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Παρασκευή 27 Μαρτίου 2015

i heart intelligence Beat The System With This List Of 40 Free Educational Websites

According to www.webometrics.info, there are more than 17 000 universities in the world, but getting a degree in many of them is quite costly. Many students around the world(and their families) get into big debts or have to work over sixty hours a week in order to afford an Education. Two thirds of the US college seniors who graduated in 2011 had student loan debt, with an average of over 27 000 USD per person. Reading those statistics I can’t stop thinking about those words from over 30 years ago:
With mass education, it turned out that most people could be taught to read and write. In the same way, once we have computer outlets in every home, each of them hooked up to enormous libraries, where you can ask any question and be given answers, you can look up something you’re interested in knowing, however silly it might seem to someone else. – Isaac Asiov
Isaac Asimov died in 1992, but if he could see the opportunities that the Internet is giving us in XXI century he would probably grin from ear to ear. Getting a degree in an university might be expensive, but there are much better options.
There are many websites on the Internet that now offer FREE of charge learning materials. Now even very poor people can afford to be better educated than many of Harvard’s graduates, all they need is access to a computer(does not even have to be personal one, it could be the one that the local library offers for public use)
Enough with the words, here is a great list of 40 useful links which can help you learn a lot for free:

1. ALISON –  over 60 million lessons and records 1.2 million unique visitors per month

2. COURSERA – Educational website that works with universities to get their courses on the Internet, free for you to use. Learn from over 542 courses.

3. The University of Reddit – The free university of Reddit.

4. UDACITY – Advance your education and career through project-based online classes, mainly focused around computer, data science and mathematics.

5. MIT Open CourseWare – Free access to quite a few MIT courses that are on par with what you’d expect from MIT.

6. Open Culture – Compendium of free learning resources, including courses, textbooks, and videos/films.


7. No Excuse List – Huge list of websites to learn from.

8. Open YALE Courses – Open Yale Courses provides free and open access to a selection of introductory courses taught by distinguished teachers and scholars at Yale University All lectures were recorded in the Yale College classroom and are available in video, audio, and text transcript formats. Registration is not required

9. Khan Academy – Watch thousands of micro-lectures on topics ranging from history and medicine to chemistry and computer science.

10. Zooniverse – Take part in a huge variety of interesting studies of nature, science, and culture.

11. TUFTS Open CourseWare – Tufts OpenCourseWare is part of a new educational movement initiated by MIT that provides free access to course content for everyone online. Tufts’ course offerings demonstrate the University’s strength in the life sciences in addition to its multidisciplinary approach, international perspective and underlying ethic of service to its local, national and international communities.

12. How Stuff Works? – More scientific lessons and explanations than you could sort through in an entire year.

13. Harvard Medical School Open Courseware The mission of the Harvard Medical School Open Courseware Initiative is to exchange knowledge from the Harvard community of scholars to other academic institutions, prospective students, and the general public.

14. VideoLectures.NET – the title says it all – amazing video lectures on many topics.

15. TED – Motivational and educational lectures from noteworthy professionals around the world.

16. Shodor – A non-profit research and education organisation dedicated to the advancement of science and math education, specifically trough the use of modeling and simulation technologies. Included in this site are instructional resources, software, interactive lessons, explorations and information about workshops for students, teachers and learners of all ages on mathematics and science. Make sure you check Shodor Interactive – a great collection of interactive math, geometry, fractal, probability, algebra and statistics activities.

17. Udemy FREE Courses – hundreds of experts teach on Udemy every month including New York Times best-selling authors, CEOs, Ivy League professionals and celebrity instructors. Courses include video, live lectures and tools to help teachers interact with students and track their progress. There are many free courses that can teach you business online, law, programming, design, mathematics, science, photography, yoga and many more.

18. Maths & Science – Courses, tests and learning materials about mathematics and science for students from 1 to 12 grade.

