Could Robots Be the Employees of the Future?

Robots are learning how to accomplish more than simply moving from place to place or maybe vacuuming a floor.

In fact, researchers at the University of Maryland recently used videos to teach a robot how to make salads.

The robot, named Julia (after Julia Child), learned each step of the salad making process after watching YouTube videos of people completing those same steps. It was then able to emulate those steps itself, though not without some difficulty. In certain areas, most notably pouring the dressing there were challenges. The video below spells out more:

http://c.brightcove.com/services/viewer/federated_f9?isVid=1&isUI=1

And while making a salad might not seem like the most exciting or innovative use of robot technology, the team is hopeful this is just the first step. It’s part of a process of teaching robots in a way that might someday benefit all of society. Yiannis Aloimonos, a computer science professor at the university, told Time:

“If you can work in the kitchen with your hands and do things, basically you can do almost anything else.”

So, while today Julia is focused on learning the fine art of salad making, tomorrow it could be learning to make other foods using the same methods. The robot could eventually learn how to do other tasks like moving boxes on a factory floor or stocking shelves at a store.

The technology is still in its early stages. Robots aren’t in the process of taking over jobs on any sort of large scale at the moment. However, the team is hopeful that in the future this technology might enable robots to become part of the workplaces. Cornelia Fermüller, a research scientist at the university, told Time:

“We would like to create tools so that eventually robots can really work together with humans in different settings, for examples in a working place or help in the kitchen.”

It’s unlikely that robots will really take over human jobs on a large scale. Even if and when they do make their way into workplaces, they’re still likely to need supervision and/or operators. But their ability to do manual labor and simple tasks could certainly free up some human workers for more complicated or thoughtful types work.

Image: University of Maryland

This article, “Could Robots Be the Employees of the Future?” was first published on Small Business Trends

from Blogger http://evangelinagius.blogspot.com/2015/05/could-robots-be-employees-of-future.html

9 Bookkeeping Apps Your Small Business Needs to Succeed

One of the most common causes of business failure is inadequate financing. But, let’s be honest, sending out invoices, keeping track of expenses, doing the weekly payroll and filing taxes can be incredibly challenging when your mind is on business growth.

No matter how vital these tasks, they are tedious and can consume more of your time and resources than you would like.

With the following bookkeeping apps, however, you streamline all of your finance tasks so that you can ensure that your business succeeds.

Wave

Since launching in 2010, Wave has been used by more than 2 million small business owners, consultants and freelancers to manage all of their accounting, payroll and invoicing needs. Wave also has a handy receipt scanner and is 100 percent free. And, if you do run into any serious problems, Wave can connect you to a local accountant through it’s ‘Find an Account’ feature.

With the Wave iOS app, you can easily send out an unlimited number of invoices while on the go. As for Android users, the Receipts by Wave app allows you to scan receipts and upload them to the cloud to simplify your business’s record keeping.

FreshBooks

Forbes has stated that FreshBooks is “incredibly user friendly,” and there’s a whole lot of truth to that. The FreshBooks platform gives you the power to create online invoices, capture expenses, track your times on a job, and keep a tab on your cash flow and expenses. If that isn’t enough, FreshBooks comes with award-winning customer support.

The FreshBooks app is free and handles all of the tasks that were just mentioned. One of the best features about the app is that you can work offline and all your information will be synced to the cloud once you’re back online.

Due.com

If you’re looking for a top-notch time tracking and invoicing platform for your business, then Due.com is worth checking out. You can create professional-looking invoices in a snap and manage times by either client, project, or task. What makes Due.com stand out from other time tracking and invoicing tools is it’s design. It’s well-organized and has brightly colored icons so that you can easily view the progress of your work.

The app is free for five clients per month. If you want to integrate with PayPal, set-up recurring payments, and send out unlimited invoices, pricing starts at $3 per month.

You Need a Budget

YNAB was named the 2011 Reader’s Choice Winner for Best Personal Finance Software by About.com because of how efficient it is at helping you make informed spending decisions. With YNAB you can quickly view your budget’s ‘outflow,’ schedule bills and paychecks, and split transactions. YNAB supports most currencies (Dollars, Euros, Pounds, Rupees, Reals, Rands) and has a convenient autosave.

