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This post is about Online Universities and why they don't compare to the real thing. Products like Saba LMS, Moodle, and iTunes U have made e-learning mainstream, and most universities offer and allow some or most of their coursework to be completed online. First off, the concern with many online universities and colleges is post-graduation employment statistics. Most have very low graduation rates. A government recruited states that "it's not ideal. It doesn't set a baseline expectation, for me or for the people he or she will meet in the field. If I just need to check off a 'degree' box on a requirements form, online will do, but if two candidates are similar, I'm going with the one from Stanford or UVA." Moreover, the differences come down to two things: brand and social interaction. Traditional schools can clearly understand reputations, strengths and weaknesses. Without historical data and a history of success or failure, the online schools' GPAs, class standing and other performance metrics are just numbers and statistics. The author of this article also states that "Giant online schools that accept pretty much everyone may be democratizing education, but they're not helping employers or anyone else separate out the best and the brightest." This can hurt the prestige, and ultimately the graduates of the school. This issue relates to the "eLifestyle" tag because in the end it will definitely affect not only the students, but the regular citizens of a country. The graduates of universities, online of traditional,  will be the leaders of the future, and I believe that traditional universities and colleges are better because professors can get to know and understand students at a different level. It is hard to judge or mark a student based only on online text. For instance, you will never be able to distinguish a student that truly tries and works hard but cannot understand the information properly to a student that understands it but is lazy and slacks off.

Online courses are now being used by students in university. This allows them to study and complete work from their own home, but the question asked by most is if the online course investment is worth it, in terms of careers. Lou Adler, (a self proclaimed hiring expert) believes not so, because when you take an online course,classes require you presenting your skills to your employer. An online course is not the same as a sit down university course, because it does not provide you with the practical skills necessary. Someone taking an online course can still have an advantage over people who commute to university. e.g. submitting a project you did using your computer, easily, and using it in a job application. You can distinguish yourself from others, using computer generated projects, etc. Depending on what field you want to get into, online courses can be harmful or helpful.

Today employers face multiple challenges with traditional online hiring portals such as:

ü  Escalating cost of accessing candidates database which is largely unused

ü  Time-consuming candidate search and review process

ü  Hard to zero-in on the right resource

ü  Limited branding options

Needless to say, all the above factors slow hiring online which delays bringing candidates on-board. To help employers tackle these online recruitment problems, Pinhopes - a new-age online hiring destination, has introduced innovative profile filtering features, video based online hiring process, multiple branding avenues combined with cost-effective payment option. Here are the key differentiators which help employers hire 3x faster:

Get relevant applications from interested candidates - Every time

Unlike existing online recruitment portals Pinhopes doesn't deal in database business which means employers are not required to search for right candidates, in a database which is largely unused. Instead employers get relevant applications directly from active job seekers for a job opening, without putting much effort.

No tedious candidate search process - Advanced built-in search bubbles best ta

With Christmas slowly approaching, many of us will be shopping for presents online. For scammers, this means there will be more unsuspecting victims to scam. McAfee knows the risk of being scammed is present and has set up a list of 12 scams seen during the holiday season. These include fake charities, malicious mobile apps, too-good-to-be-true offers, and fake gift cards. As online shopping gets more popular, the threat from scammers increases as well so we have to know how to protect ourselves and keep our information secure. While shopping online is more convenient and cheaper in some cases, it isn't as secure as shopping in person at a store. Despite the lesser security in shopping online, people still would prefer it because of its convenience. I think it is good that McAfee released this list of scams to look out for because it will make sure more consumers during the Christmas season and everyday will have knowledge of what to look out for when shopping online. Though I doubt many people will see the list, McAfee has possibly saved many people from having to deal with being scammed, besides even if you can't help everyone you should help anyway.

Bitcoin is a digital currency that can be used to pay for a variety of goods and services online. It works like paper money, as in it can make purchases online, but it is primarily used in data form so you can trade it between peer and peer online. It is accessed by an online service that is gained through mining. The mining process includes running software performances and in return you are awarded a small portion of Bitcoin. You can also purchase Bitcoins using a wallet software. It requires a bit of disk space though. This new form of currency can be the change in the electronic economics. It is different from the other forms of online payment options that we are used to, like debit or credit cards. It is easier to obtain such currency, and it does not cost actual money. However, it is accepted only at limited service or goods websites. Also, a wallet software account is required in many cases. In addition, it may not be convenient or the best choice for all the consumers. This currency has a specific focus on who it is designed to target.

States in the US have been slowly gaining traction that allows gambling to be completely legal online. This would mean that anyone over 18 can sign onto an account which allows them to gamble away all the money they have. Nevada was the first state to legalize online gambling, and more states are estimated to follow suit. Although the article doesn't give an opinion on the newly legalized gambling, I believe that this news is terrible. More and more people will become addicted to gambling, and now it's very easy and very comfortable to lose your life earnings. These new rulings will eventually run into some legal issues, as people under 18 WILL find a way to gain access to these operations. There is no proper way that rules can be enforced in online gambling. People will become addicted, kids will gain access, and people will go bankrupt. Gambling is alright, in moderation, but these new laws will allow anyone with an internet connection to gamble away everything they own without even realizing it. Good thing we live in Canada.

 This article is about impersonating people online. Outside of the internet people can be arrested and fined for pretending to be a police officer, soldier, and even a normal person. This law still does not apply to life on the internet. This politician in Arizona is trying to make this a law. Doing this could stop people from scamming others online (ex. pretending to have cancer or someone else to get one) but could also stop popular parody accounts used for entertainment(ex. popular twitter accounts such as Fill Werell). Overall this law could probably bring more good than bad helping people protect their identity.

Nintendo is shutting down servers that support online play for the Wii and DS on May 30th. No longer will you be able to enjoy popular titles on said systems like pokemon, or mariokart, to its fullest. Playing with others is a big part of the enjoyment of a game, and communities for these games will likely collapse when the wifi deteonation comes. So, with the apparent loss of a large gaming group, why IS nintendo shutting down their servers for these two systems? Nintendo is looking for people to upgrade to the superior counterparts: the 3DS and WiiU. Similar games that shaped the online Wii community are coming out later this year for the WiiU. Nintendo did not officially say that the reason for the server shutdown was just a marketing ploy. It is speculated however, running a server shouldn't be a big problem for a tech giant like Nintendo... IMO, even with titles successors, sometimes you just want to relax by playing an old game on a system you already own. Variety is key.

This article touches on a very important topic about whether technology is helping the economy and job markets more or if it is in fact hurting it. The answer is they do both. The New York Times among others write that tech companies have created relatively few jobs compared to industries such as GM. However TechCrunch argues that technology has created a lot more indirect jobs due to technology. There are in fact new jobs created such as social media marketers online. Most of these jobs are part-time because they are online and connect employers and workers with no hassle. Their conclusion is that there are millions of jobs created with a high demand but an unprepared workforce. The jobs that are needed now are more technology based than ever before and our economy is moving so fast in that direction that some skills that were needed in the past are no longer needed now. Therefore people are losing jobs not because there are not enough jobs produced but because our job market is drastically changing.  Some companies are allowing people to step into job positions with just a bit of online training or courses. Startups like General assembly are creating programs that are accessible to everyone and helps address the needs of the labor market. The final verdict is we need better training tools to quickly acquire high demanded skills and help workers adapt to the change that technology brings to the labour market. This article relates to economics and eLifestyle mostly because it has to do with how our economy is growing from the jobs created by technology but also how our workers have to respond to this change. This article deals with the changes that the labour market is going through now and how the increase in technology is now changing our lives. Some of our old jobs are being replaced by new jobs that not enough people are qualified for, so certain careers are feeling a job decline making it seem like technology is replacing workers. But in fact these new tools a

