Audio Content Management Systems (CMS)

In simple words CMS is a computer program which allows publishing, editing, modifying and maintaining content from a central interface. It can be used for audio, video, images or anything you want. There are organizations that specifically provide such services for users who does not have the capacity or knowledge in such systems.

Recently I was asked to carry out a research on audio CMS to see the potential of such products. It's similar to an app where users can listen to a small clip of the latest song and if the user likes it he/she can download the entire song by visiting the site.

I identified that there are several organizations that are doing it, but in a small scale. Personally I think that there's a lot of potential in such apps because mobile apps are the most famous and talked about technology nowadays. When I want to download or listen to a song first I need to visit YouTube and see the entire video or I get to know about it through a friend. But if I could have an app which will send the latest albums or songs and if I could listen to it I think I'm gonna buy it paying whatever the price. All because it's convenient. Also I have a basic smartphone and with that I can't go to YouTube. So it's necessary for me to go my laptop and do whatever I want.

This is my opinion. Let me know yours.

Kite Runner

Today I'm going away from my usual blogging style and I'm going to tell you about a book i read a few years ago and is still in my mind. The book's name is The Kite Runner written by Khaled Hosseini. The book was later turned into a movie.  The kite runner is a story about two childhood friends Hassan and Amir who lives in Kabul, Afganistan. The two friend's days are spent picking juicy Pomegranates, munching dried mulberries and walnuts and running across street markets in the suburbs of Kabul during time prior to war.

Evil strikes on the most important day of their lives, tearing them apart and leaving behind an emptiness, a guilt that will haunt Amir for life. Taking the easy way out Amir lives a life full of regret. Amir leaves Kabul to have a better life and lives in California until the death of his father and return back looking for his loyal friend. But finds out that he has passed away leaving his only child behind.

Amir trying to right his wrongs adapt this lost child and return back to California. The Kite Runner is not only a heart warming story of love, friendship and 'blood', but also a reflection of the ways of the people of Afganistan and the dark and bitter history of their nation.

Technical presentation - part 3

This is the last part of my preparation for technical presentations. This is the day of your presentation? Excited or nervous? Well you shouldn't be nervous if your prepared well right? If you followed all the steps in my previous parts, the hard parts are over. So now you need to concentrate on the delivery of the presentation. These are the steps you need to follow on the day of your presentation;

1. Practice talk
Practice your presentation in front of a mirror or record it. This will help you not only to be prepared but also will help you to see your body language. There should be a certain level of body language but do not overdo it. If you can practice talk in front of your family or friends to see whether they understand what the hell your talking about.

2. Presentation venue
Make sure you go to the presentation venue before the audience arrive. Prepare all your equipment, test the mike and get the slides ready. Go to the podium and just have the feel of the audience (you have to do this before anyone comes in). Also ensure that your dressed suiting to the occasion.

3. Delivery
So here comes the exciting part. Keep in mind all the preparation you did and be CONFIDENT. People will not take you serious if you have shaky hands and a sweaty face. Delivery can be stressful especially if your trying to sell a product to a customer but you need to stay calm. 

4. Answering question
So obviously there would be a Q&A session, you need to be prepared for it. If you have time maybe before one day for the presentation you could develop some questions which you think the viewers will ask and prepare the answers yourself.

Now your ready to do your presentation. If you need more inspiration go to you tube and look at Steve Jobs presentations. They are the best.
GOOD LUCK with your presentations.

Technical presentations - part 2

I hope your'll went through the first part as to how to conduct a technical presentation the easy way. This is the second part of it. In this post I'l be discussing about the slide preparation. So follow the simple points and you will have the perfect set of slides for your presentation.

1. Choose your tools 
There are so many tools that can be used for presentations except the ordinary Micrsoft presentation. I learnt about a new tool called Prezi which is available in the following link; http://prezi.com  . It's a cool tool which helps us to think out of the box and create new kinds of presentations.

2. Slides
So if you choose PowerPoint slides you need to make sure that the titles are descriptive, so that readers will know what your hoping to talk about.

3. Use pictures and audios
To avoid clutter and too much of texts in the slides, attractive pictures can be used to explain your point. When viewers see the texts they tend to read the slide without listening to your presentation. So the best way to avoid that happening is to use pictures or audio video clips. This will not only interest the listeners but also they will be engaged.

4. Conclusion
Here you need to emphasize on the unique selling points to again remind the viewers as to why they should buy your product. Remember to give your contact details for them to clarify any doubts and end the presentation on a high note.