You can download the YNAB app for iOS and Android devices for a free trial. You will have to purchase the software with a one-time payment of $60 following the free trial.

Zenpayroll

If you find payroll and taxes a bit too tedious, then Zenpayroll is one of the best solutions available. Zenpayroll will automate everything from new employee reports, calculate state and federal payroll taxes, and process payroll. You can even use Zenpayroll to track employee sick and vacation time, set up worker’s compensation, and create online payroll forms.

To access Zenpayroll on any device, you’ll have to pay a monthly fee of $25 plus $4 per employees.

Ebates

Keep on top of the coupons and cash back deals on the products and goods that your business commonly uses to save 3 to 10 percent utilizing the Ebates app.

If your small business or startup purchases supplies from Amazon, for example, the Ebates.com app can notify you or your buyer when discounts are available.

Expensify

As a business owner, there will be plenty of employee expenses that come across your desk. Thankfully, Expensify has developed software that will simplify how expenses are reported and approved. With Expensify, you can capture billable expenses, add cash expenses, scan receipts, and automate duplicate expenses with ease.

There’s a free mobile app for iOS, Android, BlackBerry, and Windows Phone devices.

Neat

Neat is a nifty tool if you’re looking to improve your workflow. This is accomplished by letting you file receipts and invoices in seconds and create tax, spending, and expense reports. And, if you need to pull up a previous invoice or receipt, you can do so in one convenient location.

The app can be used on Android and iOS devices, but you’ll have to purchase the Neat Cloud Service. Plans range from $5.99 to $24.99 per month.

Zoho Books

What can’t Zoho do for your business? The platform can be used for sales and marketing, email collaboration with team members, recruiting, invoicing and expense reporting. Zoho also seamlessly integrates with Google Apps and is an affordable option with plans starting at $12 per user per month.

If you need to manage your business’s finances while on the go, Zoho is available for iOS and Android users. There’s even an app for the brand new Apple Watch!

Which bookkeeping apps do you frequently use to handle your finances?

Image: Wave

This article, “9 Bookkeeping Apps Your Small Business Needs to Succeed” was first published on Small Business Trends

from Blogger http://evangelinagius.blogspot.com/2015/05/9-bookkeeping-apps-your-small-business.html

Apple Amping Up Maps to Compete With Google

Apple has purchased GPS software company Coherent Navigation in an attempt to make its location search comparable to Google Maps.

from Blogger http://evangelinagius.blogspot.com/2015/05/apple-amping-up-maps-to-compete-with.html

How Will the EU’s New Value Added Tax (VAT) Rules Impact US Based Businesses?

U.S.-based small businesses that sell certain digital products within European Union countries need to account for new value-added tax (VAT) regulations.

The new VAT rules went into effect on Jan. 1, 2015, and apply to companies selling digital products within any EU member country.

There are 28 EU countries in all: Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Republic of Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, and the U.K.

The new Value Added Tax rates cover a broad range of digital products. The list includes software, digital photos, screensavers and ebooks — as well as music, films, games and online magazines.

Web hosting and other online services — including selling advertising space on a website — also require compliance with the new guidelines.

The VAT tax was implemented in large part because large companies such as Amazon are known to funnel their EU sales through a corporate subsidiary based in a single EU country with an extremely low VAT rate — Luxembourg, in Amazon’s case — to keep taxes low.

The new rules force companies such as Amazon to register for VAT in every country in which it sells products so that each EU member state can get its fair share of tax money.

But the Value Added Tax is not limited to the Amazons of the world. If you are a U.S.-based small business selling digital products in the EU, you need to comply with the new VAT rules, too, according to the EU’s official VAT fact sheet.

To do so requires first identifying each of your EU customers’ locations, including address.

Then, you must gather proof of each customer’s location based on two correlating pieces of evidence, such as a billing address and matching IP address. Proof of location must be stored for 10 years.

Your company then submits a quarterly VAT return to each EU state and pays it.

You can choose to use a MOSS (mini-one-stop-shop) to report to each EU state for you. MOSS systems collect and distribute the VAT for companies based outside the EU.

