Video Conferencing & Skype Online Service
Though first demonstrated in 1968, video conferencing has just now in recent years become widely accessible to the general public. The primary factor in making this key technology so widely available and accessible is the advancement in the core software and hardware technologies as well as the widespread use of high speed Internet.
High speed Internet—
Hardware & Software Technologies—
Future Becomes Reality—
For many years, futurists envisioned a future in which telephone conversations took place as actual face-to-face encounters with video as well as audio, and now that future is reality. It is simply not possible or practical to have a face-to-face meeting all the time with two or more people who are located in multiple places. Videoconferencing is valuable when:
Impact on Business—
No matter the size or industry of your business, videoconferencing allows individuals in faraway places to have meetings on short notice while saving valuable time and money that would otherwise have been spent traveling. Technology such as VOIP can be used in conjunction with desktop videoconferencing to enable low-cost, face-to-face business meetings both nationally and internationally without even leaving the work place. The technology is also used for telecommuting allowing employees to work from home, which provides employee flexibility, eases the working parent's burden, increases employee productivity, reduces absenteeism and reduces an individual's carbon footprint, through minimizing daily commuting.
Videoconferencing is now being introduced to online networking Web sites, in order to help businesses form profitable relationships quickly and efficiently without leaving their work place. Although videoconferencing has already proven its significant value in the work place, research shows that many employees do not use the videoconference equipment because they are afraid that they will appear to be wasting time or looking for the easiest way if they use videoconferencing to enhance customer and supplier relationships. This anxiety can be avoided if managers use the technology in front of their employees.
Skype Online Service—
Skype is an affordable online service that allows you to stay in contact with family, friends and colleagues with cheap calls, texting, voicemail, call forwarding and most importantly an online number that allows anyone to call you from a regular phone and reach you anywhere. Founded in 2003 by Niklas Zennström and Janus Friis, Skype created a little piece of software that makes communicating with people around the world easy, fun and affordable. Skype is available in 28 languages and is used in almost every country around the world. For more information, visit http://www.skype.com/newtoskype.
Peer-to-Peer Lending or Social Lending & The Evolution of Banks
Peer-to-peer lending or social lending is a new breed of financial transaction (primarily lending & borrowing) born from the new role the Internet plays in everyday life. Social lending occurs directly between individuals ("peers") without the participation of a traditional financial institution. The Internet enables peer lenders to locate peer borrowers and vice-versa. This model connects borrowers with lenders through an auction-like process in which the lender willing to provide the lowest interest rate "wins" the borrower's loan.
Traditionally, lending institutions have benefited from scale and diversification. By pooling the available money supply and lending it out again, the impact of any one default is made trivial in light of the timely payment of the vast majority of the notes outstanding. The downside to this model is that it has introduced greater transaction overhead and removed community loyalty from the equation.
Social lending takes advantage of the lack of overhead, thereby reducing the traditional bid/ask spread implicit in traditional bank lending models and attempts to reintroduce the social components that are lost in traditional centralized banking models.
For example, a bank may offer its deposit customers a meager one percent return, yet, at the same time, lend those same customer funds out for a much higher rate of interest. Social lending allows those who have funds to lend to garner a better return, while, at the same time, providing a more favorable interest rate to those who need to borrow. It also allows individual participants to directly control their own funds, as opposed to the traditional banking/lending models, which pools all funds together and completely removes individuals from decision-making.
Below is a list of just some of the sites to visit for more information on social lending: