Lucidica's Blog

Small Business Broadband

May 21, 2013

If you are considering choosing business broadband for your small business, then it’s simply a case of weighing up the cost of a business package against the pros and cons associated with having a home or broadband package.

If you rarely use the internet for your business and do nothing more than send the odd e-mail and look online occasionally, then it’s probably of no importance. If, however, like most businesses, you are relying on the net more and more for your trade, then it’s definitely time to look a little closer at your options.

Some of the differences between a home and business package

Technical support: Most of us at one time or another have experienced problems with the net. It may be running slowly, working intermittently, or going down altogether. Either way, when this happens the process usually begins with calling your internet service provider (ISP), waiting on hold, only to be told the matter is being dealt with.

You then wait for days or in some cases weeks for your normal service to resume. As bad as this is, imagine it happening when your business is reliant on the net? With a business plan the level of technical support is usually far better, with resolutions coming a lot faster. In a world where time is money, this can mean a great deal.

Sharing/exclusive line: With a home package we are often sharing a line with other users, something we are constantly reminded of around dinner time of an evening when the net seems to come to a grinding halt. Some ISPs offer an exclusive line with a business package. This could be worth a lot if you find you are working online a lot during peak hours. However, they don’t all do it, so it’s worth checking before swapping.

Insurance: With a home package, most people have no insurance should the net go down for a prolonged period. With a business package, it’s often the case that you can claim compensation for loss of earnings from the ISP.

If having read this you feel that your business could do with making the transition to a business broadband deal, there are various options open to you that don’t cost the world. Here are two that have different advantages that are worth noting.

PlusNet do a package that is available from £10 per month. The package comes with 24/7 support, which is a must if you are looking for a business broadband package. There is a 10GB cap which you may want to consider, however, there are other slightly more costly packages available, including a no cap offer at £25.

Eclipse also do some interesting broadband packages. The cost is a little more expensive, starting at £14.95 – £49.95, depending on the cap. However, these packages also come with some other worthwhile features such as free PC back up for the better packages, something which most of us probably wish we have had at some point in the past.

If you do operate any of your business online it’s certainly worth considering a business broadband package. At the end of the day, it’s no use being wise after the event and if your current home service isn’t up to scratch, you could be gambling with your livelihood.

Kerry Butters is writing for the broadband comparison site Broadband Genie

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Google Glass vs. Privacy?

May 16, 2013

There are around 10,000 people in the world walking around with Google strapped to their forehead. Those lucky few either preordered way back when Glass was just a glimmer in Sergey Brin’s eye or they’ve convinced him that their life is exciting enough to deserve the chance to capture every grubby second of it. But as the first few ‘Explorers’ start to capture uneasy point-of-view clips of their day, a storm is brewing over the issue of privacy.

Cameras are everywhere. Chances are if you have a mobile phone it has a camera built in – even if it’s really basic. Cameras are in our tablets, in our computers and now, above our eyes. Yet until now if some wannabe paparazzi tries to snap a picture of you falling asleep on the tube, it’s not hard to spot. But man people fear that Glass removes this natural barrier by not only featuring, but boasting an omnipresent camera.

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The issue comes in two waves. Firstly, the fear that anyone you interact with could be recording. And there’s not necessarily any way to know for sure. Whether you’re in a bar or working at your desk anyone that can see you could be recording you. To some degree it’s a paranoid notion, and many would argue ‘who cares?’. But for a large portion of society, privacy is incredibly important. Even more so in places like the States, where broad use of CCTV is frowned upon as an unnecessary intrusion.

Perhaps more threatening is the second facet – that of misuse. Glass is technology; it’s a gadget. And one thing that’s certain about gadgets, other than that it’ll be obsolete before you finish charging it, is that someone will hack it. Google has already had several loopholes in its code pointed out to it by the man most prominently associated with jailbreaking iPhones, Jay Freeman.

Freeman’s warning shows that with some relatively simple work, anyone with knowhow and thirty seconds with your device could access your Glass remotely. From there they could see and hear everything you can. They would be able to watch, without your knowledge everything you look at, consciously or subconsciously and they could see your private moments. But think of the larger implications affecting even old-school security. They could watch you type passwords, enter door codes, take photos of your keys, even watch what you write with pen and paper. Nothing becomes private anymore.