So if your done with all this that means your ready for the presentation. The only step that is left is the things  that you need to do in the day of the presentation. It will be in my next post.

Soltura, the next generation mobile app platform

The UNCTAD (United Nations Conference on Trade and Development) ICT report is a component in the World Investment Report which is responsible for dealing with issues related to investment and enterprise development in the United Nations System. The ICT (Information and Communication Technologies) section mainly promotes international dialogue on issues related to ICTs for development and contributes to building developing countries’ capacities to measure the information economy and also to design and implement pertinent policies and legal frameworks.

hSenid Mobile provided its platform to one of Sri Lanka’s leading mobile service providers to enable the company to build their own culture in app development. The company built their own developer community by providing the necessary resources. This humongous task was carried out by hSenid Mobile who identified the potential for such products. The platform enabled the service provider to change the culture of the IT industry by providing the opportunity for all interested developers to create their own mobile applications. The UNCTAD report addresses all the above aspects mentioned above. It further acknowledges hSenid Mobile for providing Supplier support, App development support, app quality and marketing effort for the service provider, which was considered a prestige for the firm.

However hSenid Mobile’s Soltura product is a further evolution from the product mentioned before. The innovative ability together with the tech experts in the organization came up with a newer and a revolutionary product concept which will benefit not only the service providers but also the end subscribers. Its future potential is yet to be known. Soltura not only facilitate mobile service providers to build their own developer communities but also to develop partnerships with other businesses.

Soltura, the Spanish name for ‘freedom’ in reality gives the app developers the freedom to launch their apps. The subscribers are not restricted but can use their imagination to create and earn revenue for their applications. Soltura is an evolution from the product mentioned in the UNCTAD report because this platform facilitates all subscribers irrespective of their technical knowledge to build new apps. This is a tremendous opportunity for both subscribers and service providers as both technical and non-technical subscribers can be part of the developer community. Thus, the revenue generation aspect is not limited to one specific segment. 

Easy way to prepare for technical presentations

So for all the tech beginners out there here is a small guide as to how to conduct presentations for the general public. This post will be followed by 2 more giving your'l a detailed guide as to how to conduct a great presentation. Some tips are what I've learnt and very few are from the web.

Here goes the list,
1. Identify the purpose of the presentation
Before we prepare for any kind of presentation we need to first understand the purpose of it. It maybe to sell a product, share knowledge or bring awareness. Whatever it is you need to see why you have to do the presentation overall.

2. Know your audience
You can easily figure out this step when you have done the first. Say for example if the presentation is to sell your product to a potential customer then, the company marketing manager and operations manager will be present. Make sure that you know who it is before hand.

3. Create a story
This is common for any kind of presentation irrespective of the type. You need to create a presentation that can be used throughout or at least for a part of it. Make it interesting so that listeners will not be bored and they will listen to your presentation until it ends. Avoid Technical jargon. Know that all listeners will not understand all the technical aspects related to your topic. You need to ensure that there are no technical information and even if you have to put, make sure you explain what it is.

These tips are only for prior preparation for a technical presentation. I will explain other tips in my next post. 

Big data

As a promised I would give a brief intro about the concept behind big data. Did you know 30 billion pieces of content were added to Facebook this past month by 600 million users? Did you know that the average teenager sends about 4762 text messages per month? Did you know that there is a 40% projected growth in global data?

So how do businesses process such an enormous amount of information? This is where big data comes in. Big data practically enable companies to process and store large amounts of data in the database. This enable organizations to actually process and identify trends in data. I will explain this using an example.

Tesco is one of the world's largest grocery chain. It has achieved successful results through the use of this "big data" concept. The giant retail chain has achieved the following financial gains;

"£6 million less food wastage in the summer, £50 million less stock in warehouse, optimizing store operations to give £30 million less wastage".

As you can see the financial savings are not small numbers. So how have TESCO done this? 

It has a loyalty card which tracks all the customer information and analyzes the information. These customers are then segmented and individually targeted by way of newsletters and other targeted promotions. It further analyzes weather conditions to evaluate perishable goods like vegetables and fruits. 

Also there is a Depot Stock holding app that monitors all goods that pass through all the depots and Tesco's largest depots hold around 12,000 products. So you yourself can understand how much of information it should hold to process this information. Finally it has the ability to reduce waste in stores by selling products at half the price in the right time. 

There are several business models around big data. But to decide the best model for you, you need to understand the ultimate goal for your organization.

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