Techno-News Blog

By: Frank Ohlhorst, eWeek

Improvements to flash memory technology may spell the end for spinning media as the primary storage mechanism for enterprise tier 1 storage. When it comes to performance, flash-based memory has always been the undisputed king. However, flash memory has also been the leader in another area as well—expense. Until recently, flash memory has proved to be far too expensive for the typical enterprise to deploy for tier 1 storage. Simply put, the performance offered was not worth the additional cost. Nevertheless, enterprise needs change, and access speed is becoming more and more critical to many enterprises, especially those looking to deploy virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI), mine big data and push ahead with private cloud technologies. All of which depend on fast, reliable and affordable storage, which is where tier 1 storage with cache technology normally comes into play.

http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Data-Storage/Flash-Memory-Moves-Into-Enterprise-Tier-1-Storage-Space-102114/?kc=rss

By Tim Weber, BBC News

The value of the web economy in G20 countries will nearly double by 2016, according to Boston Consulting Group. Driving the spurt from $2.3tn (£1.5tn) to $4.2tn (£2.7tn) will be the rapid rise of mobile internet access. The study, supported by web giant Google, assumes that in four years 3bn people will be using the internet, or nearly 50% of the world’s population. The research suggests that the UK is one of the most advanced e-commerce economies. Right now, every year about 200 million people are going online for the very first time.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-16753902

by the BBC

Twitter has announced that it now has the technology to selectively block tweets on a country by country basis. In its blog, Twitter said it could “reactively withhold content from users in a specific country”. But it said the removed content would be available to the rest of the world. Previously when Twitter deleted a tweet, it would disappear worldwide. The decision has been criticised by the freedom of information advocacy group Reporters Without Borders. The move comes at a time when Twitter is in the process of expanding its global business.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-16753729

by the BBC

Facebook will begin the process of becoming a publicly-listed company this week, valuing the social networking site at between $75bn (£48bn) and $100bn, reports suggest. The company plans to file papers with the US financial watchdog on Wednesday, according to the Financial Times and the Wall Street Journal. The flotation later this year would raise about $10bn, they reported. This would be one of the biggest share sales seen on Wall Street. It would dwarf the $1.9bn raised by Google when it went public in 2004. It would still, however, be some way short of the $20bn raised by carmaker General Motors in November 2010.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-16779779