19. edX.org – Free courses designed specifically for interactive study via the web, provided by MIT, Harvard, Barkley, Georgetown, Boston University, University of Washington, Karolinska Institute, Kyoto University and many more.

20. iTunes U – Apple’s free app that gives students mobile access to many courses. It offers many free video courses, books, presentations and audio lectures.

21. Liberty Classroom – Owned by bestselling author Tom Woods. Offers some free courses in history and economics, but at the price of one movie ticket a month you can gain access to a lot of useful information. Not completely free, but totally worth it…

22. Drawspace – Hundreds of free drawing lessons.

23. Codeacademy – Easy way to learn how to code. It’s interactive, fun and you can do it with your friends.

24. Duke U – Duke offers variety of free courses on iTunesU.

25. Scitable – A free science library and personal learning tool that currently concentrates on genetic, the study of evolution, variation and the rich complexity of living organisms.

26. My own business – Offers free online business administration course that would be beneficial to new managers and to anyone who is interested in starting a business.

27. Kutztown University’s free courses – The Kutztown University of Pennsylvania’s Small Business Development Center offers more than 80 free business online learning. Kutztown’s courses are individualized and self-paced. Many of the courses feature high-end graphics, interactive case studies and audio streams.

28. Open Learn – Gives you free access to Open University course materials.

29. Free Computer Books – Free computer, mathematics, technical books and lecture notes.

30. Academic Earth – Free video lectures from the world’s top scholars.31. American Sign Language Browser – Teach yourself sign language online

32. BBC Languages – Teach yourself a new spoken language online.

33. unplugthetv – Randomly selects an educational video for you to watch.

34. Lifehacker – Learn to hack life! Tips and tricks for improving all areas of your life.

35. JustinGuitar – Hundreds of free guitar lessons as well as some basic music theory.

36. DuoLingo – Learn a new language for free while helping to translate the web.

37. Layers Magazine – Photoshop, Illustrator, Dreamweaver, Flash, Premiere Pro, In Design and After Effects tutorials.

38. Creative Flow – list of OVER 950 Photoshop tutorials to keep your skillset up to date.

39. Open2study – Open2Study delivers free, high-quality education online. You can study subjects with real value, and in just four weeks you can learn something new, explore the next step in your career, challenge yourself or simply satisfy your curiosity. These subjects are provided by leading Australian institutions, and are taught by academics and leading industry professionals who love to teach. All you need is an internet connection and the desire to study.

40. OEDb – Choose from over 10,000 free online classes
FROM THE WEBi heart intelligence Beat The System With This List Of 40 Free Educational Websites:




Πέμπτη 26 Μαρτίου 2015

Kaspersky Lab: Πώς μπορεί να σας κλέβουν χρήματα μέσω Ίντερνετ - Τεχνολογία - Ειδήσεις - in.gr

H εταιρεία ανάπτυξης λογισμικού ασφαλείας, Kaspersky Lab περιγράφει βήμα προς βήμα το «εικονικό ταξίδι» της πληρωμής ενός δολαρίου στον κυβερνοχώρο με το διαδραστικό πρόγραμμα One Dollar Lesson. Προορισμός του δολαρίου, ένας υπολογιστής τράπεζας που αντιμετωπίζει όμως κάθε λογής εμπόδια, όπως επιθέσεις phishing, προγράμματα Trojan και επιθέσεις τύπου man-in-the-middle. Οι απειλές απεικονίζονται έντονα, όπως και οι «ήρωες» που βοηθούν το δολάριο να φτάσει στον προορισμό του με ασφάλεια.



Με το One dollar lesson η Kaspersky Lab επιχειρεί να εκπαιδεύσει τους χρήστες του Διαδικτύου και να τους μάθει πώς να προστατεύουν τα χρήματά τους από τις ηλεκτρονικές απάτες. Πιο συγκεκριμένα, το νέο εκπαιδευτικό πρόγραμμα της εταιρείας παρουσιάζει στους χρήστες τις πιο κοινές online τραπεζικές απειλές, δείχνοντας τους πως να προστατεύουν τα χρήματά τους σε κάθε μία από αυτές τις περιπτώσεις.



