What is Digital Marketing?

Digital Marketing is the use of digital technology to deliver your marketing messages and to allow your customers to interact with your business.

Traditionally marketing has been about pushing your messages to your customer. With technology, now you can enter into a dialogue with your customers and deliver what they actually want and not want you think they want. Often there is quite a gap and digital marketing is what allows you to communicate one to one with your customers and on a mass scale.

So what areas does digital marketing cover?

For me Digital Marketing includes:

• Web Sites which includes:
  • Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) – Getting found on Google etc
  • Pay Per Click (PPC) – Paying for somebody to find you on Google etc
  • Banner Adverts – Paying for banners to get visitors to your site
  • Ecommerce – The ability to buy and sell products, services and information over the Internet.
• Consumer Reviews – Consumer reviews are a powerful way to get consumers on to your eCommerce site as they make the purchasing decision easier as the reviews are by consumers who have purchased the product. Whole businesses are built around this concept such as TripAdvisor.
• Blogs. Personal web sites with stories, expert opinion etc that you believe will help your readers, customers and stakeholders.
• Social Media. Twitter, Facebook, Linkedin, YouTube, Google+, Ushi, Xing etc. These are web based systems that allow you to connect and share information such as ideas, links, photos, videos with like minded people. They can also generate income for your business and so can be routes to market for your business. They can be great ways to connect with people who you may not be able to get to by any other means. Twitter can be a great source of publicly available real time information and has reported major global events ahead of the world’s press.
• Social Media News. Mashable is by far the biggest social media news site.
• Online PR. There are specific web sites for making press releases available to the press. Prlog.org and helpareporter.com are examples.
• Webinars/Events – Webinars are one to many seminars distributed across the Internet. This allows you to present to a large number of people independent of location. Events are traditional meetings or workshops but are marketed through Social networks such as Linkedin.
• Email Marketing – The sending out of bulk emails which you believe are relevant to the people you are sending the message to.
• Lead Nuturing – This is where a prospect gives you their email address in exchange for something free. This is usually an eBook (in pdf format), video, course of emails on how to do something.
• Viral Marketing – The sending out of a message which is so compelling that people forward it on to other people unknown to you. A great way to send out a message if you get it right.
• Video – Increasingly popular method of sharing ideas, passing on information and selling on the web. Great for selling more complex products or services. YouTube is the most popular at the present but video is becoming embedded into more digital media.
• Music/Podcasts. Spotify is becoming the most popular legal file sharing system as it gives you access to a large range of music. Podcasts are voice recordings about a particular subject. They can be download for listening to on computer or MP3 players at a later date. Great for relaxation or for learning about a new subject whilst travelling.
• Chat/Instant Messaging/Skype. Chat and Instant Messaging are systems for conversations using a keyboard which are done in real time. I.e. one person types something and the other responds. Both need to be present and online for this to work. Users of Facebook, Bebo etc use this, especially the younger generation. Skype is an internet based video and phone system that allows Skype users to call each other for free or at lot low cost and is becoming increasingly popular for business use and will grow now that the video version is available on Facebook.
• Smartphone or Mobile Apps. Smartphone or mobile apps (or software applications which is where the term is derived from) are small pieces of computer software that run on your phone that allow you to do things that you would normally do on a computer. The need to work anywhere, anytime means that these will become increasing popular with business systems starting to appear on them. Great for anybody who works away from the office including executives, technical and sales people. Also watch for a growing number of consumers using their mobiles for online purchases as they fill their time waiting for something.
• Cloud based storage/File Sharing. The Cloud is for most purposes another name for the Internet. So Cloud based storage is the ability to store information on the internet including backups and sending large files to customers and suppliers. DropBox and Yousendit are examples of systems for sharing large files between unrelated users. There are a wide range of suppliers of remote backup systems now with most corporates including them in their backup strategies. Personal File sharing is also available for two or more computers to be linked together to share information including music and videos. Personal File Sharing is generally not a business tool for larger corporates.
• Cloud based systems. These are systems that allow you to work anywhere. Google has Google Docs, Microsoft has Office 365. A lot of third party software providers are moving their systems onto the Cloud so that customers can access them from anywhere and don’t have to worry about their own IT infrastructure. Companies are moving their IT infrastructure on to the Cloud in order to reduce costs as all the infrastructure is managed by a third party.
• Extranets/Web based Systems. Companies are now looking to give customers and suppliers access to their information (through Extranets) and their systems (through Web based systems). This allows customers and suppliers to access to information relevant to them and enables them to do any processing on a DIY basis saving you both time and money such as the entering and progressing of orders and checking stock levels.
• Remote Access. The ability to work anywhere means that you sometimes need access to your computer at home or work. Remote access through web sites such as Teamview and Logmein are a great way to get at critical documents away from the computer. Some of these systems allow you to do on line demonstrations of your product and service. This saves you and your customer time and money.
• Online Games/Gaming. More gaming companies are moving their operations on to the web so that their services can be accessed anywhere anytime. Also notice that more consumer applications have games technology or ideas built in to them in order to make it more fun to buy. The term is called gamification. This could be a challenge for parents as the line becomes blurred between buying something and playing a game.

