the upward trends, although warning about the nascence of the market. While spending on cloud security solutions is relatively small today compared with total spending on security software, its rapid growth is attracting the attention of more traditional security tech vendors, Adams wrote. Larger tech vendors are quickly entering and consolidating the space via acquisitions.

This isnt the same story for everyone; take for instance Netskope, the acclaimed cloud access security broker who announced a $100 million boost in series E funding earlier this month. Yet recent acquisitions in the space, as Adams notes, include Microsoft acquiring Adallom in 2015, as well as Cisco buying CloudLock, and Oracle acquiring Palerra in 2016.

Either way, the trend is inexorable as old school security fails to live up to the task. Traditional perimeter-based security tools do little to protect cloud workloads, and do it yourself internal solutions can be costly to develop and consume variable in-house IT resources, the report notes. We expect most companies to look to commercial off the shelf solutions for their cloud security needs.

You can find out more and read the full report here (paid).

See more here:
Cloud security spending to hit $3.5bn by 2021, says Forrester - Cloud Tech

Read More..