We love the Double! The robot itself is comprised of an ipad (not supplied), so you will benefit from Apple's approved technology, coupled with the simple and efficient concept of a robot!

We tested it during professional meetings, as well as workshops. As a remote guest, you will appreciate being able to turn your head (the screen…), in order to look at each participant face-to-face. Even the fact of being able to, quite simply, move around the conference room to have a separate discussion.

You will be able to offer a self service of your Double robots on several of your sites. An employee in Geneva will simply be able to find out the availability of a robot in New York, and use it remotely to get in contact with a colleague, by moving around the offices.

And we love the double, simply because it means we can stay connected with our friends and family abroad, by sending them an invitation via email, for them to connect to the Double at the agreed time and date.

Its uses are infinite, so it's up to you to find ideas for staying connected!

• Stay connected with your friends at home!
• Its use during workshops or professional meetings
• The invitation of a remote presenter for your conference or school
• The last-minute substitute for the person who can no longer travel to your event
• The « Frequent Business Traveller », who wishes to stay in contact with his family
• A child on a foreign language trip
• A child who can no longer get to school due to illness or to an accident
• Surveillance and presence for the aged
• Remote museum visits
• Remote house viewings

http://lovedproducts.ch/en/robotics/1-robot-double.html

The Rise of Generation C: Implications for the world of 2020

In the course of the next 10 years, a new generation—Generation C—will emerge (the 'C' stands for connect, communicate, change). Born after 1990, these 'digital natives,' just now beginning to attend university and enter the workforce, will transform the world as we know it.


Business workers will self-organise into agile communities of interest, always connected, will bring their personal computers to work and travelling much less frequently given all the solutions to collaborate more quickly and instantly.

Source: The Rise of Generation C: Implications for the world of 2020 | Booz & Company | AMEinfo.com

Tech debate: Google Gmail vs. hosted Microsoft Exchange

Source: Jonathan McCormick and Daniel Riley, Network World - March 08, 2010 12:08 AM ET

More and more businesses are looking to hosted e-mail services to reduce costs and ease management, and the choice often comes down to Google's Gmail (the key component of Google Apps) or a hosted version of Microsoft Exchange...

http://www.networkworld.com/news/2010/030810-tech-debate-gmail-exchange.html

Google Wave Kicks Ass!

You can define it as an "email" solution if email was invented today or as an instant wiki communicator.

You can share your "email" conversation (a wave) with all your friends/colleagues/network, instead of sending individual emails to predefined people.

You can just reply to someone like replying to an email, but as replying contextually within the text posted by the others (like editing a wiki page) and you see all changes in real time!

Furthermore, later on, you can easily play the recorded "real time" responses chain to better follow or understand a previous wave.

Last, but not least, you will be able to publish a wave within a blog and then anyone being able to join this wave from the blog and vice-versa.

Communicating, collaborating on documents, sharing, editing them in real time and playing back "real time" in any type of web clients! Mobile support for Android and iPhone will be available as well.

All this available in open source to increase developers' adherence and engagement around the wave client.

Whatever you like or not, Google Wave, but Yammer, Facebook, twitter, etc, if not replacing your current email, are changing the way we define those old email inboxes.

Let's make sure you surf all waves and get ready for collaboration and innovation!

Do you poken?

Have you seen this new gadget? A Poken, they call it... in fact an USB key which contains your business cards and kind of bluetooth reader, so that when you match your poken with someone poken, they exchange their business cards.

Once back on the poken website, you can save their business cards and connect through your favorite social networks, LinkedIn, Plaxo, Facebook, etc.

You can do this with your friends, but why not with your colleagues or business contacts, even more why not connecting closer with your customers or at least providing them some online services with additional value. The Poken API is there to open your creativity!

How to manage Instant Disruption Softwares?

The other day, a colleague told me that yesterday he was overloaded with emails and today, even worst, he is getting mass of instant messages...
More and more devices, software are based on reaching someone at anytime and being reachable at any time! Of course, while it is very convenient, it is very disrupting as well!

My colleague found an interesting solution, he decided to launch his IM only when he needs to contact someone... in fact, this is a very egoist attitude, being able to use the others and hiding from them!

I believe, it is all about learning how to use those instant solutions for the best of everyone. Even, in real life, we can always make a bad face, close the door, wear black sun glaces to tell the others that you are not in the mood of communication or busy doing something else.

Of course, there is avatars, I can also set my online status, but I always forget to switch!!! I will love to have some device interface, next to my mouse, where I can easily push the Happy button, the Busy, the Sad or the Available one... it will be even greater, if it could realized when I moved away my desk and automatically set Jerome is away.

Anyone else interested to develop the concept?

Sharing knowledge and research?

What will refrain a company to post all its knowledge and research in progress in a blog or even on Wikipedia? Maybe the balance between the risk to be copied and the value of others starting to collaborate, comment, challenge and innovate with this company will fully balanced and even start to make this company much more innovative than others! Today innovation is all about speed and without others thoughts, nobody will be able to be fast enough...

http://www.wikipedia.org

Do we still need to own IT infrastructure?

Already couple of years ago, I found that Yahoo services were providing most, if not all services that a small company need to run their business.

Obviously, more and more companies are providing IT tools and services online on the Internet. Of course, most of them in messaging and collaboration services, but the trend is there and Enterprise services for Finance, Supply Chain, HR, etc might come in the future... it will be all about risks vs benefits...

I like particularly Web Office for the "intranet" solution, which incorporate collaboration, documents management, web meeting and email all in one service, quite impressive.

Take also in consideration Groove, the peer to peer solution, very nice instant collaboration. Groove had been founded by Ray Ozzie the inventor of Lotus Notes and had been acquired by Microsoft earlier this year. Knowing that Ray Ozzie will become Chief Software Architect after Bill Gates next year, we should definitively keep an eye on what he is doing!

http://www.weboffice.com/
http://www.groove.net
http://www.yahoo.com