That’s an extreme example. But it’s still a concern among many people to have so many cameras pointed at them in public, without their consent. It’s such a worry one bar had already banned the device before it even hit the streets! There’s discussion also on the place of Glass in cars. It could be a great GPS, but it could also cause unnecessary accidents and even deaths.

The real-world impact of Glass wont’ reveal itself until the product hits the shelves for real sometime (probably) next year. There will be debates, there will be legislation changes and there will be angry people. But until then you can continue enjoying the drip feed of information on the latest in wearable tech, or you can join the people over at Stop The Cyborgs in their effort to ban the device altogether. Your call.

Posted in Internet & Security, Products, Random Technology | Leave a comment

How To Know If a Website Is Secure

April 30, 2013

In 2012 the US and EU spent just under £500 billion on online shopping.
Over 1 billion people log on to Facebook each month and share information.
The average British worker send and receives 10,000 emails each year.

We send and store so much information online every day that sometimes we take for granted how sensitive a lot of it is. It can seem like every website you visit wants your details, but how can we know for sure that they’ll protect it properly and we don’t end up a victim of fraud?

One easy way to make sure a website is secure enough that you can trust it with your information is to check the address in the bar a the top:

The little ‘s’ that follows http in a URL stands for secure. It means that the website has the right security certificates, which are only given to website that have been verified as secure.

You can read more information about the certificate by clicking on the padlock icon (we’ve demonstrated it in Chrome but most browsers operate in a similar fashion – look for the padlock).

The important thing to remember is that if you’re on a website that’s asking you for a password, and especially if it’s asking for your bank or credit card details, and it’s not showing ‘https’ – steer clear!

But why is this so important if you recognise the website? Surely if you know the site and it’s asking you to log in you’re fine?

One day a friend sends you an email with a link to a photo on Facebook – his dog was just wearing sunglasses; adorable. You click on the link and you’re asked to sign in:

Looks like Facebook. But notice anything off about that page? 10 points if you noticed the incorrect URL. If you didn’t, and you also didn’t notice that it wasn’t a secure site, and you logged in, you’d be handing your email address and password to a sneaky person who wants to exploit your account. This is ‘phishing’ – the act of stealing people’s login details (or bank details) by posing as a real website.

It’s so important to pay attention when wandering around the internet since it’s hard to trust your eyes sometimes. But you can fend off fraud and phishing by following these two steps:

1) Check the URL carefully
2) Check for the secure site (https)

Posted in Internet & Security, Random Technology | Leave a comment

Carbon Voyage & The Prince’s Trust

April 26, 2013

In February’s newsletter we talked about the free IT recycling company RDC and Carbon Voyage, offering a service that allows you to get rid of your old office IT equipment and raise money for charity at the same time. In the last month with your help Carbon Voyage raised £183 for the Prince’s Trust, an organisation that does great work changing the lives of the one million NEET (not in education, employment or training) young people around the UK.

prince

“The Carbon Voyage Tech City initiative is an fantastic idea and a really innovative way for companies to support The Trust whilst selling or recycling their IT equipment. We are grateful for all donations received to support our work with disadvantaged young people across the UK. All funds raised will go towards helping those that are hardest to reach build up the skills and confidence to get back into work, education or training and change their lives for the better” -Nina Walker, The Prince’s Trust.

Do you have old redundant IT equipment taking up space in your office? RDC will pick it up from your premises and either pay you for the equipment or donate the money to charity.

Why use RDC? It’s a free service that safely disposes of old IT equipment for you. There are no data protection concerns because each piece of equipment is wiped clean during disposal and data protection certificates can be provided. The process is as easy as 1-2-3.

First step is to find out how much your old IT is worth by using the Quick Calculator. Or if it’s easier feel free to email in a list of items to rdc@carbonvoyage.com and we’ll get back to you. Second step is to tell us where to pick up the IT equipment and then let us know where to allocate the money. Third and final step is to set up and confirm a pick up time and we will come get it.

It’s as simple as that. You get rid of your old office IT equipment without hassle, and the money raised makes a real difference to disadvantaged people. Take a look at RDC and see how you can help out.