In an age where systems are everywhere businesses need to understand how to exploit Digital Marketing as it is a means to improving the service to your customers, driving down costs and making your organization more agile.

All organizations large and small need to understand Digital Marketing and have a strategy of how they are going to exploit the opportunities that Digital Marketing has to offer.

Back in early 2009 I had the pleasure of speaking with legendary rock vocalist Jeff Scott Soto. During our conversation he spoke to me, with great excitement, about a new project he was working on called W.E.T. This was going to be A collaboration between Robert Sall from Work of Art, Eric Martensson from Eclipse, and himself. Once I had heard their 2009 self titled debut album I could see why he was so excited. In short, this is melodic rock at its finest. In 2013 the band would release the follow up album Rise Up which would take the band to another level. This would then lead to the release of a live CD/DVD package in 2014 titled One Live In Stockholm. To get the inside story of the band’s formation, the state of the music industry and the band’s new live CD/DVD I caught up with bassist, keyboardist and rhythm guitarist Eric Martensson.

Rock Man: Congratulations on the success you have had with W.E.T. and also Eclipse, are you happy with what both bands have been able to achieve?

Erik Martensson: Yeah I am really happy with both bands. With Eclipse we have been working really hard but with W.E.T., of course we have been working hard with W.E.T. as well, but we had no idea the amount of success or how much people would love the band. When we did the first album it sold a lot of albums, it is just fantastic.

RM: Can you tell me about how W.E.T. initially came together?

EM: It started off with Frontiers (Records), they asked me to write six songs for a band or project with Jeff Scott Soto and of course I said yes. Jeff is a big old hero, he has been singing with Yngwie Malmsteen and everything so of course I wanted to write songs for Jeff. A friend of mine, Robert Sall from Work of Art, he also got requested to write six songs but then we delivered the previous Eclipse album Are You Ready To Rock and the day after we delivered it they were kind of impressed with the production and they asked if I wanted to produce the whole album with Jeff. And it was Wow! It was a big thing for me, it was the first producer job I got in my life, so it was a big thing. Robert from Work of Art, he came to my studio, I handed him two songs I had, Brothers In Arms and One Love and Robert came and he had these Toto sounding songs and it was “Okay, this won’t fit on the same album, it’s two different kind of music styles” so we decided to write the whole album together, instead of writing separately. We wanted the whole project to have a band feeling because a lot of these melodic rock projects are projects in general, they sound like they have songs coming from all over the place from different writes and then the producer takes them in and tries and make them sound the same and they are really different from each other, but we wanted this to sound like a band record. But me and Robert wrote the rest of the songs together then Jeff came in and heard the songs and was like “Wow! this is really good stuff”, so we kind of changed from a project to a band because everyone felt we had a special sound to these songs, with Jeff’s voice on it, it just came together really good, so we wanted to change the name from a project name to something more personal, that is why W.E.T.

RM: The new W.E.T. album is One Live – In Stockholm and this CD/DVD package was recorded in January 2013. I imagine you have tons of live recorded material, so what made this show so special that you would want to release it?

EM: Honestly we didn’t have a single note recorded live from the band at all. We had been playing gigs, in 2013 we did several gigs but before this show with W.E.T. in Stockholm we had done only one show at Firefest in the U.K. So we only had one live show in our back pocket actually before we did the live DVD recording, so we decided to do this live DVD we arranged the whole concert, I booked the camera team, we had 18 songs, we had two days of rehearsals and it was our second live gig ever. We had no idea who was going to show up, how many people or anything, so we booked out a small club but the place was packed and there was a big line outside that could not get in, we even had to delay the concert an hour because there was so many people coming, the whole show was really fun doing it. It was a special night for us, it was 2 or 3 weeks before the release of the previous album Rise Up so half of the songs the audience had no idea what kind of songs we were playing, it was new to them and kind of new to us as well.

RM: How difficult was the process of song selection for this set, because you include W.E.T. material but also material from your other individual bands?