Online services such as cloud may be convenient, but there is always a risk of such services that your locally installed software won't. Unfortunately, what could happen is that your cloud service could abandon you at any moment. OfficeDrop users were facing just about the same scenario. After receiving a notice that last Friday that the online service of OfficeDrop stopped its service on May 5. This left collaboration and service no longer available to its users. Many people have come to depend on OfficeDrop to store and share your files in the cloud. Unfortunately, OfficeDrop is not longer able to offer OfficeDrop as a standalone service anymore and also discontinued it permanently as of May 5th, 2013. OfficeDrop as a company did not go away, just the service to its users. OfficeDrop signed an agreement to sell OfficeDrop to another Cloud Storage player. Also, the acquirer has decided to not continue offering the OfficeDrop service and instead will combine the product, technology and team with theirs and market it through their channels. According to the notice sent to OfficeDrop users, billing for OfficeDrop has stopped, and refunds are being issues when applicable. The notice urges all files be downloaded as soon as possible, because they will be securely and permanently deleted as of May 6th, 2013. This is a negative impact when you use the cloud.

With the advancement in technology, the human race is slowly headed in the opposite direction. With internet access on almost every electronic device, it has become our main source of communication. This advancement in communication are making people less dependent on social interaction. With the ability to order food online we are allowed to order necessities without leaving the comfort of our homes. This is crucial because without the need to leave your home, many people would take advantage of this and not be active both socially and physically. This can lead to many medical problems as people wont have the need to get off their couch and workout. Some positive aspects of being able to order food and other necessities online is the fact that is efficient and easy to do. Another bonus is the fact that the order will be sent immediately and I find that there is less room for error when you are able to type what ever it is you want and not have a language barrier with the people on the other side of the order. 

Pearson (the company that makes most textbooks) has recently bought Connections Education (which is online teaching) In my opinion this move foreshadows that school lessons will be taught more and more online.

Christopher "moot" Poole, creator of 4chan and Canvas, talks at the web 2.0 summit on identity and the average person's persona on the web. According to him, social networking sites like Facebook think problems with security lie in who we share with, but Poole says that it's really our jobs to monitor the person we portray ourselves to be online. He says Facebook misrepresents people, making us think that a person's personality can be generally summed up in a name along side a photo. Poole praises Twitter for doing the exact opposite. We can't just blame companies like Google and Facebook for skewing our online image, because we are the ones who are abusing it by posting too much information anyways. But in the end, it's up to us to be careful what we post online.

Battlefield 3, a new first-person shooter video game from EA and DICE, has hit the ground running with great sales numbers and a slew of online problems. The game, released Oct. 25, was hit with serious problems in its first weekend, Kotaku reports. Gamers were blocked from going online and joining multiplayer games. Other players were booted mid-game thanks to widespread server issues. These faults haven't stopped Battlefield 3 from shipping more than 10 million copies of the game, according to EA, with more than 2.2 million players logging in to play online

Timeline is an online tool created by Zach Wise. This tool allows users to develop timelines on the internet by administrating content from sites such as YouTube, Twitter, Flickr, Vimeo, Google maps, and Sound Cloud. It also provides users a JavaScript, and HTML based tool. They can provide content about media on their websites using coding.

Video interviews are becoming immensely popular in today's workplace. Today, companies are increasingly catering to global clients with diverse resource requirements, therefore hiring via video interview online, is the need of the hour

This article talks about our famous #firstworld problems jokes on Twitter and other Social Networking sites. They may seem funny to you, but DDB New York sees them as creating an online atmosphere of neither sensitivity nor awareness to deal with real social and worldwide problems. So DDB decided to team up with the non-profit organization called WATERisLIFE. Together they traveled to Haiti to film locals reading aloud a series of these "problems" to show how ridiculous they are in comparison to real problems that people face in third-world countries like Haiti. In addition to the video they tweeted some of the original authors of the #firstworld problems saying things like "I'm sorry you were awoken by your cleaning lady. I hope today is better" as well as a call to action to donate money to WATERisLIFE which helps create water solutions and rebuilding communities.  This article relates to eLifestyle and how those posts may be funny to us they can also be insensitive to real problems world-wide even though we don't always intend to be hurtful. This also relates because it shows how the internet can be such a positive or negative thing worldwide. In this case out of an insensitive tweet people were inspired to create awareness for bigger issues and a way to help through a video and a few tweets online.  I think this shows a positive side of the internet where people can take something and turn it into a way of helping people world-wide and getting word out faster and to more people all with the power of the internet.