Israel Begins Counting Its Problem Gamblers
Efshar, the Association for the Development of Social Services in Israel, recently commissioned a survey to gauge the preponderance of gambling among Israelis and whether gambling problems are on the rise, reported Sunday's Jerusalem Post.
The results of Efshar's survey show that gambling, whether through legal or illegal sources, is on the rise in Israel.
For example, the survey found that 67 percent of the country's Jewish population and 58 percent of its Arab population regularly gamble. Plus, 13 percent of Israeli adults have gambled at one of the "underground" casinos in the area.
Another 20 percent of those surveyed said they had family members who gambled in an "exaggerated" fashion.
The study said, "Under the surface there is an active infrastructure of illegal betting parlors, as well as gambling operations over the phone and via the Internet."
The popularity of gambling can't be attributed to its "forbidden" status, since at least one-third of the survey respondents indicated that they would want to gamble if there were a legal casino allowed in the area.
Personalized Technology Makes Winning Services
Technology powering personalization services promises to be a booming market, and experts predict investment in personalization technology will top $2 billion by 2006.
U.K. research firm Datamonitor examines the topic closely in its "Global Personalization Technologies: making one-to-one a reality" report, which was released on Sept. 11.
"Personalization software is still in its early stages and privacy is an issue," said Antoine Bousquest, a Datamonitor technology analyst. "However, personalization will increasingly become crucial to companies as well as a service that customers will expect. As the flow of information grows--be it marketing, service or media content--alongside the development of new channels, it will become vital for companies to acquire the means to target information appropriately."
In the report, Datamonitor said personalization technology is being used primarily by the financial services and retail industries, which together account for nearly 50 percent of spending on the technology in North America and Europe.
Are You Practicing Safe Computing?
A recent survey, "Are You Practicing Safe Computing?," released on Aug. 29 shows people are not taking necessary steps to protect their PCs from damaging viruses.
Central Command Inc., an Ohio-based provider of PC anti-virus software and computer security services, surveyed more than 750,000 PC users worldwide, 12 percent of which responded.
Company officials weren't surprised that viruses have infected so many computers. The majority of those surveyed said they were unlikely to change their computer and e-mail habits to better protect their PCs from outside harm.
For example, more than one-fifth of home and office personal computer users have knowingly opened an unknown e-mail attachment out of sheer curiosity, exposing themselves and others to e-mail viruses.
The company also learned that 31 percent of respondents using Instant Messaging software have accepted and downloaded a file transfer within the last six months, while 16 percent admitted that the file transfer came from an unknown source. A basic Internet security protocol is to never open attachments or accept file transfers via IM from unknown senders.
"Based on a new trend of viruses written to exploit these IM channels, this statistic is alarming," said Steven Sundermeier, product manager at Central Command.
Details of the survey can be accessed online at www.centralcommand.com/safesurvey.html
IT Costs from Terrorist Attacks Assessed
While workers continue digging through the tons of rubble that were the World Trade Center, a world-renowned landmark of economic vitality and technological wonder until the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11 destroyed it, business and economic leaders are trying to grasp the economic fallout from the tragedy.
On Tuesday the TowerGroup, a Needham, Mass.-based financial services research firm, put the price tag on rebuilding the surrounding Wall Street-area IT infrastructure as high as $3.2 billion.
The outlay would probably be spread over the course of one to two years as companies replace technology, find new office space and replace other equipment destroyed in the attack.
An estimated $1.7 billion will be needed to replace employees' workstations and equipment, including PCs, servers,
minicomputers, storage devices, cables, communication hubs, routers and switches. Companies that need specialized desktop trading technology will add to their shopping list multiple monitors, extra memory and state-of-the-art systems so that financial and trading staffers can access the multiple market data feeds and complex market activity analysis software necessary to perform their jobs and remain competitive.
Up to 30,000 securities workstations were destroyed in the seven World Trade Center buildings, said Larry Tabb, vice president of securities and investment research for TowerGroup.
He also sees another 15,000 to 20,000 workstations that will need to be replaced in adjacent buildings such as the World Financial Center and 1 Liberty Plaza.
More African Americans Hit the Web Last Month
An Internet ratings report from Nielsen//NetRatings for the month of August showed that 8.2 million African Americans accessed the Web from home last month, much more than the 6.9 million that went online during
August 2000.
On a year-to-year basis, this was a 19 percent increase of Internet usage by the African American population. In comparison, the overall U.S. online population grew by 14 percent.
"African Americans account for more than eight percent of the online population, but according to the U.S. Census Bureau, the group represents nearly 13 percent of the overall U.S. population," said T.S. Kelly, director and principal analyst for NetRatings. "Compared to the number of African Americans reflected in the total U.S. population, representation of the
African American group on the Internet has room for growth."
As part of the August ratings report, NetRatings also listed the top 10 sites, as ranked by composition percentage, visited by African Americans.
- Black Planet.com
- BET.com
- CollegeClub.com
- Aaliyah2001.com
- Ohhla.com
- Aaliyah.com
- NBA.com
- Nike.com
- SonyMusic.com
- GA.us