EM: Yeah, we wanted to have something special. So of course we picked out our favourite songs or songs that work well in a live situation from W.E.T. and then we wanted to have something special, we wanted to do something from, you know, the name (W.E.T.). So we were in Stockholm, we could have the Work of Art singer coming up on stage doing a song (for the W) and Eclipse we wanted to do one song with our band (for the E) and then we did a couple of Talisman songs (for the T).

RM: This package also features two tracks Poison (Numbing The Pain) and Bigger Than Both Of Us, can you tell me why those two songs weren’t included on the studio album but made it on this live release?

EM: We had too many songs. We had 15/16 songs I think when we recorded the Rise Up album and I felt strongly we can’t have an album with 15 or 16 songs, it was too much music to take in for a new album, even if it is good music it is too much to take in. So I wanted to pull out a couple of songs, one was Victorious which ended up a Japanese bonus track and the two on the live CD/DVD, but everyone chose different songs to take out. We had three ballads but you can’t have three ballads on a rock record, so one had to be taken out. We could not agree on which but we ended up like, we had to pull one of them, it was not that these songs were not good enough, because both of them could have easily fit on the album, some songs had to be pulled.

RM: Some time has passed since the release of both your studio records, W.E.T. and Rise Up, looking back on those albums are you still happy with the way they turned out?

EM: Absolutely. The first one was kind of a trial and error record and the second one we kind of focused on writing songs in the style of the songs that we kind of felt sounded most like W.E.T. They had our distinct sound. On the first album we had this more pink and fluffy stuff, the kind of softer rock and this more heavier sound with One Love, Brothers In Arms, Comes Down Like Rain and we wanted to focus more on those heavy songs because we felt we sounded more unique on those songs, that is kind of where we had our strength.

RM: What is your favourite part of the writing and recording process?

EM: I like every part of it, but I think it is song writing. It is hard work to write a whole album and I write a lot of albums, I write a lot of stuff for people, it is kind of pressure to write songs that are good because you want to write a great song every time, you know, you do not want to write a filler track. So when all the songs are finally written and you start doing the basic foundation of them, recording guitars, they start to sound like proper real songs I think that is the best part. When you are kind of in the middle process of recording the album, that is the best part.

RM: Can you tell me where you are in terms of Eclipse? The last studio record was Bleed & Scream back in 2012, when do you think you might start work on a new studio record?

EM: We have already started working on a new one and we have started writing for it. I have been working with a Norwegian artist at the moment, I have been writing his whole studio album and producing it, so as soon as I am finished with that I am going to move over 100% focus to Eclipse. For a new album we have a release date for February next year (2015). In a year we will have a new Eclipse album out in stores.

RM: Do you have any thoughts on the state of the music industry at the moment?

EM: It is a tough industry to be in at the moment. The tough part is getting people to pay for music and I think the situation has to change somehow. We have Spotify, a Swedish company that started the whole thing out, it made it so easy for people to listen to music so they do not have to download it at least anymore, they can stream it legally, but still it pays so bad it is almost like legal stealing. As a song writer you get almost nothing if fans listen to the album on Spotify, it almost pays close to zero in what you get paid for. So it is hard to put a lot of time on albums because the record labels they do not make as much money so they cannot pay that much money for production, it is a hard situation to get paid for it. But it has never been better for fans because they are able to listen to music anywhere, anytime, as a music fan it is a great situation to be in. But as a musician, producer, it is not as great [laughs].

RM: Is there any advice you can give to up and coming musicians looking to make a career out of music?

EM: Write good songs. I think good songs is the key to anything. You can be the best guitar player but the only thing that matters is good songs. Everyone knows the reason you listen to a band is because they have good songs, if they are a great guitarist you cannot listen to a whole album because of the guitar solo, it is going to be 30 seconds long, good songs is the key to having success in the music business. I think that is the advice and if you have good songs people will listen.

RM: Once again, congratulations on the release of the W.E.T. One Live – In Stockholm CD/DVD. On behalf of everyone here at Full Throttle Rock I’d like to wish you and the band many years of continued success.

EM: Thank you.

FKA Twigs is unique in more than just her looks and style, but her creativity is like no other. She dances the fine line between weird and artsy, her music video concepts can be hard to understand. In one video, she’s an Egyptian goddess, in another she’s in bondage. It can be hard to keep up but her talent speaks for itself. Her music may not be your cup of tea but her name is on a lot of people’s lips. I prefer her without the overdone make up, as she’s a beautiful girl. I’ve included one of her best songs (in my opinion) at the bottom that I feel the most people will like. I’ll warn you now, if you’re not into alternative sounding music and open minded, this may not be for you She’s pretty mysterious but we were able to find out a few facts about her.

1. FKA Twigs’ real name is Tahliah Debrett Barnett. She was born January 16, 1988 in Gloucestershire, England. Her father is Jamaican and her mother is English and Spanish. Her mother was a former gymnast and dancer. She didn’t meet her father, who was a jazz dancer until she was 18. She was raised by her mother and stepfather.

2. She attended private Catholic school, St. Edward’s School, Cheltenham, on an academic scholarship. She came from a low-income family.

3. She began pursuing her interest in music at the age of 16, and moved to London at 17 to pursue a dance career. She moved there on her own, sometimes working three or four jobs to support herself. By the time she hit her early 20’s, she was performing as a backup dancer in music videos by Kylie Minogue, Ed Sheeran, Taio Cruz and Jesse J.

4. She earned the name Twigs for the way her joints crack. She added “FKA” to her name when another artist who was also going by the name Twigs complained.

5. FKA Twigs’ genre of music is described as trip hop, experimental, alternative R&B and electronic. She loves experimenting with different sounds. She’s a singer, songwriter, producer, dancer and now a music video director. She sings, plays the keyboards, the synthesizer and the drums. She co-produced every song on her debut album.

6. She self-released her debut, EP1 on Bandcamp on December 4th, 2012. She also filmed a video for each song.

7. She has been awarded BBC’s Sound of 2014 prize and was chosen by Spotify for their Spotlight on 2014 list. She has been featured on Billboard’s 14 Artists to Watch in 2014, she’s Grammy nominated, Brit Award nominated and she has won a YouTube Music Award. She has even directed and starred in an advert for Google Glass.

8. Her early musical influences were Billie Holiday, Ella Fitzgerald and Marvin Gaye.

9. She got her big break at a bondage party, when she met Tic Zogson, an A&R rep at Young Turks record label.

10. She is currently dating Twilight star Robert Pattinson and has been since August 2014. She has been the subject of extensive cyber bullying by diehard Twilight fans.

In 2018 Mark Zuckerberg showed the world how a steady stream of blunders and insensitivity to consumers’ concerns over privacy and fake news has tragically damaged trust in the Facebook brand. The Facebook founder and CEO essentially traded a core value, privacy, for profits. His performance last year provides a classic case study for all companies on how to manage brand risk, or at least what not to do.

Facebook’s new mission statement says it seeks “to give people the power to build community and bring the world closer together”. A brand is basically a promise designed to create a trustful bond with customers. Facebook users provide personal data with the expectation and trust that Facebook’s promise to build this community would be delivered with full privacy protection. However, Zuckerberg’s actions in 2018 have created a perception that he has chosen profits over people, a misalignment negatively viewed by the public that is tarnishing Facebook’s brand reputation.

In general, the brand risks from social media firms like Facebook have become more disconcerting, as users all over the world have become aware of the cyber security issues and how easily their private data can be exposed. The 2018 Edelman Trust Barometer found that trust in social media is only 41% globally. With this declining trust, consumers have become intent on wanting brands to pressure social media platforms to more effectively:

• Safeguard personal data – 71%

• Curb the spread of fake news – 70%

• Shield them from offensive content – 68%

The deceitful performance of Zuckerberg last year has undermined trust in Facebook and reminded many of his arrogant behavior portrayed in the movie “The Social Network”. It started early last year when it was revealed that a third party had gained access to the personal data of 87 million Facebook users in 2015, but the company did little to address this. It seemed there was a privacy or fake news scandal every month in 2018. A few highlights:

• March – the world learned that Facebook exposed private data from 50 million users to an academic researcher who sold it to the analytical firm, Cambridge Analytica. Upsetting consumers more was the fact that this data was used in Trump’s Presidential advertising campaign.

• April – appearing before Congress, Zuckerberg tried to convince the world that Facebook “doesn’t sell data” to advertisers, stating this 8 times in a condescending way. This may be technically true, but the public didn’t buy it in light of the sad reality of these data breaches.

• July – when Zuckerberg was asked why he would not ban an extreme conspiracy theory guy like Alex Jones, he dug himself a deeper hole by bringing up Holocaust deniers as an example of false news he would not take down. This explanation resulted in Facebook suffering the biggest stock sell-off in U.S. history, down $119 billion in one day, reflecting investors’ losing faith in the brand.

• December – despite ongoing promises by Zuckerberg to add controls for privacy, it was disclosed that Facebook continued to grant access to personal data to other tech firms like Microsoft, Amazon, and Spotify.

This disturbing practice of making promises but not delivering on them has freaked out users, as well as the Congress which is calling for greater oversight and stricter privacy laws. Zuckerberg may not have blatantly lied, but he was not forthcoming with the whole truth and his statements were often misleading, even deceitful. Facebook has since acknowledged that it cannot maximize both privacy and profits at the same time.

So what can we learn from this steady flow of brand risk scandals? Some suggestions:

1. Preparation – clearly Facebook underestimated their ability to control access to private data and the adverse reaction from consumers when these data breaches were exposed. A detailed assessment of such vulnerabilities would have led to a more observant company culture and tighter controls throughout.

2. Timing and Credibility of Responses – after each scandal, Facebook waited several days to officially respond. These delays allowed the bad news to spread and fester, exacerbating the growing perception of deceit. While Zuckerberg did eventually admit fault (“I’m responsible for… ), he should have been more specific.

3. Apologize Convincingly – a sincere, direct apology can be a credible gesture of humility as the first step in restoring trust, something Zuckerberg never adequately conveyed.

4. Proactive Redemption – perhaps most important, detailed corrective action must be outlined to convince users that these problems would never happen again. Such preventative steps represent a promise which must be delivered, something Facebook failed to do.

Social media is a powerful, engaging and enjoyable communication tool, but success will be accomplished only if users trust the brand behind it. It is not only what a brand says; more important is what it does. This defines a brand’s integrity and trust.

Have you ever been frustrated at the prospect of trying to hire out the latest blockbuster DVD, having to drive to your closest outlet only to be told “they are all booked out”. Now there is an alternative using fast Media Streaming devices via the internet direct to your Plasma television. In this article you can discover which device might suit your needs!

This was my experience recently when trying to rent the Blu-ray Cowboys and Aliens. That got me thinking, what about buying one of the new Media Streamers and attaching it to my Plasma television?

Having a relatively fast internet speed of 11MBytes/sec would allow me to open up a whole new world of digital media, from streaming music files and internet radio to HD movies from the likes of Netflix and Blinkbox. But which device would suit my system, because my internet router is situated in my study upstairs.

I could buy a device like the more expensive D-Link Boxee which includes a wireless connection or spend less money and go for the new Sony SMP-N200 which is more of a straightforward streamer at half the cost.

Further Investigation

Since being released a few years ago the D-Link Boxee which was able to play a wide range of video and music files has undergone a software upgrade. It’s cost is £200 and can play high quality audio formats (FLAC and WAV) as well as HD video (inc MKV files).Outputs include two USB sockets to enable it to connect to external devices and that could include an external Hard drive. This would effectively create an inexpensive server. Also the Boxee will communicate with any NAS (Networked Storage Device) on your system which will allow you to browse your library of video,music and media data.

Interestingly, Boxee now has a dedicated BBC iPlayer app onboard which means it is easier to navigate around and as long as you have at least 2MB/sec internet speed, browsing quality should not be a problem.

However what struck my interest the most was the fact that the movie-streaming provider Blinkbox had now signed up to include a dedicated Film app too. YouTube was also catered for and a big plus for music fans the addition of Spotify.

It seems that D-Link are on to a winner here!!

What about a viable alternative? Well as I mentioned earlier the Sony SMP-N200 can provide a simple Smart-TV upgrade.Coming in at just under £99 it can also play a variety of video and audio files, although it will not handle MKV or AAC Files over the network.it will however play both these formats via its USB input.

This device includes wifi and its software menus are easy to navigate around and similar to those found on its Blu-ray players and TVs. A big plus for those of us with older TVs is the fact that the SMP-N200 also sports analogue audio and component video outputs.

If you do own a 3D Flat Screen TV, Sony can also display 3D Video both online and via USB. Whether you are streaming the BBC iPlayer in HD or using its Video Unlimited film service, we have been told the sound and picture quality is superb.

Every once in a while, especially during vacations, families, and friends would check in at a fancy resort or hotel. Ideally, these luxury hotel rooms would be able to fascinate you with all their high-tech gadgets, widescreen televisions, automated doors and more. Any hotel that provides this service would often be costly. Why spend a lot to go to fancy hotel rooms when you can bring that experience to your very own home? There are many ways to turn homes into high-tech hotel-like rooms and those with the budget can start by getting these items:

Smart TV’s

Smart TV’s are not uncommon in the market. In fact, visiting the nearest electronics store will display their latest smart TV’s available. Aesthetically, a large smart TV would be the ideal option to make your homes look like a luxury hotel. Almost the options across different brands are similar so you have the freedom to choose which suits you best. Some allow you to browse through the net through voice activations. Others will detect specific hand gestures to operate commands.These smart TV’s will only get better as the years pass by.

Digital Keys

Hotels either have the usual physical keys for their locks or card keys that you can swipe. However, these can be a hassle especially in the case where they get misplaced. Fancier hotels, on the other hand, use digital keys that can be accessed usually through phones. There are two ways this can work. The first is similar to the concept of a Radio Frequency Identification (RFID). Instead of actually having the card, an app of the phone can imitate that concept so you would not need the actual card. The second way would be through Bluetooth. There are high-tech locks that will automatically open once they detect your phone’s Bluetooth ID nearby so you can just walk right in without doing much.

Voice-Activated Rooms

So once you get into your home without touching anything, the next thing you might want to do is to turn on the lights still without touching anything. How? Voice activation. It is popular in the movies and fancy hotels. With just a short speech command, anything with that is voice-enabled will do its job. It is the step towards making Jarvis, artificial intelligence (AI) assistant of Tony Stark in popular comic book and movie, Iron Man. Wynn Las Vegas just recently integrated about 5,000 of their rooms with Echo, a voice-controlled speaker, allowing guests to easily communicate with the front desk or turn appliances on by simply telling it to do so.

Automation

In line with the voice-activated rooms, automation enabled by robots or AI, just like Echo, will further provide efficiency for anyone in the room. Automation is usually defined as something that turns on and off by itself. However, it goes beyond. Automation really is about technology allowing itself to be engaged only when needed to. To an extent, getting your room automated can even save a lot of money on the electricity bills.

Wireless Charging

Having a lot of wires tangled up in the room would be tedious to untangle. It can even break and cause you to buy new ones. With wireless charging, you save up space from not needing wires and you don’t always have to be near the sockets anymore. Some tables and desks in hotels have built-in chargers that when phones are nearby, they automatically charge.

Projector TV’s inside the Bathroom

This is perfect for anyone who likes taking their time when doing their business or just enjoy taking a bath. Make that an even better experience by having TV’s projected in your very own bathroom. A cheap trick would be through the use of mirrors on the ceilings. Match this with your Smart TV and you virtually do anything with it, play music with Spotify, watch YouTube videos, browse the internet, and more as if you have never left the living room.

Versatile Bathroom Walls

More on to the bathrooms, it can even be further upgraded, even down to the walls. Usually, bathrooms anywhere would be divided by glass walls that are translucent or can be covered by blinds. With chrome-enabled bathroom walls, you would not need any of those. With a push of a button, the bathroom wall can either be made translucent, transparent or just plain matte. This way the bathroom looks even more spacious when the walls are made transparent.

On 5th Jan 2015 Intel launched its next 5th generation of Intel Core Processors codenamed Broadwell microarchitecture. The Broadwell microarchitecture is not a new architecture, but is a die-shrink of the previous Haswell microarchitecture. The Haswell microarchitecture was based on a 22 nanometer process, whereas the new Broadwell microarchitecture is based on a 14 nm process.

Of the 5th generation of Intel Processors, there will be 10 new dual core processors with a TDP of 15W and 4 new dual core processors with new Iris Graphics 6100 and a TDP of 28W.

Intel has made several advancements in the silicon and mainly beefed up their graphic component. Due to these improvements, Intel claims up to 22% better 3D Graphics, up to 50% faster video compression, up to 4% better productivity and up to 1.5 hours of longer battery life. All this combined with the smaller 14nm process allows 35% more transistors on a 37% smaller die size.

This 5th Generation Core processor is not a mere die shrink and it brings hardware improvements like PCH I/O Intelligent Throttling and a Dynamic Power and Thermal Framework which improves the power efficiency of the chipset. It will also feature six ports of PCI-E Gen2 ports for further IO expansion, like more USB 3.0 ports. These new generation processors will also feature an on-die digital signal processor (DSP) which will process audio at the digital level and will improve power efficiency and reduce audio processing power consumption.

The new 5th generation Core processor will now introduce a 2nd generation of wireless adapter 802.11ac7265 wireless adapter with up to 15% better peak throughput, improved link reliability for better range and low idle and active power consumption. It will also feature a new Intel WiDi 5.1 with display resolution of up to 4K UltraHD.