Διαβάστε σχετικά στο tech.in.gr:



Οι χρήστες ενδέχεται να υποτιμούν πόσο εκτεθειμένοι είναι κατά τη διάρκεια των ηλεκτρονικών οικονομικών συναλλαγών. Μπορεί να είναι δύσκολο να κατανοήσουν τις λεπτομέρειες των online διαδικασιών πληρωμής και των διαφόρων απειλών που θα μπορούσαν να προκύψουν στην πορεία. Είτε πρόκειται για ένα δολάριο, είτε για χιλιάδες, η πορεία είναι συχνά η ίδια και οι χρήστες θα πρέπει να έχουν επίγνωση του τι μπορεί να πάει στραβά όταν μεταφέρουν χρήματα, χρησιμοποιώντας τον φορητό υπολογιστή, το tablet ή το smartphone τους.



Σε κάθε ενότητα περιλαμβάνονται σύντομες περιγραφές των απειλών, καθώς και τα πιο πρόσφατα στοιχεία σχετικά με τις τάσεις και τις επιπτώσεις αυτών των online κινδύνων. Τα δεδομένα αυτά προέρχονται από αναγνωρισμένες πηγές, όπως η έρευνα των ίδιων των ειδικών της Kaspersky Lab.



«Το online banking και οι ηλεκτρονικές πληρωμές είναι πλέον κοινός τόπος, με εκατομμύρια ανθρώπους να μεταφέρουν χρήματα για να πληρώσουν τους λογαριασμούς τους, να κάνουν δωρεές ή αγορές μέσω Internet. Οι χρήστες του Διαδικτύου μπορεί να μη διαθέτουν την κατάλληλη ενημέρωση για τις απειλές που μπορεί να αντιμετωπίσουν τα χρήματά τους, κάτι που μπορεί να τους κάνει πιο απρόσεκτους στις online συναλλαγές τους. Γι’ αυτό, δημιουργήσαμε τα διαδραστικά αυτά μαθήματα, ώστε να βοηθήσουμε τους χρήστες να κατανοήσουν καλύτερα τις απειλές και να χειρίζονται με μεγαλύτερη υπευθυνότητα τα χρήματά τους, όταν βρίσκονται online. Πιστεύουμε ότι η σωστή ενημέρωση είναι και η καλύτερη προετοιμασία για όλους μας», δήλωσε ο Alexander Erofeev, Chief Marketing Officer της Kaspersky Lab.

Kaspersky Lab: Πώς μπορεί να σας κλέβουν χρήματα μέσω Ίντερνετ - Τεχνολογία - Ειδήσεις - in.gr:




Σάββατο 21 Μαρτίου 2015

9 Free Ning Alternatives And Some Open Source Solutions

Many people have started communities on the popular network creation site Ning since its inception. On April 15th they announced they would no longer offer their free services. Realize this isn’t the end of Ning as they point out
The tens of thousands of you who already use our paid service represent over 75% of our traffic
So I imagine most of the popular networks you belong to on Ning will remain in place.
However, for the other 25% that might navigate elsewhere you have several options. I’ve yet to see a good breakdown of some of the better free Ning alternatives out there so I thought I would give it a shot. I found most of these sites in the comments and blog posts of other despaired Ning network creators. I’ve also tried to track down these other networks reactions to Ning’s announcement. Hopefully this will help you with your own transition.

Hosted Solutions

Spruz

Create a free socially enabled website! Many powerful features including Blog, Forum, Videos, Member Management, Shopping Cart & more! Fully data driven free websites.

Spruz seems to be the network of choice for most ex-ningers. I’ve read several reports of great up time and quality service. Spruz seems to have everything Ning has and a few extras that make it somewhat unique. I’ve seen users specifically boast about its file sharing capabilities.

[Post from Spruz welcoming Ning users]


Webs

Webs gets 30 times the traffic of Spruz and any other network on this list falling short only to Ning at two-thirds its traffic. Webs promises to always be free and shares several of the main features that made Ning popular including forums, member profiles and blogs.

WackWall

I guess being in beta it wouldn’t be fair to compare their traffic to some of the other sites on the list. However, WackWall looks very promising. They are backed by a software company and don’t rely on investments which is why, they say, they will always remain free.

Grou.ps

Grou.ps is another great choice based on open source software. It seems to have everything Ning has and a very reasonable pricing plan to help scale your network. They also prefer to be called a social operating system. Looks very powerful.

Grouply



Grouply looks a lot like Ning on the front end and already has FAQs on importing members from other services. Matter of fact I’ve mistaken grouply groups for Ning groups a few times. One does have to wonder why their traffic has been dropping only to be revived by Ning’s latest news.
[UPDATE: Grouply no longer available]

BigTent



BigTent may be one of the babies of the bunch but it provides all of the same services in an “integrated” approach. Users claim the support is tremendous making it worth their switch. BigTent looks like a very simple solution, maybe a little too simple for some.

Zerista

Still trying to wrap my brain around this one but it looks VERY cool. Imagine FourSquare meets Ning and has little mobile babies. With tons of cool features to integrate the social experience, maybe its about time you take your network to the next level and go mobile?

Groupsite

Groupsite (formerly known as CollectiveX) looks like an awesome network solution with some excellent features. It does seem like they find ways to lure you into buying their premium services, like limiting subgroups to 5 but overall another good solution on the free side.

SocialGo

SocialGo, like the rest has a very impressive feature list and is just as popular as Spruz traffic-wise. The site seems to have a pretty satisfied user-base as I’ve seen several people recommend the site across different blogs and networks. Definitely worth putting on the list.

Open Source Solutions

Maybe the phasing out of Ning’s free service is what it takes to get you to take ownership of your community and move to a self hosted solution. The following are all free and trusted solutions in the industry. I personally would go with BuddyPress but to each his own.
9 Free Ning Alternatives And Some Open Source Solutions:




Τετάρτη 18 Μαρτίου 2015

Japanese Scientists Successfully Transmit Electricity Through The Air | True Activist

tesla
Scientists in Japan have successfully transmitted electric energy wirelessly through the air, proving that Nikola Tesla was onto something big.
For years debates have raged about whether or not power could be transferred through the air, and while there have been many reports of this being achieved on a small scale, there has never been a major mainstream study into the phenomenon, until now.
Scientists with the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency used microwaves to deliver electricity to a specific target 55 meters away.
This was the first time anyone has managed to send a high output of nearly two kilowatts of electric power via microwaves to a small target, using a delicate directivity control device,” a spokesman for the agency told AFP on Thursday.
SSPS consists of a space-based power generation/transmission facility that gathers sunlight, converts it into microwaves or laser beams, and transmits those to the ground; and a power receiving facility on the ground,” explained researcher Yasuyuki Fukumuro.
“There are many technological challenges to solve before SSPS can be implemented. When transmitting power by microwaves, a significant technological challenge is how to control the direction, and transmit it with pinpoint accuracy from a geostationary orbit to a receiving site on the ground,” he added.
The SSPS project will initially be geared towards space applications, to power space stations, shuttles, and equipment, but will eventually be used for practical purposes on Earth as well.