The benefit of using MOSS is that you don’t have to VAT-register in each country. However, MOSS is not a “magic bullet” solution because, while it registers you with the necessary tax authorities and distributes any VAT you owe for you, it doesn’t collect and store the two pieces of proof of location you need for each customer.

And you still need to know the applicable VAT rate for each sale. Rates vary not only with each EU member nation but also with different kinds of products. Additional information about MOSS is available on the Web from sources like this page posted on a UK government site.

The Value Added Tax overall is a difficult pill to swallow. One criticism is that there’s no clear definition of precisely which products fall under the new tax, so each EU country interprets the product categories differently. Also, each EU country is divided into zones.

The result of this complexity means there are actually 81 VAT rates. Those interested in reading specifics of the guidelines can peruse (PDF) the VAT’s explanatory notes.

Third-party platforms have arisen with offers to solve all your VAT problems — for a fee, of course.

But some cloud-based eCommerce platforms also have emerged to assist small businesses suddenly faced with VAT — at no charge.

One of them is San Diego, California-based Ecwid, an add-on eCommerce platform.

The company keeps an eye on new VAT guidelines on its official blog, where it notes:

“As a small business owner, the new rules present you with some difficult challenges that we’re prepared to help you navigate and comply.”

Ecwid provides a virtual shopping cart that seamlessly integrates with a merchant’s existing online presence via the inclusion of a few lines of code. Available free of charge (without set-up or transaction fees), Ecwid also provides three step-up plans for businesses seeking support and additional features. Monthly prices are $15, $35 and $99.

Ecwid offers the functionality to set VAT rates in three steps via Ecwid’s control panel. First, you create the VAT tax itself and name it. Next, you create a “destination zone” for each EU country (totaling 28), then add each country’s zones, as well as each zone’s VAT rate.

Also, by using Ecwid’s “defined by billing address” feature you have a mechanism to gather and store the location of each customer. (Their IP address is automatically stored when they visit your website or eCommerce site.

A full list of Value Added Tax rates are available on VATlive.com here.

European Parliament Building Photo via Shutterstock

This article, “How Will the EU’s New Value Added Tax (VAT) Rules Impact US Based Businesses?” was first published on Small Business Trends

from Blogger http://evangelinagius.blogspot.com/2015/05/how-will-eus-new-value-added-tax-vat.html

Will Increasing the Social Safety Net Boost Entrepreneurship?

The traditional view of entrepreneurship holds that policy makers can increase business creation by reducing intervention in the economy. Less government involvement frees up those willing to take the risk of starting companies to pursue business opportunities, this school of thought argues.

But recently some scholars have challenged this view, suggesting that the main obstacle to more entrepreneurship is not a lack of freedom or incentives, but an unwillingness to bear the risk of failure.

In an Atlantic article, Walter Frick summarized their views. The government can boost rates of entrepreneurship by increasing the social safety net. Knowledge that would-be entrepreneurs would have something to fall back on should their new businesses fail encourages more of them to take the risk of opening a new business.

Over the years, many economists have argued that programs like food stamps and welfare discourage entrepreneurship by reducing the incentive to start a business. If people can get the money and food they need to survive without working, the relative magnitude of the financial gain from starting a business will be lower, reducing the motivation to strike out on one’s own.

Moreover, to pay for social welfare programs, the government must tax people, and those taxes reduce the after tax return from entrepreneurship, some scholars explain (PDF).

Studies show that at times and in countries where spending on social welfare programs is higher, new business creation is lower.

Recent research shows evidence of the alternative risk-reduction hypothesis. Gareth Olds, an assistant professor at the Harvard Business School found (PDF) that states that boosted the food stamp programs, allowing would-be entrepreneurs a better safety net, saw an increase in business creation.

Robert Fairlie of the University of California Santa Cruz and his colleagues found (PDF) that business creation rises among people at age 65 — because at that age, people would not lose health insurance by striking out on their own.

Gareth Olds also found that the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP), which provides health insurance to children not covered by Medicare or private insurance, led to a rise of business creation in both immigrant and non-immigrant households.

It’s not clear from these few studies whether expanding social welfare programs boosts business creation more than cutting those schemes enhances it.

To measure whether society is better or worse off from a government program to enhance entrepreneurship, policy makers must look at all of the beneficial and detrimental effects together and calculate the net effect.

Nevertheless, the argument of Olds, Fairlie, and others is intriguing. If government social welfare programs reduce the risk of entrepreneurship, policy makers might stimulate business creation by stealing a plan from the liberal playbook.

Given this possibility, our policy makers should examine the overall effect of the social safety net on business formation when they formulate entrepreneurship programs.

Safety Netting Photo via Shutterstock

This article, “Will Increasing the Social Safety Net Boost Entrepreneurship?” was first published on Small Business Trends

from Blogger http://evangelinagius.blogspot.com/2015/05/will-increasing-social-safety-net-boost.html

Keywords on Mobile: Not Comparable to Desktop

Now that mobile search has overtaken desktop, it’s important to understand the differences: on mobile, shorter keyword counts have higher CTR, while longer keywords lead to increased CPC.

from Blogger http://evangelinagius.blogspot.com/2015/05/keywords-on-mobile-not-comparable-to.html

Are You Making These Three Silly SEO Mistakes?

Ignoring link equity, mismanaging exclusions and failing to communicate with search engines are just three common – but easily-avoidable – mistakes marketers make regarding their SEO.

from Blogger http://evangelinagius.blogspot.com/2015/05/are-you-making-these-three-silly-seo.html

Pets at the Office are the Cat’s Meow for Employee Morale

While not everyone may like pets around, bringing pets to the office is actually very beneficial for employees. A recent study published in the International Journal of Workplace Health Management stated that stress declined for people who brought their dogs to work. When owners left their dogs at home, their stress level increased throughout the day. Therefore, it is predictable to see that more offices around the U.S. started to adopt a pet friendly office policy for the past few years.

Let’s look at the pros and cons of a pet friendly office.

Positives

Lower Stress

Employees who take their pets to work have lower stress levels compared to other employees who don’t bring their pets with them. Pets create physiologically a better environment. For example; if you had a bad meeting, petting your cat or taking your dog for a short walk will automatically help you refresh yourself and take a break to clear your mind.

Improve Communication Among Employees

Having pets around will help employees get socialized more quickly because pet lovers will find a common interest to start a conversation. Also, stopping by someone’s desk to pet their cat or dog will spontaneously initiate a conversation.

Improve Health

When you bring your dog to work, instead of hiring a dog walker, you can take your dog for a walk yourself. This will help you exercise during the day and give you an excuse to get out of the office to take some fresh air.

Increase Employee Commitment

Bringing your pet with you will help you feel like you are at home. As a result, you can stay in the office longer if you need to and don’t need to worry about your pet anymore. Moreover, this pet friendly office policy will help bring new talent to the company and keep the existing talent longer.

Drawbacks

Workplace Environment

Unfortunately, you cannot allow pets in every type of environment. For example, it is not appropriate to let the staff of a restaurant bring their pets with them. Same statement holds for a supermarket as well.

Health Conditions

Some employees may have allergies to pets. In this case, they should sit in areas where pets are not allowed or pets should only be allowed in some parts of the office. Also, pets should be healthy, trained and well-behaved. In addition, their immunizations should be complete and up-to-date.

Republished by permission. Original here.
Pets at the Office Photo via Shutterstock

This article, “Pets at the Office are the Cat’s Meow for Employee Morale” was first published on Small Business Trends

from Blogger http://evangelinagius.blogspot.com/2015/05/pets-at-office-are-cats-meow-for.html

Fraudulent DMCA Takedown Requests: Finally, a Lid on Them?

Critics have charged that the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) has been used as a tool of abuse.  Fraudulent claims of copyright infringement have been a major problem with the DMCA Act, according to some.

However, a recent California district court ruling is a step in the right direction to finally put a lid on fraudulent DMCA takedown requests.

Or at least, that’s what observers are hoping for.