The new graphic processors named HD 5500, 6000, and Iris 6100 will support DirectX 11.2 and will be DirectX 12 ready and will also support OpenGL 4.3, OpenCL 2.0, and even 4K UltraHD support over wireless and a new Media Decoder for VP8, VP9, and HEVC. This new architecture will also support Intel RealSense Technology. Intel RealSense devices can see in 3D, objects can be separated from background in realtime and can capture the shape and depth of objects.

Now Intel processors will support Voice Assistant where you can use voice for dictation, search the web, control PC, play media files, integrate with applications like iTunes, Spotify, Facebook, browsers, etc. So now you can talk to your PC and give voice commands.

With the launch of new Broadwell microarchitecture of 5th Generation Intel Core Processors, Intel brings faster performance, better power consumption and battery life, beefed up graphics and new features.

Let’s get to know one man of many talents, anyone could be envious of this one who can be a rock star in the classroom in day time, and see him singing his message away – on stage, at night, or on the park, on weekends.

1. Describe yourself sans M (music) and T (teaching) in your answer.

Kind. Hehe.

1. How long have you been teaching? Composing song?

Have 17 years in teaching, 25 years composing songs.

2. You are juggling your time between teaching and singing, right? How do you do such a thing?

Priority first, and time management.

4. I thought you were just transitioning from classroom to stage, but when I saw you in an FB post having a post con with your COT observer, I could not imagine how you manage time, energy and the like wearing two hats– one after the other, er one on top of another, or what. Do tell.

It’s hard to do two things at the same time. Actually, am a family man also so it’s three. I just list down priorities that should be done first. I mark it on my wall hehe, on my wall calendar should I say.

5. One of your songs which is, as of this writing, on the top 4 in a chart of indie music is KAPE..where did you get the inspiration for that?

The idea of the song Kape was purely about my emotions. Words had truly existed. It’s a true story of my dad and I. Remember when he was still alive every morning we would always share a cup of coffee. We would talk many things like his thoughts about life, to mention one.

6. Aside from teaching and singing, what are other talents have you got under your belt?

I can play guitar a little bit of piano and drums. In sports, I very much love to play basketball. I am an author also of my self- published book “Meron Akong Kuwento from Victime Printing Press and Publishing House. The book contains 12 all original stories for children and 16 select articles. I love writing children stories. Aside from that, I dabble as illustrator, cartoonist, and comic creator.

7. Oh, you have self-published a book. That’s good to know. Share with us the wisdom upon conception, drafting, editing and publishing stages of your first book.

My book is 1% business 99% remembrance lang, that was really the main concept. I write because I just want to create my own legacy and to prove myself how far my life would be valuable. It has been great experience producing a book. But, I guess, I need some people who can support me and teach me properly on the nitty-gritty of book publishing and so on.

8. Do you sing your way to school or do you have plan before you embark on a stage? Do tell.

Every day is a busy hour for me because I’m with my two daughters in school. Before I go to school I make sure that I am prepared with my lessons. Not thinking anything about my singing career when I’m inside the school. Hehe.

9. An artist is a rare breed of genius –so if you gonna choose a world of art, what would it be and why?

If I can choose a world of art, I would want to be with the people who truly appreciate art.

10. Describe your passion with a couple of lyrics you’d originally written or about to write. “Bumangon ka anak, wag pilitin ang sarili; ang mundo’y aayon din sayo” -Kape

The first time I heard “Kape” I was having coffee. Now I know the story behind those lyrics. So touching and dramatic. Thank you, Noel. God bless. Wishing you more success what with you being a multi-talented musician, teacher, published author —a real artist indeed. Soon the world is on your fingertip!

Noel Bernaldo is from City of San Jose del Monte, Bulacan, Philippines. You can check his gigs sched on his FB account Noel Bernaldo / FB page Noel Bernaldo Music, or you can stream a couple of his songs “Kape, ” or “Ang Pinoy” on Spotify and they are available in other digital outlets. You can subscribe also to his videos on YouTube channel Noel Bernaldo. You can catch him on these dates: at Conspiracy Garden Cafe QC on Sept.11 DWZE and Sept. 20 iFM 93.9

EDM GROWTH STATISTICS 2018:

When it comes to music, the world has a few EDM growth statistics that prove just how valuable music is to society. Music, more specifically EDM, or electronic dance music, has made quite the impact these past few years toward their target market and listeners all over the world. Just in the U.S. alone, there are several things that prove just how much the EDM market is starting to grow in the country. Here area few statistics that show the impact that electronic dance music has been having on the masses who listen to music every day.