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Our Correspondent At The Scene: You

April 23, 2013

On April 14th 1865, during the middle of a performance Ford’s theatre in Washington D.C., US President Abraham Lincoln was assassinated. The news travelled as fast as possible crossing land by telegraph and oceans by ship, until it arrived in London 12 days later, on April 26th.

Fast forward to September 11th 2011. As the first reports of a plane colliding with New York’s World Trade Centre travel across the globe an estimated 1 billion people worldwide turn on their TVs and witness the second attack live.

With everyone so tightly and immediately connected old media is struggling to find its place. News was once the domain of the elite with access to long-range communication, mass printing and corporations able to afford the airtime. But today the capacity to broadcast has been almost entirely diffused. Chances are that right now you, along with billions of others around the world, have in your pocket all the technology you need to broadcast further, and in better quality than even the richest people and largest corporations ever could 70 years ago.

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The widespread nature of broadcast technology isn’t the death knell of the old media, in fact it relies on it. From any tragedy or warzone worldwide the first pictures, video and even raw facts no longer come from “our correspondent in…”, but from a bystander with a smartphone. These people haven’t studied or been taught journalism, they’re not on the media payroll but all of a sudden their social sharing dominates the headlines. Continue reading →

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A Brief Guide To Spam

April 19, 2013

Everyone and their grandmother suffers spam. If you’re smart you can minimise the amount of cheap Rolexes and little blue pills that you get offered on a daily basis, but it’s always a problem. In fact nearly 80% of all the emails the average person receives are spam. So why, in an age where we can have our emails delivered straight to our eyeballs, is spam still a blight on your otherwise sparkling inbox?

What is spam?

Now just to be clear we need to understand what counts as spam. Offers for free courses at a mysterious university, pre approvals for a 0% interest Credscam™ credit card and discount laser eye surgery? Spam. Friend request, password change and bank T&Cs notifications? Annoying as they may be, they’re not spam.

The crucial element is consent. There’s an official, long legalese definition here. But to break it down: for an email to be considered spam it has to be:

a) Sent in bulk, and
b) Unsolicited

spam

A newsletter you regret that you subscribed to is not spam because you gave consent at some point to receiving that email. Chances are if it’s a legitimate newsletter it’ll also let you unsubscribe at the bottom.

What’s the point?

Quite simply to sell you stuff. Mostly it’s bogus, non-existent or fake products or services that either never arrive or aren’t quite what was advertised. Occasionally they’re genuine, but don’t expect a decent price. After all, if a seller wasn’t up to something they wouldn’t have to use spam to advertise.

But as bad as some of the emails can be they do actually ensnare some unlucky souls. And because the operating costs of spam are so cheap, and the effort required negligible, it only takes 1 purchase for every 25,000 emails for spam to net a profit for its sender. And the numbers are much higher than that in reality.

It’s been theorised that despite these low costs there’s actually only a reasonable profit to be made from spam – it’s not the easy ride that it seems. In fact the global profits from spam are thought to be around $200 million a year. Meanwhile the cost to society, in terms of keeping spam at bay, is around $20 billion.

How do I avoid it?

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As long as people are making money off it there will be spam. In most cases it’s almost impossible to avoid, but you can do simple things to try and reduce the amount of junk that floods your inbox.

The best practice for this is to avoid posting your email address anywhere that isn’t necessary. For one-off website subscriptions try using a disposable email address like GuerillaMail, FakeInbox or any of the other hundreds of services.

For online shops and other site that want to send you marketing material, make sure you check or uncheck the boxes at the bottom (depending on how sneaky they want to be). To be super secure you might even want to set up another email address specifically for high spam-risk sites.

Of course if you really can’t stand email spam, it might be easiest to switch back to snail mail.

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Handy Keyboard Shortcuts

April 9, 2013

Life moves fast. Time is short. There’s no industry that understands that more than tech. Which is why every device you’ve ever used has been designed to make it as easy as possible. Sometimes though, these little tips and tricks that let us master our devices aren’t brilliantly obvious.