The case, called Automattic vs. Steiner, awarded over $25,000 in damages against a group that filed an unfounded DMCA takedown request.  It puts some teeth in the law, because it’s one of the few, maybe only, times damages have actually been awarded against abusers.

DMCA — A Flawed Law

Enacted in 1998, the DMCA requires Web content to be “taken down” if it infringes on someone else’s copyright.

There’s certainly a good side to the DMCA. The Act helps a content owner whose content has been stolen or republished without permission. It quickly forces removal of plagiarized or infringing content.

But what if you are on the receiving end — and haven’t done a thing wrong?

Unscrupulous competitors or people with an ax to grind have played dirty at times. They have used the law to harass or get back at their enemies or try to censor views they don’t agree with. They do this by lodging unfounded infringement claims in the form of “DMCA takedown requests.”

Social platforms like YouTube, hosting companies and search engines have to follow the law. They may have no choice but to take down the content, remove it from search results, or suspend Web pages.

What makes it seem so unfair is that this can happen without the site owner having a chance to defend against or refute claims, until after the fact.

It’s as if a neighbor you have a beef with could call the police to close down your business, merely on his or her say-so.  Then the burden is on you to somehow prove that you didn’t do anything wrong, and get it up and running again.

It’s all because of the way the DMCA law is written.

Using DMCA Takedown Requests as a Club

As Mike Masnick of TechDirt once noted, Google’s own data supports how the DMCA is being used as a commercial bludgeon:

“Google notes that more than half (57 percent) of the takedown notices it has received under the US Digital Millennium Copyright Act 1998, were sent by businesses targeting competitors and over one third (37 percent) of notices were not valid copyright claims.”

And the numbers of takedown notices have soared in recent years.

Google publishes a Transparency Report of DMCA takedown requests it gets.  This graph shows the growth of the number of infringement claims just in the past four years:

Google says in the last month alone, it received notices on over 36 million URLs that allegedly link to infringing content.

Under the law, Google doesn’t get to decide whether the claim is baseless or not. It can only determine whether the notice on its face meets the DMCA’s requirements.

If it does, Google de-indexes the content. And it does so fast — within six hours on average.

On its Copyright Center, Google states:

“Google isn’t able to mediate rights ownership disputes. When we receive a complete and valid takedown notice, we remove the content as the law requires. When we receive a valid counter notification we forward it to the person who requested the removal. If there is still a dispute it’s up to the parties involved to resolve the issue in court.”

In other words, if it’s your website or Web page that’s been de-indexed without good reason, it’s your problem.

You may be forced into the expense and hassle of taking the complaining party to court — instead of the other way around as our legal system normally requires.

While all of that is happening, you’re nowhere to be found in Google.  You’re losing business.

And it’s not just search results you have to be concerned about.  Blogging platforms and social media platforms also have taken down blogs, videos and other content.

Hosting companies also are subject to the DMCA.  They too have been known to suspend pages or even entire sites.  (Plagiarism Today explains the process.)

Over at TechDirt, a site covering copyright issues, hardly a week goes by without a new story about abusive DMCA complaints. Some are breathtakingly brazen.

Putting Teeth into Fighting Fraudulent Takedowns

That’s what makes the Automattic vs. Steiner case so interesting.

The case, decided in March 2015, held that someone filing a knowingly unfounded DMCA takedown request is liable for the other parties’ expenses and damage.

Liability for damages has always been in the DMCA law.  That part is not new.

What is new is that this case is one of the rare times a court has actually granted a substantial dollar amount.

Jack Greiner, a lawyer with the Cincinnati-based Graydon Head law firm who writes for Enquirer Media in First Amendment and media issues, described the decision as “the first and most clear explanation of the available damages.”

In the case, Nick Steiner, an official with a group called Straight Pride UK, sent a press release to a blogger who had requested information.  The blogger incorporated parts of the press release into an unfavorable blog post.  Steiner then issued a DMCA takedown request to WordPress.com, where the blog was hosted.

Automattic Inc, which runs WordPress.com, effectively said ‘We’ve had it up to here with these unfounded DMCA claims.’

After all, the information used in the blog was from a press release. By its very nature the information was intended for third parties to use.

So Automattic Inc. filed suit in U.S. District Court in California.

In March, U.S. District Judge Phyllis J. Hamilton granted a judgment in favor of Automattic and the blogger for their expenses and time spent fighting the takedown notice.

Straight Pride UK no longer seems to exist, however. Therefore, the $25,000 awarded to the plaintiffs may never be collected.

Still, the ruling “sets a rare precedent against attempts to use the [DMCA] to take content offline,” the Guardian noted.

What does it mean for entrepreneur bloggers and small business website owners?

First, this court case may make unscrupulous competitors and grudge holders stop and think before filing unfounded DMCA takedown requests.  If requests are not based on justifiable reasons, it could cost the fraudsters in damages.

Second, because a big player like WordPress.com decided to weigh in, it means more small businesses may have allies to fight fraudulent claims.  As a WordPress.com representative wrote, the company plans to battle DMCA abuses:

“Until there are some teeth to the copyright laws, it’s up to us — websites and users, together — to stand up to DMCA fraud and protect freedom of expression. Through these suits, we’d like to remind our users that we’re doing all we can to combat DMCA abuse on WordPress.com … and most importantly, remind copyright abusers to think twice before submitting fraudulent takedown notices. We’ll be watching, and are ready to fight back.”

Justice via Shutterstock; Google screenshot

This article, “Fraudulent DMCA Takedown Requests: Finally, a Lid on Them?” was first published on Small Business Trends

from Blogger http://evangelinagius.blogspot.com/2015/05/fraudulent-dmca-takedown-requests.html

Does This Change Your Mind About Advertising on Facebook?

Can advertising on Facebook to increase your page likes and social engagement be a bad idea? At least one commentator thinks so.

Derek Muller, founder and host of the educational science channel Veratasium on YouTube thinks so.

In this video, Muller recounts his own experiences and those of BBC tech corespondent Rory Cellan-Jones with Facebook advertising.

Muller explains there are two ways of paying for likes on Facebook. One is by paying for Facebook advertising. This is supposed to allow you to target those specifically interested in your content.

The other, Muller says, involves buying likes on Facebook through sites like Boostlikes. These sites employ workers in developing countries like Egypt, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, and India who are paid $1 for every thousand or so likes. (This is an approach explicitly forbidden by Facebook, Muller adds.)

And the trouble with this second approach, according to Muller, goes beyond the fact that it is against the rules. Acquiring these so-called “fake likes” might actually make it harder to promote yourself on Facebook in the long run. In the video, Muller explains:

“When you make a post, Facebook distributes it to a small fraction of the people who like your page just to gauge their reaction. If they engage with it by liking, commenting or sharing, then Facebook distributes it to more of your likes and even their friends. Now, if you somehow accumulate fake likes, Facebook’s initial distribution goes out to fewer real fans and therefore it receives less engagement and consequently you reach a smaller number of people. That’s how a rising number of fans can result in a drop in engagement.”

But Muller insists that what he and Cellan-Jones discovered suggests paying for Facebook ads may not be that much better.

It turns out likes Muller and Cellan-Jones acquired from Facebook ads seemed suspicious too. A large number were concentrated in the same developing countries so-called “click farm” likes tend to originate.

So these likes tended to result in less engagement too.

Why?

Muller theorizes that “click farm” employees may actually be clicking on legitimate Facebook ads to prevent detection by Facebook’s algorithm.

So essentially this is the same as if advertisers had bought fake likes from a site like Boostlikes instead. More from Muller:

“And from this Facebook makes money twice over, once when you acquire new fans and then again when you try to reach them. I mean your organic reach may be so restricted by your level of engagement that your only option is to pay to promote the post.”

The takeaway? When advertising on Facebook, be sure the likes you receive are coming from engaged members who share and comment on your posts regularly.

Otherwise, you may be paying to attract users who aren’t really interested in your content. That will make it even harder and more expensive to eventually attract the users you want.

Facebook Like Photo via Shutterstock

This article, “Does This Change Your Mind About Advertising on Facebook?” was first published on Small Business Trends

from Blogger http://evangelinagius.blogspot.com/2015/05/does-this-change-your-mind-about.html