OVERALL MARKET:

In 2018, Billboard released a market statistic that proved the value and worth of the electronic dance music market. In this statistical statement, the company shows a 12-percent growth within one year where many changes took place with this musical revolution. EDM has since been incorporated in various genres and subgenres, though it has made quite the name for itself as well. While the overall market has been growing, there are a few submarkets that have incorporated into this market growth.

YOUTUBE SUBSCRIPTIONS

One of the biggest helpers in this EDM market growth was YouTube. Just in the past few years alone,YouTube has incorporated for at least three different areas of subscribers. 60-percent growth has been seen on smartphones of all kinds, 77-percent on televisions, and 175-percent on all gaming consoles. The YouTube versions of the albums released had grossed a total of 2.3 billion views. This is a combination of videos. This growth for EDM on YouTube has brought a few numbers up in the overall market.

FESTIVALS AND TICKETS

Another big supporter of this overall growth trend in the electronic music department is the festivals and tickets to various festivals and concerts. In the past few years, the 2017 sales from festivals and tickets to festivals have been grossed around 146,999,963 total tickets. The money value for each ticket is different, which makes the annual festival season the biggest times of the year for sales in the electronic dance music department. This has also incorporated with that overall growth number mentioned at the start.

CLUBS

2018 seems to have been the big starting year for EDM. Well, in 2017, along with the intense overall growth, 12 of the largest clubs in the U.S. alone began to play EDM in their clubs. These clubs include places like Las Vegas, Miami, New York, Los Angeles, and San Francisco. Their total revenue was

generated and combined to come up with a total of $900 million just in 2016. It is safe to say that these numbers have grown in the past few years as the popularity of electronic dance music has grown as well.

ALBUMS

Albums that specialize in electronic dance music has also contributed to the overall growth of this genre of music. In 2014, there were 12 EDM specific albums that were known in the top 100 selling albums during that year. in 2016 there were 36. This means that 12 albums, covered in electronic dance music, sold enough albums to be in the top 100 albums for that year. Considering how many people were entranced with the music enough to purchase albums is only one reason why EDM has grown considerably in the past few years.

SUMMARY STATISTICS

• 147,000,000 EDM festival tickets are sold annually
• The global economic value of the EDM Industry is currently estimated at $7.1 Billion
• Only 45% of EDM listeners are female
• In Europe, 1 in 7 people have recently attended an EDM event
• North America is estimated to represent around 29 percent of the EDM industry
• Spotify commands 12 billion streams from electronic music genres alone

Today, if you’re going to go out and buy a high end car, you’ll be amazed by the range and variety of in-car entertainment systems. From the introduction of the radio, our cars have since evolved satellite navigation systems, dual mode screens for watching films and even the ability to answer questions you have on the road. However, these systems can often be pretty dumb. Slow, unintuitive and rarely updated, they can be much less useful than the computer you’ve got in your pocket – your iPhone.

Unlike your car, your iPhone is always with you, learning what you’re interested in and figuring out where your likely destinations are going to be. It also knows what kind of music you like to hear, the sound of your voice and exactly where it is at all times. Those are things which your car simply can’t do, and with the help of an iPhone car mount, you can turn any older car into an ultra-modern smart ride. Here are our three favourite iPhones features to use in a car:

1) Navigation

In-car navigation services can be pretty awful at times. You’re either stuck using the one which came built in to your car, which might never have been updated to the latest maps or dedicated GPS units which can be costly and clumsy to install. With an in car iPhone mount, you can use the GPS you’ve always got on you – your phone. You’ll always have the latest maps, as well as access to things like traffic updates, something many in-car navigation systems don’t offer. Perhaps best of all though, because the many docks support charging, your phone’s battery won’t drain whilst it gets you from location to location.

2) Hey, Siri!

Since iOS 9, iPhones have had the capability of listening out for the command ‘Hey, Siri’. At home, that means you can ask it things like how long you’re meant to boil an egg for, or to set an alarm. If you’ve got your iPhone mounted in your car though, it can mean doing things like asking it to find restaurants in your destination before you arrive, telling it to play an album that you love or even redirect you to another location.

3) Unlimited music choice

Remember the days of filling your cars storage compartments with CD’s in order to keep your music choices fresh? Say goodbye to them, because with an iPhone and mount combination, you can stream as much music as you like. Many cars from the last decade have Bluetooth connectivity, and many more have 3.5mm connection, making connection to your iPhone easy. With an in-car iPhone mount, album arts, information and controls are all at your fingertips; so all you really need to do is choose between Spotify, Google Play Music or Apple Music.