So today, to help you harness all the free time you can, we bring to you a cheat sheet of the 10 most useful keyboard shortcuts. Some are basic, and others aren’t very well known at all. First up: Windows

What keys?	What does it do?
Ctrl + C/V	Copies selected/paste
Ctrl + Z	Undo
Win + L	Locks your computer
Alt + D	Selects the address bar in your browser/folder
Alt + Tab	Cycles through currently open programs
Ctrl + Tab	Cycles through tabs in current window (e.g. browser)
Win + D	Shows your desktop (hides open windows)
Win + 1/2/3/4…	Launch app
Ctrl + Shift + T	Undo close tab (some browsers)
Ctrl + Shift + Esc	Brings up Task Manager (without the extra screen)

And for OS X:

What keys?	What does it do?
Cmd + C/V	Copies selected/paste
Cmd + Z	Undo
Cmd + L	Selects address bar in browsers
Cmd + Tab	Cycles through currently open apps
Ctrl + Tab	Cycles through tabs in current window (e.g. browser)
Cmd + Option + Shift + Esc	Force quits a hanging app
Shift + Opt + Volume Keys	Increases/decreases volume in smaller increments
Cmd + Opt + Eject	Initiates sleep instantly
Cmd + Space	Opens Spotlight in the top right corner
Cmd + Ctrl + D	Displays definiton of selected word

The list isn’t exhaustive, there are hundreds of magic combinations, so let us know any you want to share with people in the comments.

Posted in Desktops, laptops and Macs, How-to Guides, Random Technology | Leave a comment

What is Bitcoin?

April 4, 2013

Bitcoin. It sounds like something you use to buy extra tools for your Farmville game, but if you’ve been reading the news recently, some pretty major players are starting to talk about it. But what exactly is Bitcoin and why should you care?

bitcoin

With banks struggling to keep afloat and entire countries withholding citizens’ funds, you’d be fair to say that the global economy is somewhat… precarious at the moment. Last month’s banking turmoil in Cyprus has given even the most steadfast person reason to think twice about where their money is. And in a world where everything is so rapidly changing it has become fair to question the nature of how money works.

How does modern money work?

We’re a tech blog, not a financial blog, so we’re not going into every gory detail. But money basically works because we believe it does. When you hand someone a £5 note they only accept it because you, they and the Bank of England believe it’s worth £5. If one day everyone decided that a potato was also worth £5, and they were willing to accept it as payment, nothing would stop us loading our pockets with potatoes to go to the pub. And that’s all any currency is – mutual belief.

So then what’s a Bitcoin?

A potato. Continue reading →

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DIY Logos

March 26, 2013

The Logo is one of the most essential steps of building and communicating your brand hence you’d want to make it as punchy as possible.

Here at Lucidica we work with small businesses and start-ups and we know how difficult (and costly) some parts of setting a business can be. Simply hiring a designer to create your logo might be more expensive than buying your office furnishing! So we decided to have a look at what ways are there to do a logo yourself with little to no budget.

There are quite a few online platforms which you can experiment with by simply entering your company’s name and slogan.

Tweak.com – A super straightforward website and really easy to navigate around. It offers a wide range of simple and some very creative logo designs in various colours schemes and typography. It’s limited in placement of text and image, but it’s a very quick process and totally free.

Continue reading →

Posted in How-to Guides, Small business stuff, Website | Leave a comment

How To Build Your Own Website

March 19, 2013

Are you are a small business or just an individual with a desire to set up your own website but don’t really know how? Here are some easy tips on how you can do it yourself without any coding.

First off, you have to have a strategy. What’s the point of your website and how you are going to structure it? Second, you need to have a clear idea of who your target audience is in order to know how to make it more appealing to them so when they come to your website they will linger longer. And last but not least, the templates you’ll chose have to be in line with your company’s image, vision and values since this is what will communicate who you are. It’s also worth checking out the competition to get an idea of what you’re up against.

Now, let’s have a look at some website-building platforms.

1. WordPress

This is a blogging platform which can easily be made to look like a more fully featured website. In its free state it has some limitations, like requiring the URL to include ‘Wordpress’.

If you fancy flashing your cash you can get a domain of your own choice for about £30-40 or more a year depending on the plan you select.

Continue reading →

Posted in Products, Small business stuff, Website | Leave a comment

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