Read More: http://www.trueactivist.com/japanese-scientists-successfully-transmit-electricity-through-the-air/?utm_source=fb&utm_medium=fb&utm_campaign=antimediaJapanese Scientists Successfully Transmit Electricity Through The Air | True Activist:




Κυριακή 1 Μαρτίου 2015

5 Business Tools and Apps Your Employees Will Love



5 Business Tools and Apps Your Employees Will Love

3 Comments


Photo: Mighty Healthy

Photo: Mighty Healthy




Your workforce is the backbone of your small business. Some may argue that it is your human resources department, or an external recruiter that makes it all possible. While that is certainly open to debate, one irrefutable fact remains: The quality of the people doing the work determines the quality of an organization.
Developing a quality workforce requires motivated employees; and motivated employees are engaged and productive individuals. Yet while motivation is not the sole responsibility of an employer, as a business owner, it pays dividends to do your part.
One of the best ways to equip your people is through the use of tools to help them do their job better, with ease. From task execution to expense reporting and more, here’s a look at five business tools that you, and your employees, will benefit from:

  1. Bitrix24

    When working with teams, easy collaboration and communication is imperative. You don’t want tasks, updates and important news lost in instant messaging platforms or hard-to-track email threads. Bitrix24 is a free social collaboration tool with a host of features including real-time activity streaming, CRM, task management, database, instant messaging, group chat, file sharing, time tracking, workload planning, and even video conferencing.
    Best of all Bitrix24 can be installed on-premise or cloud-based. While the free version offers a maximum of 12 participants, for larger small businesses with more than 12 team members, Bitrix24 Cloud starts at $99 per month (with added features such as external users, IP blocking, custom logo, and more).
  2. Trello

    Trello is a cloud-based project management software that takes care of both the big and small things. With Trello you can record every piece of information that matters to you – from daily to-dos to business ideas you may want to revisit in the future. Information is stored on cards, and cards can be organized into customizable lists that are stored via a board.
    For team-based projects, you can invite as many people as you like to a board where members can be assigned tasks, add or edit cards, upload attachments, and vote on cards among other things. With Trello, collaboration happens in real-time, since changes made by other board members are instantaneously reflected on your screen. Meanwhile, Trello’s activity log and email notifications ensure that everyone receives timely information. Trello offers three subscription packages: Free, Gold ($5 per month), and Business Class ($50 per month).
  3. Expensify

    Expensify is a cloud and mobile-based application that makes expense reporting faster and easier. It simplifies the entire process by centralizing everything from expense tracking to reimbursement, and lets users take snapshots of their receipts on the spot and save a digital copy. If receipts are scattered everywhere – in Google Apps, Dropbox, Evernote, for example – you can easily import them into Expensify with one click.
    For individual users, Expensify is free. For small companies, the first two submitters are free, and every submitter thereafter is priced at $6 per month. For larger businesses, after the first two, submitters cost $11 per user per month. The great thing about Expensify is their business model: a pay-per-activity pricing strategy, instead of monetization based on a number of users. This simply means if nobody submits an expense for a month, you pay nothing.
  4. AnyPerk

    After a hard day’s work, employees deserve access to quality employee perks. AnyPerk is a tool to help you do just that and more — you can reward employees with perks and VIP treatment. AnyPerk represents over 2,500 small businesses and startups, giving your company access to discounts from the top brands across different industries. For a minimum of five employees at $5 per month per employee, employees can immediately access AnyPerk perks upon registration.
  5. iDoneThis

    As the name suggests, iDoneThis is a tool that helps employees keep track of the things they’ve accomplished for the day by responding to an email reminder. This can help your team stay on top of larger projects with many moving pieces, complete daily to-do lists, and bolster overall productivity. On the management side, you receive unprecedented visibility into what’s being done and what needs to improve, sans the endless team meetings.
    For personal use, iDoneThis is free. For more features such as visual graphs, word clouds and organization tags, iDoneThis Gold is priced at $5 per month while team subscription start at $5 per member per month.

Maricel Rivera is a researcher, freelance writer, and the founder and chief editor of The Sourcing Pen. She has been into web writing since August of 2011 and regularly contributes to business and technology blogs.5 Business Tools and Apps Your Employees Will Love: