1.
Geographic coordinate system
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A geographic coordinate system is a coordinate system used in geography that enables every location on Earth to be specified by a set of numbers, letters or symbols. The coordinates are chosen such that one of the numbers represents a vertical position. A common choice of coordinates is latitude, longitude and elevation, to specify a location on a two-dimensional map requires a map projection. The invention of a coordinate system is generally credited to Eratosthenes of Cyrene. Ptolemy credited him with the adoption of longitude and latitude. Ptolemys 2nd-century Geography used the prime meridian but measured latitude from the equator instead. Mathematical cartography resumed in Europe following Maximus Planudes recovery of Ptolemys text a little before 1300, in 1884, the United States hosted the International Meridian Conference, attended by representatives from twenty-five nations. Twenty-two of them agreed to adopt the longitude of the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, the Dominican Republic voted against the motion, while France and Brazil abstained. France adopted Greenwich Mean Time in place of local determinations by the Paris Observatory in 1911, the latitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle between the equatorial plane and the straight line that passes through that point and through the center of the Earth. Lines joining points of the same latitude trace circles on the surface of Earth called parallels, as they are parallel to the equator, the north pole is 90° N, the south pole is 90° S. The 0° parallel of latitude is designated the equator, the plane of all geographic coordinate systems. The equator divides the globe into Northern and Southern Hemispheres, the longitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle east or west of a reference meridian to another meridian that passes through that point. All meridians are halves of great ellipses, which converge at the north and south poles, the prime meridian determines the proper Eastern and Western Hemispheres, although maps often divide these hemispheres further west in order to keep the Old World on a single side. The antipodal meridian of Greenwich is both 180°W and 180°E, the combination of these two components specifies the position of any location on the surface of Earth, without consideration of altitude or depth. The grid formed by lines of latitude and longitude is known as a graticule, the origin/zero point of this system is located in the Gulf of Guinea about 625 km south of Tema, Ghana. To completely specify a location of a feature on, in, or above Earth. Earth is not a sphere, but a shape approximating a biaxial ellipsoid. It is nearly spherical, but has an equatorial bulge making the radius at the equator about 0. 3% larger than the radius measured through the poles, the shorter axis approximately coincides with the axis of rotation
2.
Types of business entity
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A business entity is an entity that is formed and administered as per commercial law in order to engage in business activities, charitable work, or other activities allowable. Most often, business entities are formed to sell a product or a service, there are many types of business entities defined in the legal systems of various countries. These include corporations, cooperatives, partnerships, sole traders, limited liability company, the specific rules vary by country and by state or province. Some of these types are listed below, by country, for guidance, approximate equivalents in the company law of English-speaking countries are given in most cases, ≈ public limited company ≈ Ltd. When creating or restructuring a business, the legal responsibilities will depend on the type of business entity chosen, Shoqëri komandite, ≈ limited partnership Shoqëri kolektive, ≈ general partnership S. A. ≈ plc S. R. L. ≈ Ltd. ≈ limited liability company S. C. S. ≈ limited partnership S. C. p. A, S. E. ≈ state-owned enterprise S. G. R. Inc. restricted to non-profit associations Ltd. ≈ plc. The suffix Ltd. may also be used by a company limited by guarantee. NL, A type of mining, speculative, or research company with no right to call up the issue price of shares. In Australia companies can act as a trustee for a trust, pty. company with a share capital, A company, similar to its limited company counterpart, but where the liability of the members or shareholders is not limited. Gen, ≈ cooperative Privatstiftung, ≈ private foundation Verein, ≈ nonprofit association European business entities e. U. ≈ sole trader, sole proprietorship Kapitalgesellschaften, ≈ companies AG, Incorporated, OG, ≈ general partnership KG, ≈ limited partnership GmbH & Co. KG, KG in which a GmbH is the general partner, EBVBA / SPRLU, single member Ltd. NV / SA, ≈ plc co-operative companies, CVBA / SCRL, ≈ limited liability cooperative CVOA / SCRI, ≈ GmbH k. d. ≈ limited partnership s. p. ≈ Sole proprietorship Sociedade limitada, ≈ Ltd, a private company contains the term Sendirian Berhad or Sdn. Bhd. as part of its name where as for a public company Berhad or Bhd. is used. KD / КД, ≈ limited partnership KDA / КДА, limited partnership with shares SD / СД, ≈ general partnership, ≈ Plc Ltd. ≈ plc PEEC State Company, ≈ plc State Joint Venture Company, ≈ plc Import Export Co. Ltd In Canada entities can be incorporated under federal or provincial law. Unlimited liability corporations can be formed in Alberta AULC and Nova Scotia NSULC, the word or expression Limited, Limitée, Incorporated, Incorporée, Corporation or Société par actions de régime fédéral or the corresponding abbreviation Ltd. Forms part of the name of every entity incorporated under the Canada Business Corporations Act, ≈ Ltd. or Plc As an exception, entities registered prior to 1985 may continue to be designated Société commerciale canadienne or by the abbreviation S. C. C
3.
Philip Rosedale
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Philip Rosedale is an American entrepreneur, best known as the founder of the virtual world Second Life. In 2008 Rosedale was honored at the 59th Annual Technology & Engineering Emmy Awards for Linden Lab’s creation of the Second Life online world, Rosedale took an interest in computers, technology, and virtual reality from an early age. In 1995, Rosedale created an innovative Internet video conferencing product, which was acquired by RealNetworks. A year later Rosedale left RealNetworks and founded Linden Lab, named after a street in Hayes Valley, with the creation of Second Life, he fulfilled his lifelong dream of creating an Internet-scale virtual world. In 2006, he and Linden Lab received WIREDs Rave Award for Innovation in Business, on March 14,2008, Rosedale announced he would be stepping down as the CEO of Linden Lab and assuming the role of Chairman of the Board of Directors. Rosedale had stated that his goal with Second Life was to demonstrate a viable model for an economy or virtual society. In his own words, We dont see this as a game and we see it as a platform that is, in many ways, better than the real world. In October 2009, Rosedale announced that hed be involved in the development of Second Life. The announced project turned out to be a company named LoveMachine Inc, in June 2010, he announced that he was back to the office as CEO of Linden Lab. However in October 2010, Rosedale announced he was leaving his position as interim CEO, in November,2011, Rosedale released a new project named Coffee and Power a site that Rosedale calls a meta-company, that enables people to connect for small jobs and services. On April 16,2013 Coffee & Power posted to their blog that they were going to stop work on Workclub, their mobile application. Philip Rosedale is married to Yvette Forte Rosedale and they live in San Francisco with their four children. One of the children is named August Rosedale, as told to Michael Fitzgerald at Inc. com FORA. tv Presentation by Philip Rosedale for The Long Now Foundation LoveMachine Inc. SLCC10 - Saturday Keynotes Foundation interview with Kevin Rose, story of his life and new venture, Coffee & Power High Fidelity Philip Rosedale interviewed on the TV show Triangulation on the TWiT. tv network
4.
Rod Humble
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He is currently the GM for the San Francisco studio of SGN. He has been contributing to the development of games since 1990, previously he worked at Sony Online where he worked on EverQuest and before that Virgin Interactives SubSpace. In his spare time, he continues to develop experimental games including The Marriage, Stars Over Half Moon Bay and his work was shown and played at the SFMOMA in 2016. On 7 October 2008, a press release noted that Electronic Arts Inc. had promoted Humble to Executive Vice President and Head of The Sims Label of EA. In this role, Humble was to be responsible for The Sims Label, the Sims is the best-selling PC franchise of all time. An NPC in The Sims 2 expansion pack, FreeTime, is based on Humble and he is seen delivering a gift to new home-owners, the gift always being a computer, the computer having a sneak preview of The Sims 3. On 23 December 2010, Linden Lab, the creators and operators of the virtual world Second Life, announced that he would become their new CEO as of January 2011. On 24 January 2014, Humble announced on his Facebook account that he would be leaving Linden Lab to pursue founding a new company that will make Art, Entertainment, on 29 January 2015, Humble announced his latest solo project Cults & Daggers, with his new company Chaphat. SimSect, Rod Humble Announces Cults & Daggers, lindenlab. com Rod Humble presentation at Inventing the Future of Games Symposium in 2011 Free Will and the Future of Games,15 April 2011 Cmpevents. com Thesims3. ea. com Biz. yahoo. com
5.
Virtual world
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These avatars can be textual, two or three-dimensional graphical representations, or live video avatars with auditory and touch sensations. In general, virtual worlds allow for multiple users, the user accesses a computer-simulated world which presents perceptual stimuli to the user, who in turn can manipulate elements of the modeled world and thus experience a degree of presence. Such modeled worlds and their rules may draw from the reality or fantasy worlds, example rules are gravity, topography, locomotion, real-time actions, and communication. Communication between users can range from text, graphical icons, visual gesture, sound, and rarely, forms using touch, voice command, and balance senses. Massively multiplayer online games depict a range of worlds, including those based on science fiction, the real world, super heroes, sports, horror. The most common form of games are fantasy worlds, whereas those based on the real world are relatively rare. Most MMORPGs have real-time actions and communication, players create a character who travels between buildings, towns, and worlds to carry out business or leisure activities. Communication is usually textual, but real-time voice communication is also possible, the form of communication used can substantially affect the experience of players in the game. Virtual worlds are not limited to games but, depending on the degree of immediacy presented, can encompass computer conferencing, sometimes, emoticons or smilies are available to show feeling or facial expression. Emoticons often have a keyboard shortcut, edward Castronova is an economist who has argued that synthetic worlds is a better term for these cyberspaces, but this term has not been widely adopted. The concept of virtual worlds significantly predates computers, the Roman naturalist, Pliny the Elder, expressed an interest in perceptual illusion. Such devices are characterized by bulky headsets and other types of sensory input simulation, contemporary virtual worlds, in particular the multi-user online environments, emerged mostly independently of this research, fueled instead by the gaming industry but drawing on similar inspiration. Maze War was the first networked, 3D multi-user first person shooter game, maze introduced the concept of online players in 1973–1974 as eyeball avatars chasing each other around in a maze. It was played on ARPANET, or Advanced Research Projects Agency Network, the initial game could only be played on an Imlac, as it was specifically designed for this type of computer. The first virtual worlds presented on the Internet were communities and chat rooms, some of which evolved into MUDs, the first MUD, known as MUD1, was released in 1978. The acronym originally stood for Multi-User Dungeon, but later came to mean Multi-User Dimension. A MUD is a world with many players interacting in real time. The early versions were text-based, offering only limited graphical representation, users interact in role-playing or competitive games by typing commands and can read or view descriptions of the world and other players
6.
E-commerce
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E-commerce is a transaction of buying or selling online. Modern electronic commerce typically uses the World Wide Web for at least one part of the life cycle although it may also use other technologies such as e-mail. 1979, Michael Aldrich demonstrates the first online shopping system,1981, Thomson Holidays UK is the first business-to-business online shopping system to be installed. 1982, Minitel was introduced nationwide in France by France Télécom,1983, California State Assembly holds first hearing on electronic commerce in Volcano, California. Testifying are CPUC, MCI Mail, Prodigy, CompuServe, Volcano Telephone and it is the first comprehensive electronic commerce service. 1989, In May 1989, Sequoia Data Corp, introduced Compumarket The first internet based system for e-commerce. Sellers and buyers could post items for sale and buyers could search the database,1990, Tim Berners-Lee writes the first web browser, WorldWideWeb, using a NeXT computer. 1992, Book Stacks Unlimited in Cleveland opens a sales website selling books online with credit card processing. 1993, Paget Press releases edition No.3 of the first app store, The Electronic AppWrapper 1994, Netscape 1.0 is introduced in late 1994 with SSL encryption that made transactions secure. 1994, Ipswitch IMail Server becomes the first software available online for sale,1994, Ten Summoners Tales by Sting becomes the first secure online purchase through NetMarket. 1995, The US National Science Foundation lifts its former strict prohibition of commercial enterprise on the Internet, the shopping service at launch featured W H Smith, Tesco, Virgin Megastores/Our Price, Great Universal Stores, Interflora, Dixons Retail, Past Times, PC World and Innovations. 1995, Jeff Bezos launches Amazon. com and the first commercial-free 24-hour, internet-only radio stations, Radio HK, eBay is founded by computer programmer Pierre Omidyar as AuctionWeb. 1996, IndiaMART B2B marketplace established in India,1996, ECPlaza B2B marketplace established in Korea. 1996, The use of Excalibur BBS with replicated Storefronts was an implementation of electronic commerce started by a group of SysOps in Australia. 1998, Electronic postal stamps can be purchased and downloaded for printing from the Web,1999, Alibaba Group is established in China. Business. com sold for US $7.5 million to eCompanies, the peer-to-peer filesharing software Napster launches. ATG Stores launches to sell items for the home online. 2000, Complete Idiots Guide to E-commerce released on Amazon 2000,2001, Alibaba. com achieved profitability in December 2001
7.
Software development
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Software development is the process of computer programming, documenting, testing, and bug fixing involved in creating and maintaining applications and frameworks resulting in a software product. Therefore, software development may include research, new development, prototyping, modification, reuse, re-engineering, maintenance, system software underlies applications and the programming process itself, and is often developed separately. There are many approaches to project management, known as software development life cycle models, methodologies, processes. The waterfall model is a version, contrasted with the more recent innovation of agile software development. A software development process is a framework that is used to structure, plan, a wide variety of such frameworks has evolved over the years, each with its own recognized strengths and weaknesses. One system development methodology is not necessarily suitable for use by all projects, each of the available methodologies is best suited to specific kinds of projects, based on various technical, organizational, project and team considerations. Different approaches to development may carry out these stages in different orders. The level of detail of the produced at each stage of software development may also vary. These stages may also be carried out in turn, or they may be repeated over various cycles or iterations, the more extreme approach usually involves less time spent on planning and documentation, and more time spent on coding and development of automated tests. More “extreme” approaches also promote continuous testing throughout the development lifecycle, there are significant advantages and disadvantages to the various methodologies, and the best approach to solving a problem using software will often depend on the type of problem. If the problem is understood and a solution can be effectively planned out ahead of time. If, on the hand, the problem is unique. The sources of ideas for software products are plenteous, in a marketing evaluation phase, the cost and time assumptions become evaluated. A decision is reached early in the first phase as to whether, based on the detailed information generated by the marketing and development staff. Students of marketing learn marketing and are exposed to finance or engineering. Most of us become specialists in just one area, to complicate matters, few of us meet interdisciplinary people in the workforce, so there are few roles to mimic. Yet, software product planning is critical to the development success and these processes may also cause the role of business development to overlap with software development. Planning is an objective of each and every activity, where we want to discover things that belong to the project, an important task in creating a software program is extracting the requirements or requirements analysis
8.
Alexa Internet
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Alexa Internet, Inc. is a California-based company that provides commercial web traffic data and analytics. It is an owned subsidiary of Amazon. com. Founded as an independent company in 1996, Alexa was acquired by Amazon in 1999 and its toolbar collects data on browsing behavior and transmits them to the Alexa website, where they are stored and analyzed. This is the basis for the web traffic reporting. According to its website, Alexa provides traffic data, global rankings, as of 2015, its website has been visited by over 6.5 million people monthly. Alexa Internet was founded in April 1996 by American web entrepreneurs Brewster Kahle, Alexa initially offered a toolbar that gave Internet users suggestions on where to go next, based on the traffic patterns of its user community. The company also offered context for each site visited, to whom it was registered, how many pages it had, how other sites pointed to it. Alexas operations grew to include archiving of web pages as they are crawled and this database served as the basis for the creation of the Internet Archive accessible through the Wayback Machine. In 1998, the company donated a copy of the archive, Alexa continues to supply the Internet Archive with Web crawls. In 1999, as the company moved away from its vision of providing an intelligent search engine. Alexa began a partnership with Google in early 2002, and with the web directory DMOZ in January 2003, in May 2006, replaced Google with Bing as a provider of search results. In December 2006, Amazon released Alexa Image Search, built in-house, it was the first major application built on the companys Web platform. In December 2005, Alexa opened its extensive search index and Web-crawling facilities to third-party programs through a set of Web services. These could be used, for instance, to construct vertical search engines that could run on Alexas own servers or elsewhere. In May 2007, Alexa changed their API to limit comparisons to three websites, reduce the size of embedded graphs in Flash, and add mandatory embedded BritePic advertisements. In April 2007, the company filed a lawsuit, Alexa v. Hornbaker, in the lawsuit, Alexa alleged that Ron Hornbaker was stealing traffic graphs for profit, and that the primary purpose of his site was to display graphs that were generated by Alexas servers. Hornbaker removed the term Alexa from his name on March 19,2007. Thereafter, Alexa became a purely analytics-focused company, on March 31,2009, Alexa launched a major website redesign
9.
Privately held company
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More ambiguous terms for a privately held company are unquoted company and unlisted company. Though less visible than their publicly traded counterparts, private companies have major importance in the worlds economy. In 2008, the 441 largest private companies in the United States accounted for US$1,800,000,000,000 in revenues and employed 6.2 million people, according to Forbes. In 2004, the Forbes count of privately held U. S. businesses with at least $1 billion in revenue was 305, cargill, Koch Industries, Bechtel, Publix, Pilot Corp. Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu, Hearst Corporation, Cox Enterprises, S. C, johnson, McWane, Carlson Companies, and Mars are among the largest privately held companies in the United States. In the broadest sense, the private corporation refers to any business not owned by the state. This usage is found in former communist countries to differentiate from former state-owned enterprises. In the United States, the privately held company is more often used to describe for-profit enterprises whose shares are not traded on the stock market. In countries with public trading markets, a privately held business is taken to mean one whose ownership shares or interests are not publicly traded. Often, privately held companies are owned by the company founders and/or their families, sometimes employees also hold shares of private companies. Most small businesses are privately held, Private companies may be called corporations, limited companies, limited liability companies, unlimited companies, or other names, depending on where and how they are organized and structured. In the United States, but not generally in the United Kingdom, privately held companies generally have fewer or less comprehensive reporting requirements and obligations for transparency, via annual reports, etc. than publicly traded companies do. For example, in the United States, unlike in Europe, in addition, private company executives may steer their ships without shareholder approval, allowing them to take significant action without delays. There is a requirement for large proprietary companies, which are required to lodge Form 388H to the ASIC containing their financial report. In the United States, private companies are held to different accounting auditing standards than are public companies, other companies, like Sageworks, provide aggregated data on privately held companies, segmented by industry code. Privately held companies also sometimes have restrictions on how many shareholders they may have, for example, the U. S. Securities Exchange Act of 1934, section 12, limits a privately held company, generally, to fewer than 2000 shareholders, and the U. S. Investment Company Act of 1940, requires registration of investment companies that have more than 100 holders, in Australia, section 113 of the Corporations Act 2001 limits a privately held company to fifty non-employee shareholders. Private enterprises comprise the sector of an economy
10.
United States
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Forty-eight of the fifty states and the federal district are contiguous and located in North America between Canada and Mexico. The state of Alaska is in the northwest corner of North America, bordered by Canada to the east, the state of Hawaii is an archipelago in the mid-Pacific Ocean. The U. S. territories are scattered about the Pacific Ocean, the geography, climate and wildlife of the country are extremely diverse. At 3.8 million square miles and with over 324 million people, the United States is the worlds third- or fourth-largest country by area, third-largest by land area. It is one of the worlds most ethnically diverse and multicultural nations, paleo-Indians migrated from Asia to the North American mainland at least 15,000 years ago. European colonization began in the 16th century, the United States emerged from 13 British colonies along the East Coast. Numerous disputes between Great Britain and the following the Seven Years War led to the American Revolution. On July 4,1776, during the course of the American Revolutionary War, the war ended in 1783 with recognition of the independence of the United States by Great Britain, representing the first successful war of independence against a European power. The current constitution was adopted in 1788, after the Articles of Confederation, the first ten amendments, collectively named the Bill of Rights, were ratified in 1791 and designed to guarantee many fundamental civil liberties. During the second half of the 19th century, the American Civil War led to the end of slavery in the country. By the end of century, the United States extended into the Pacific Ocean. The Spanish–American War and World War I confirmed the status as a global military power. The end of the Cold War and the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991 left the United States as the sole superpower. The U. S. is a member of the United Nations, World Bank, International Monetary Fund, Organization of American States. The United States is a developed country, with the worlds largest economy by nominal GDP. It ranks highly in several measures of performance, including average wage, human development, per capita GDP. While the U. S. economy is considered post-industrial, characterized by the dominance of services and knowledge economy, the United States is a prominent political and cultural force internationally, and a leader in scientific research and technological innovations. In 1507, the German cartographer Martin Waldseemüller produced a map on which he named the lands of the Western Hemisphere America after the Italian explorer and cartographer Amerigo Vespucci
11.
Internet
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The Internet is the global system of interconnected computer networks that use the Internet protocol suite to link devices worldwide. The origins of the Internet date back to research commissioned by the United States federal government in the 1960s to build robust, the primary precursor network, the ARPANET, initially served as a backbone for interconnection of regional academic and military networks in the 1980s. Although the Internet was widely used by academia since the 1980s, Internet use grew rapidly in the West from the mid-1990s and from the late 1990s in the developing world. In the two decades since then, Internet use has grown 100-times, measured for the period of one year, newspaper, book, and other print publishing are adapting to website technology, or are reshaped into blogging, web feeds and online news aggregators. The entertainment industry was initially the fastest growing segment on the Internet, the Internet has enabled and accelerated new forms of personal interactions through instant messaging, Internet forums, and social networking. Business-to-business and financial services on the Internet affect supply chains across entire industries, the Internet has no centralized governance in either technological implementation or policies for access and usage, each constituent network sets its own policies. The term Internet, when used to refer to the global system of interconnected Internet Protocol networks, is a proper noun. In common use and the media, it is not capitalized. Some guides specify that the word should be capitalized when used as a noun, the Internet is also often referred to as the Net, as a short form of network. Historically, as early as 1849, the word internetted was used uncapitalized as an adjective, the designers of early computer networks used internet both as a noun and as a verb in shorthand form of internetwork or internetworking, meaning interconnecting computer networks. The terms Internet and World Wide Web are often used interchangeably in everyday speech, however, the World Wide Web or the Web is only one of a large number of Internet services. The Web is a collection of interconnected documents and other web resources, linked by hyperlinks, the term Interweb is a portmanteau of Internet and World Wide Web typically used sarcastically to parody a technically unsavvy user. The ARPANET project led to the development of protocols for internetworking, the third site was the Culler-Fried Interactive Mathematics Center at the University of California, Santa Barbara, followed by the University of Utah Graphics Department. In an early sign of growth, fifteen sites were connected to the young ARPANET by the end of 1971. These early years were documented in the 1972 film Computer Networks, early international collaborations on the ARPANET were rare. European developers were concerned with developing the X.25 networks, in December 1974, RFC675, by Vinton Cerf, Yogen Dalal, and Carl Sunshine, used the term internet as a shorthand for internetworking and later RFCs repeated this use. Access to the ARPANET was expanded in 1981 when the National Science Foundation funded the Computer Science Network, in 1982, the Internet Protocol Suite was standardized, which permitted worldwide proliferation of interconnected networks.5 Mbit/s and 45 Mbit/s. Commercial Internet service providers emerged in the late 1980s and early 1990s, the ARPANET was decommissioned in 1990
12.
Second Life
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Second Life is an online virtual world, developed and owned by the San Francisco-based firm Linden Lab and launched on June 23,2003. By 2013, Second Life had approximately 1 million regular users, the virtual world can be accessed freely via Linden Labs own client programs or via alternative Third Party Viewers. Second Life users create virtual representations of themselves, called avatars, and are able to interact with places, objects, and other avatars. They can explore the world, meet other residents, socialize, participate in individual and group activities, build, create, shop, the platform principally features 3D-based user-generated content. Second Life also has its own currency, the Linden Dollar. Second Life is intended for people aged 16 and over, with the exception of 13–15-year-old users, built into the software is a 3D modeling tool based on simple geometric shapes, that allows residents to build virtual objects. There is also a procedural scripting language, Linden Scripting Language, sculpted prims, mesh, textures for clothing or other objects, animations, and gestures can be created using external software and imported. The Second Life terms of service provide that users retain copyright for any content they create, however, Linden Lab changed their terms of service in August 2013, to be able to use user-generated content for any purpose. The new terms of service prevent users from using textures from 3rd-party texture services, in 1999, Philip Rosedale formed Linden Lab with the intention of developing computer hardware to allow people to become immersed in a virtual world. That vision changed into the software application Linden World, in which participated in task-based games. That effort eventually transformed into the known, user-centered Second Life. In 2005 and 2006, Second Life began to significant media attention, including a cover story on BusinessWeek magazine featuring the virtual world. By that time, Anshe Chung had become Second Lifes poster child, at the same time, the service saw a period of exponential growth of its user base. On December 11,2007, Cory Ondrejka, who helped program Second Life, was forced to resign as chief technology officer. In January 2008, residents spent a total of 28,274,505 hours inworld, Rosedale announced Mark Kingdon as the new CEO effective May 15,2008. In 2010, Kingdon was replaced by Rosedale, who took over as Interim CEO, after four months Rosedale abruptly stepped down from the Interim CEO position. It was announced in October 2010, that Bob Komin, Linden Labs chief financial officer and chief operating officer, in 2008, Second Life was honored at the 59th Annual Technology & Engineering Emmy Awards for advancing the development of online sites with user-generated content. In May 2009, concurrent users averaged about 62,000, as of May 2010, concurrent users averaged about 54,000
13.
San Francisco
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San Francisco, officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the cultural, commercial, and financial center of Northern California. It is the birthplace of the United Nations, the California Gold Rush of 1849 brought rapid growth, making it the largest city on the West Coast at the time. San Francisco became a consolidated city-county in 1856, after three-quarters of the city was destroyed by the 1906 earthquake and fire, San Francisco was quickly rebuilt, hosting the Panama-Pacific International Exposition nine years later. In World War II, San Francisco was a port of embarkation for service members shipping out to the Pacific Theater. Politically, the city votes strongly along liberal Democratic Party lines, San Francisco is also the headquarters of five major banking institutions and various other companies such as Levi Strauss & Co. Dolby, Airbnb, Weebly, Pacific Gas and Electric Company, Yelp, Pinterest, Twitter, Uber, Lyft, Mozilla, Wikimedia Foundation, as of 2016, San Francisco is ranked high on world liveability rankings. The earliest archaeological evidence of habitation of the territory of the city of San Francisco dates to 3000 BC. Upon independence from Spain in 1821, the became part of Mexico. Under Mexican rule, the system gradually ended, and its lands became privatized. In 1835, Englishman William Richardson erected the first independent homestead, together with Alcalde Francisco de Haro, he laid out a street plan for the expanded settlement, and the town, named Yerba Buena, began to attract American settlers. Commodore John D. Sloat claimed California for the United States on July 7,1846, during the Mexican–American War, montgomery arrived to claim Yerba Buena two days later. Yerba Buena was renamed San Francisco on January 30 of the next year, despite its attractive location as a port and naval base, San Francisco was still a small settlement with inhospitable geography. The California Gold Rush brought a flood of treasure seekers, with their sourdough bread in tow, prospectors accumulated in San Francisco over rival Benicia, raising the population from 1,000 in 1848 to 25,000 by December 1849. The promise of fabulous riches was so strong that crews on arriving vessels deserted and rushed off to the gold fields, leaving behind a forest of masts in San Francisco harbor. Some of these approximately 500 abandoned ships were used at times as storeships, saloons and hotels, many were left to rot, by 1851 the harbor was extended out into the bay by wharves while buildings were erected on piles among the ships. By 1870 Yerba Buena Cove had been filled to create new land, buried ships are occasionally exposed when foundations are dug for new buildings. California was quickly granted statehood in 1850 and the U. S. military built Fort Point at the Golden Gate, silver discoveries, including the Comstock Lode in Nevada in 1859, further drove rapid population growth. With hordes of fortune seekers streaming through the city, lawlessness was common, and the Barbary Coast section of town gained notoriety as a haven for criminals, prostitution, entrepreneurs sought to capitalize on the wealth generated by the Gold Rush
14.
Boston
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Boston is the capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts in the United States. Boston is also the seat of Suffolk County, although the county government was disbanded on July 1,1999. The city proper covers 48 square miles with a population of 667,137 in 2015, making it the largest city in New England. Alternately, as a Combined Statistical Area, this wider commuting region is home to some 8.1 million people, One of the oldest cities in the United States, Boston was founded on the Shawmut Peninsula in 1630 by Puritan settlers from England. It was the scene of several key events of the American Revolution, such as the Boston Massacre, the Boston Tea Party, the Battle of Bunker Hill, and the Siege of Boston. Upon U. S. independence from Great Britain, it continued to be an important port and manufacturing hub as well as a center for education, through land reclamation and municipal annexation, Boston has expanded beyond the original peninsula. Its rich history attracts many tourists, with Faneuil Hall alone drawing over 20 million visitors per year, Bostons many firsts include the United States first public school, Boston Latin School, first subway system, the Tremont Street Subway, and first public park, Boston Common. Bostons economic base also includes finance, professional and business services, biotechnology, information technology, the city has one of the highest costs of living in the United States as it has undergone gentrification, though it remains high on world livability rankings. Bostons early European settlers had first called the area Trimountaine but later renamed it Boston after Boston, Lincolnshire, England, the renaming on September 7,1630 was by Puritan colonists from England who had moved over from Charlestown earlier that year in quest of fresh water. Their settlement was limited to the Shawmut Peninsula, at that time surrounded by the Massachusetts Bay and Charles River. The peninsula is thought to have been inhabited as early as 5000 BC, in 1629, the Massachusetts Bay Colonys first governor John Winthrop led the signing of the Cambridge Agreement, a key founding document of the city. Puritan ethics and their focus on education influenced its early history, over the next 130 years, the city participated in four French and Indian Wars, until the British defeated the French and their Indian allies in North America. Boston was the largest town in British America until Philadelphia grew larger in the mid-18th century, Bostons harbor activity was significantly curtailed by the Embargo Act of 1807 and the War of 1812. Foreign trade returned after these hostilities, but Bostons merchants had found alternatives for their investments in the interim. Manufacturing became an important component of the economy, and the citys industrial manufacturing overtook international trade in economic importance by the mid-19th century. Boston remained one of the nations largest manufacturing centers until the early 20th century, a network of small rivers bordering the city and connecting it to the surrounding region facilitated shipment of goods and led to a proliferation of mills and factories. Later, a network of railroads furthered the regions industry. Boston was a port of the Atlantic triangular slave trade in the New England colonies
15.
Seattle
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Seattle is a seaport city on the west coast of the United States and the seat of King County, Washington. With an estimated 684,451 residents as of 2015, Seattle is the largest city in both the state of Washington and the Pacific Northwest region of North America. In July 2013, it was the major city in the United States. The city is situated on an isthmus between Puget Sound and Lake Washington, about 100 miles south of the Canada–United States border, a major gateway for trade with Asia, Seattle is the fourth-largest port in North America in terms of container handling as of 2015. The Seattle area was inhabited by Native Americans for at least 4,000 years before the first permanent European settlers. Arthur A. Denny and his group of travelers, subsequently known as the Denny Party, arrived from Illinois via Portland, the settlement was moved to the eastern shore of Elliott Bay and named Seattle in 1852, after Chief Siahl of the local Duwamish and Suquamish tribes. Logging was Seattles first major industry, but by the late-19th century, growth after World War II was partially due to the local Boeing company, which established Seattle as a center for aircraft manufacturing. The Seattle area developed as a technology center beginning in the 1980s, in 1994, Internet retailer Amazon was founded in Seattle. The stream of new software, biotechnology, and Internet companies led to an economic revival, Seattle has a noteworthy musical history. From 1918 to 1951, nearly two dozen jazz nightclubs existed along Jackson Street, from the current Chinatown/International District, to the Central District, the jazz scene developed the early careers of Ray Charles, Quincy Jones, Ernestine Anderson, and others. Seattle is also the birthplace of rock musician Jimi Hendrix and the alternative rock subgenre grunge, archaeological excavations suggest that Native Americans have inhabited the Seattle area for at least 4,000 years. By the time the first European settlers arrived, the people occupied at least seventeen villages in the areas around Elliott Bay, the first European to visit the Seattle area was George Vancouver, in May 1792 during his 1791–95 expedition to chart the Pacific Northwest. In 1851, a party led by Luther Collins made a location on land at the mouth of the Duwamish River. Thirteen days later, members of the Collins Party on the way to their claim passed three scouts of the Denny Party, members of the Denny Party claimed land on Alki Point on September 28,1851. The rest of the Denny Party set sail from Portland, Oregon, after a difficult winter, most of the Denny Party relocated across Elliott Bay and claimed land a second time at the site of present-day Pioneer Square, naming this new settlement Duwamps. For the next few years, New York Alki and Duwamps competed for dominance, david Swinson Doc Maynard, one of the founders of Duwamps, was the primary advocate to name the settlement after Chief Sealth of the Duwamish and Suquamish tribes. The name Seattle appears on official Washington Territory papers dated May 23,1853, in 1855, nominal land settlements were established. On January 14,1865, the Legislature of Territorial Washington incorporated the Town of Seattle with a board of managing the city
16.
Virginia
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Virginia is a state located in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States, as well as in the historic Southeast. The geography and climate of the Commonwealth are shaped by the Blue Ridge Mountains and the Chesapeake Bay, the capital of the Commonwealth is Richmond, Virginia Beach is the most populous city, and Fairfax County is the most populous political subdivision. The Commonwealths estimated population as of 2014 is over 8.3 million, the areas history begins with several indigenous groups, including the Powhatan. In 1607 the London Company established the Colony of Virginia as the first permanent New World English colony, slave labor and the land acquired from displaced Native American tribes each played a significant role in the colonys early politics and plantation economy. Although the Commonwealth was under one-party rule for nearly a century following Reconstruction, the Virginia General Assembly is the oldest continuous law-making body in the New World. The state government was ranked most effective by the Pew Center on the States in both 2005 and 2008 and it is unique in how it treats cities and counties equally, manages local roads, and prohibits its governors from serving consecutive terms. Virginias economy changed from agricultural to industrial during the 1960s and 1970s. Virginia has an area of 42,774.2 square miles, including 3,180.13 square miles of water. Virginias boundary with Maryland and Washington, D. C. extends to the mark of the south shore of the Potomac River. The southern border is defined as the 36° 30′ parallel north, the border with Tennessee was not settled until 1893, when their dispute was brought to the U. S. Supreme Court. The Chesapeake Bay separates the portion of the Commonwealth from the two-county peninsula of Virginias Eastern Shore. The bay was formed from the river valleys of the Susquehanna River. Many of Virginias rivers flow into the Chesapeake Bay, including the Potomac, Rappahannock, York, and James, the Tidewater is a coastal plain between the Atlantic coast and the fall line. It includes the Eastern Shore and major estuaries of Chesapeake Bay, the Piedmont is a series of sedimentary and igneous rock-based foothills east of the mountains which were formed in the Mesozoic era. The region, known for its clay soil, includes the Southwest Mountains around Charlottesville. The Blue Ridge Mountains are a province of the Appalachian Mountains with the highest points in the state. The Ridge and Valley region is west of the mountains and includes the Great Appalachian Valley, the region is carbonate rock based and includes Massanutten Mountain. The Cumberland Plateau and the Cumberland Mountains are in the southwest corner of Virginia, in this region, rivers flow northwest, with a dendritic drainage system, into the Ohio River basin
17.
Davis, California
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Davis is a city in the U. S. state of California and the most populous city in Yolo County. It had a population of 65,622 in 2010, not including the population of the University of California, Davis. The city is a suburb of Californias capital, Sacramento, Davis grew into a Southern Pacific Railroad depot built in 1868. It was then known as Davisville, named after Jerome C, however, the post office at Davisville shortened the town name simply to Davis in 1907. The name stuck, and the city of Davis was incorporated on March 28,1917, from its inception as a farming community, Davis has been known for its contributions to agricultural policy along with veterinary care and animal husbandry. The farm, later renamed the Northern Branch of the College of Agriculture in 1922, was upgraded into the seventh UC general campus, the University of California, Davis, in 1959. Davis is located in Yolo County, California,11 mi west of Sacramento,70 mi northeast of San Francisco,385 mi north of Los Angeles, at the intersection of Interstate 80, neighboring towns include Dixon, Winters, and Woodland. Davis lies in the Sacramento Valley, the portion of the Central San Joaquin Valley, in Northern California. According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has an area of 10.5 square miles. 10.4 square miles of it is land and 0.04 square miles of it is water, the topography is flat, which has helped Davis to become known as a haven for bicyclists. The Davis climate resembles that of nearby Sacramento and is typical of Californias Central Valley Mediterranean climate regime, dry, hot summers and cool, rainy and it is classified as a Köppen Csa climate. Average temperatures range from 46 °F in December and January to 75 °F in July, thick ground fog called tule fog settles into Davis during late fall and winter. This fog can be dense with visibility to nearly zero, as in other areas of northern California, the tule fog is a leading cause of road accidents in the winter season. Record temperatures range from a high of 116 °F on July 17,1925, Davis is internally divided by two freeways, a north–south railroad, an east-west mainline and several major streets. The city is divided into six main districts made up of smaller neighborhoods, Central Davis, north of Fifth Street and Russell Boulevard. East of SR113, and west of the tracks running along G Street. Within these boundaries is the officially denoted neighborhood of Old North Davis, Downtown Davis, roughly the numbered-and-lettered grid north of I-80, south of Fifth Street, east of A Street, and west of the railroad tracks, including the Aggie Village and Olive Drive areas. East Davis, north of I-80, south of Covell Blvd. North Davis, north of Covell Blvd
18.
Mountain View, California
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Mountain View is a city located in Santa Clara County, California, United States, named for its views of the Santa Cruz Mountains. From its origins as a stop, it grew to a large suburb with a pedestrian-friendly downtown, free wi-fi. The city borders Palo Alto and the San Francisco Bay to the north, Los Altos to the south, situated in the southern end of the San Francisco Peninsula in the San Francisco Bay Area, Mountain View is home to many high technology companies. In 1956, Shockley Semiconductor Laboratory, the first company to develop silicon semiconductor devices in what came to be known as Silicon Valley, was established in the city by William Shockley. Today, many of the largest technology companies in the world are headquartered in the city, including Google, Mozilla Foundation, Symantec, and Intuit. The original Byte Shop computer store was opened at 1063 El Camino Real, Mountain View by Paul Terrell, the Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority integrates the city with the neighboring cities of Palo Alto, Los Altos, and Sunnyvale. The Mexican land grant of Rancho Pastoria de las Borregas was given in 1842 by Alta California Governor Juan Alvarado to Francisco Estrada. This grant was passed on to Mariano Castro, who sold half of the land to Martin Murphy, Jr. Eventually. First known as the center of Fremont Twp. before the first California 1852 census. Which meant that it was a predecessor to Mayfield and Palo Alto, Mountain View Station, officially named in 1864, had its beginnings earlier as a stagecoach stop on the route between San Francisco and San Jose, including the Butterfield Overland Mail. & El Camino Real of today, was closer to what was once the town center. The early pioneers were buried at the old cemetery between Mercy & Church, off Castro Street, now the present city Library and park. Reverend Henry Merrill Henderson, born in Maryland, age 35, arrived in Spring of 1852, with his family to meet with relatives Ricketts and he was the first Baptist minister in town and soon was going by horse to Half-Moon Bay, and McCartersville for services. His next-door neighbor arrived later that year, Seligman Weilheimer and brother Samuel from Dossenheim, Baden, Germany, who built at that property, the Fremont twp. population was about 560 by 1860, less Mayfield Post office section, which began north of present San Antonio Road. The towns early growth was due to agriculture, William Bubb later being a figure, buying 80 acres to farm in October 1851. His heirs expanded and intermarried in the area, agriculture remained the primary industry into the middle of the 20th century. The U. S. Navys adjacent 1000 acre Moffet Field Complex began after 1931, after World War II, the population grew significantly with the development of the aerospace and electronics industries. Between 1950 and 1960, the population grew from 6,563 to 30,889, today, high technology is the foundation of the local economy, and there exist few remnants of the citys agricultural past
19.
Brighton
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Brighton /ˈbraɪtən/ is a seaside resort on the south coast of England. It is part of the county of East Sussex, within the historic county of Sussex. Archaeological evidence of settlement in the dates back to the Bronze Age, Roman. The ancient settlement of Brighthelmstone was documented in the Domesday Book, Brighton began to attract more visitors following improved road transport to London and becoming a boarding point for boats travelling to France. The town also developed in popularity as a resort for sea bathing as a purported cure for illnesses. Brighton continued to grow as a centre of tourism following the arrival of the railways in 1841. Many of the attractions were built in the Victorian era, including the Grand Hotel, the West Pier. Brighton attracted 7.5 million day visitors in 2015/16 and 4.9 million overnight visitors, Brighton has also been called the UKs hippest city, and the happiest place to live in the UK. Brightons earliest name was Bristelmestune, recorded in the Domesday Book, although more than 40 variations have been documented, Brighthelmstone was the standard rendering between the 14th and 18th centuries. Brighton was originally a shortened form, first seen in 1660, it gradually supplanted the longer name. Brighthelmstone was the official name until 1810, though. The name is of Anglo-Saxon origin, most scholars believe that it derives from Beorthelm + tūn—the homestead of Beorthelm, a common Old English name associated with villages elsewhere in England. The tūn element is common in Sussex, especially on the coast, an alternative etymology taken from the Old English words for stony valley is sometimes given but has less acceptance. Brighthelm gives its name to, among other things, a church, the town was originally split in half by the Wellesbourne, a winterbourne which was culverted and buried in the 18th century. Poet Horace Smith called it The Queen of Watering Places, which is widely used. Novelist William Makepeace Thackeray referred to Doctor Brighton, calling the one of the best of Physicians. London-by-Sea is well-known, reflecting Brightons popularity with Londoners as a resort, a commuter dormitory. The Queen of Slaughtering Places, a pun on Smiths description, the mid 19th-century nickname School Town referred to the remarkable number of boarding, charity and church schools in the town at the time
20.
Singapore
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Singapore, officially the Republic of Singapore, sometimes referred to as the Lion City or the Little Red Dot, is a sovereign city-state in Southeast Asia. It lies one degree north of the equator, at the tip of peninsular Malaysia. Singapores territory consists of one island along with 62 other islets. Since independence, extensive land reclamation has increased its size by 23%. During the Second World War, Singapore was occupied by Japan, after early years of turbulence, and despite lacking natural resources and a hinterland, the nation developed rapidly as an Asian Tiger economy, based on external trade and its workforce. Singapore is a global commerce, finance and transport hub, the country has also been identified as a tax haven. Singapore ranks 5th internationally and first in Asia on the UN Human Development Index and it is ranked highly in education, healthcare, life expectancy, quality of life, personal safety, and housing, but does not fare well on the Democracy index. Although income inequality is high, 90% of homes are owner-occupied, 38% of Singapores 5.6 million residents are permanent residents and other foreign nationals. There are four languages on the island, Malay, Mandarin, Tamil. English is its language, most Singaporeans are bilingual. Singapore is a multiparty parliamentary republic, with a Westminster system of unicameral parliamentary government. The Peoples Action Party has won every election since self-government in 1959, however, it is unlikely that lions ever lived on the island, Sang Nila Utama, the Srivijayan prince said to have founded and named the island Singapura, perhaps saw a Malayan tiger. There are however other suggestions for the origin of the name, the central island has also been called Pulau Ujong as far back as the third century CE, literally island at the end in Malay. In 1299, according to the Malay Annals, the Kingdom of Singapura was founded on the island by Sang Nila Utama and these Indianized Kingdoms, a term coined by George Cœdès were characterized by surprising resilience, political integrity and administrative stability. In 1613, Portuguese raiders burned down the settlement, which by then was part of the Johor Sultanate. The wider maritime region and much trade was under Dutch control for the following period, in 1824 the entire island, as well as the Temenggong, became a British possession after a further treaty with the Sultan. In 1826, Singapore became part of the Straits Settlements, under the jurisdiction of British India, prior to Raffles arrival, there were only about a thousand people living on the island, mostly indigenous Malays along with a handful of Chinese. By 1860 the population had swelled to over 80,000, many of these early immigrants came to work on the pepper and gambier plantations
21.
Amsterdam
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Amsterdam is the capital and most populous municipality of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. Its status as the capital is mandated by the Constitution of the Netherlands, although it is not the seat of the government, which is The Hague. Amsterdam has a population of 851,373 within the city proper,1,351,587 in the urban area, the city is located in the province of North Holland in the west of the country. The metropolitan area comprises much of the part of the Randstad, one of the larger conurbations in Europe. Amsterdams name derives from Amstelredamme, indicative of the citys origin around a dam in the river Amstel, during that time, the city was the leading centre for finance and diamonds. In the 19th and 20th centuries the city expanded, and many new neighborhoods and suburbs were planned, the 17th-century canals of Amsterdam and the 19–20th century Defence Line of Amsterdam are on the UNESCO World Heritage List. As the commercial capital of the Netherlands and one of the top financial centres in Europe, Amsterdam is considered a world city by the Globalization. The city is also the capital of the Netherlands. Many large Dutch institutions have their headquarters there, and seven of the worlds 500 largest companies, including Philips and ING, are based in the city. In 2012, Amsterdam was ranked the second best city to live in by the Economist Intelligence Unit and 12th globally on quality of living for environment, the city was ranked 3rd in innovation by Australian innovation agency 2thinknow in their Innovation Cities Index 2009. The Amsterdam seaport to this day remains the second in the country, famous Amsterdam residents include the diarist Anne Frank, artists Rembrandt van Rijn and Vincent van Gogh, and philosopher Baruch Spinoza. The Amsterdam Stock Exchange, the oldest stock exchange in the world, is located in the city center. After the floods of 1170 and 1173, locals near the river Amstel built a bridge over the river, the earliest recorded use of that name is in a document dated October 27,1275, which exempted inhabitants of the village from paying bridge tolls to Count Floris V. This allowed the inhabitants of the village of Aemstelredamme to travel freely through the County of Holland, paying no tolls at bridges, locks, the certificate describes the inhabitants as homines manentes apud Amestelledamme. By 1327, the name had developed into Aemsterdam, Amsterdam is much younger than Dutch cities such as Nijmegen, Rotterdam, and Utrecht. In October 2008, historical geographer Chris de Bont suggested that the land around Amsterdam was being reclaimed as early as the late 10th century. This does not necessarily mean there was already a settlement then, since reclamation of land may not have been for farming—it may have been for peat. Amsterdam was granted city rights in either 1300 or 1306, from the 14th century on, Amsterdam flourished, largely from trade with the Hanseatic League
22.
Electronic Arts
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Electronic Arts Inc. is an American video game company headquartered in Redwood City, California. Currently, EA develops and publishes games under several labels including EA Sports titles FIFA, Madden NFL, NHL, NCAA Football, NBA Live, and SSX. EA also owns and operates major gaming studios, EA Tiburon in Orlando, EA Canada in Burnaby, BioWare in Edmonton as well as Montreal, the company began developing games in-house and supported consoles by the early 1990s. EA later grew via acquisition of several successful developers, by the early 2000s, EA had become one of the worlds largest third-party publishers. In a note to employees, EA CEO John Riccitiello called this an important milestone for the company. EA began to move toward direct distribution of games and services with the acquisition of the popular online gaming site Pogo. com in 2001. In 2009, EA acquired the London-based social gaming startup Playfish, and in June 2011, EA launched Origin, there is also a On The House feature in Origin that lets you download full versions of EA games for free, it is updated regularly. In July 2011, EA announced that it had acquired PopCap Games, in February 1982, Trip Hawkins arranged a meeting with Don Valentine of Sequoia Capital to discuss financing his new venture, Amazin Software. Valentine encouraged Hawkins to leave Apple Inc. in which Hawkins served as Director of Product Marketing, on May 28,1982, Trip Hawkins incorporated and established the company with a personal investment of an estimated US$200,000. The company was not named Amazin Software, but instead Electronic Arts, seven months later in December 1982, Hawkins secured US$2 million of venture capital from Sequoia Capital, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, and Sevin Rosen Funds. For more than seven months, Hawkins refined his Electronic Arts business plan, with aid from his first employee, Rich Melmon, the original plan was written, mostly by Hawkins, on an Apple II in Sequoia Capitals office in August 1982. The business plan was refined in September and reissued on October 8,1982. By November, employee headcount rose to 11, including Tim Mott, Bing Gordon, David Maynard, having outgrown the office space provided by Sequoia Capital, the company relocated to a San Mateo office that overlooked the San Francisco Airport landing path. Headcount rose rapidly in 1983, including Don Daglow, Richard Hilleman, Stewart Bonn, David Gardner and he recruited his original employees from Apple, Atari, Xerox PARC, and VisiCorp, and got Steve Wozniak to agree to sit on the board of directors. Hawkins was determined to sell directly to buyers, combined with the fact that Hawkins was pioneering new game brands, this made sales growth more challenging. Retailers wanted to buy known brands from existing distribution partners, after more flyers were handed out, former CEO Larry Probst arrived as VP of Sales in late 1984 and helped the company sustain growth into US$18 million in its third full year. This policy of dealing directly with retailers gave EA higher margins and better market awareness, in December 1986, David Gardner and Mark Lewkaspais moved to the UK to open a European headquarters. Up until that point publishing of Electronic Arts Games, and the conversion of many of their games to compact cassette versions in Europe was handled by Ariolasoft
23.
EBay
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EBay Inc. is a multinational e-commerce corporation, facilitating online consumer-to-consumer and business-to-consumer sales. It is headquartered in San Jose, California, eBay was founded by Pierre Omidyar in 1995, and became a notable success story of the dot-com bubble. Today it is a business with operations in about 30 countries. The company manages eBay. com, an auction and shopping website in which people and businesses buy and sell a broad variety of goods. It previously offered online money transfers, which was a wholly owned subsidiary of eBay from 2002 until 2015, the website is free to use for buyers, but sellers are charged fees for listing items and again when those items are sold. The AuctionWeb was founded in California on September 3,1995 by French-born Iranian-American computer programmer Pierre Omidyar as part of a personal site. One of the first items sold on AuctionWeb was a laser pointer for $14.83. Astonished, Omidyar contacted the winning bidder to ask if he understood that the pointer was broken. In his responding email, the buyer explained, Im a collector of broken laser pointers and this was revealed in Adam Cohens book, The Perfect Store, and confirmed by eBay. Reportedly, eBay was simply a hobby for Omidyar until his Internet service provider informed him he would need to upgrade to a business account due to the high volume of traffic to his website. The resulting price increase forced him to start charging those who used eBay and it resulted in the hiring of Chris Agarpao as eBays first employee to handle the number of checks coming in for fees. Jeffrey Skoll was hired as the first president of the company in early 1996, growth was phenomenal, in January 1997 the site hosted 2,000,000 auctions, compared with 250,000 during the whole of 1996. The company officially changed the name of its service from AuctionWeb to eBay in September 1997, originally, the site belonged to Echo Bay Technology Group, Omidyars consulting firm. Omidyar had tried to register the domain name echobay. com, but found it already taken by the Echo Bay Mines, in 1997, the company received $6.7 million in funding from the venture capital firm Benchmark Capital. Meg Whitman was hired as eBay President and CEO in March 1998, at the time, the company had 30 employees, half a million users and revenues of $4.7 million in the United States. EBay went public on September 21,1998, and both Omidyar and Skoll became instant billionaires, eBays target share price of $18 was all but ignored as the price went to $53.50 on the first day of trading. As the company expanded product categories beyond collectibles into almost any saleable item, in February 2002, the company purchased iBazar, a similar European auction web site founded in 1998, and then bought PayPal on October 3,2002. By early 2008, the company had expanded worldwide, counted hundreds of millions of registered users,15, after nearly ten years at eBay, Whitman decided to enter politics
24.
The Walt Disney Company
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The Walt Disney Company, commonly known as Disney, is an American diversified multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate, headquartered at the Walt Disney Studios in Burbank, California. It is the second largest media conglomerate in terms of revenue. Disney was founded on October 16,1923 – by brothers Walt Disney, the company also operated under the names The Walt Disney Studio and then Walt Disney Productions. Taking on its current name in 1986, it expanded its operations and also started divisions focused upon theater, radio, music, publishing. In addition, Disney has since created corporate divisions in order to more mature content than is typically associated with its flagship family-oriented brands. The company is best known for the products of its studio, Walt Disney Studios. Disneys other three divisions are Walt Disney Parks and Resorts, Disney Media Networks, and Disney Consumer Products. The company has been a component of the Dow Jones Industrial Average since May 6,1991, Mickey Mouse, an early and well-known cartoon creation of the company, is a primary symbol and mascot for Disney. In early 1923, Kansas City, Missouri, animator Walt Disney created a film entitled Alices Wonderland. After the bankruptcy in 1923 of his previous firm, Laugh-O-Gram Studios, Disney moved to Hollywood to join his brother, Walt and Roy Disney formed Disney Brothers Cartoon Studio that same year. More animated films followed after Alice, in January 1926, with the completion of the Disney studio on Hyperion Street, the Disney Brothers Studios name was changed to the Walt Disney Studio. The distributor owned Oswald, so Disney only made a few hundred dollars, Disney completed 26 Oswald shorts before losing the contract in February 1928, due to a legal loophole, when Winklers husband Charles Mintz took over their distribution company. After failing to take over the Disney Studio, Mintz hired away four of Disneys primary animators to start his own animation studio, Snappy Comedies. In 1928, to recover from the loss of Oswald the Lucky Rabbit, Disney came up with the idea of a character named Mortimer while on a train headed to California. The mouse was later renamed Mickey Mouse and starred in several Disney produced films, ub Iwerks refined Disneys initial design of Mickey Mouse. Disneys first sound film Steamboat Willie, a cartoon starring Mickey, was released on November 18,1928 through Pat Powers distribution company and it was the first Mickey Mouse sound cartoon released, but the third to be created, behind Plane Crazy and The Gallopin Gaucho. Disney used Pat Powers Cinephone system, created by Powers using Lee De Forests Phonofilm system, Steamboat Willie premiered at B. S. Mosss Colony Theater in New York City, now The Broadway Theatre. Disneys Plane Crazy and The Galloping Gaucho were then retrofitted with synchronized sound tracks, Disney continued to produce cartoons with Mickey Mouse and other characters, and began the Silly Symphonies series with Columbia Pictures signing on as Symphonies distributor in August 1929
25.
Adobe Systems
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Adobe Systems Incorporated /əˈdoʊbiː/ is an American multinational computer software company. The company is headquartered in San Jose, California, United States, Adobe has historically focused upon the creation of multimedia and creativity software products, with a more recent foray towards rich Internet application software development. It is best known for Photoshop, an image editing software, Acrobat Reader, Adobe was founded in February 1982 by John Warnock and Charles Geschke, who established the company after leaving Xerox PARC in order to develop and sell the PostScript page description language. In 1985, Apple Computer licensed PostScript for use in its LaserWriter printers, as of 2015, Adobe Systems has about 13,500 employees, about 40% of whom work in San Jose. The name of the company, Adobe, comes from Adobe Creek in Los Altos, California, Adobes corporate logo features a stylized A and was designed by the wife of John Warnock, Marva Warnock, who is a graphic designer. Adobes first products after PostScript were digital fonts, which released in a proprietary format called Type 1. Apple subsequently developed a standard, TrueType, which provided full scalability and precise control of the pixel pattern created by the fonts outlines. In the mid-1980s, Adobe entered the software market with Illustrator. Illustrator, which grew from the firms in-house font-development software, helped popularize PostScript-enabled laser printers, Adobe Systems entered NASDAQ in 1986. Its revenue has grown from roughly $1 billion in 1999 to roughly $4 billion in 2012, Adobes fiscal years run from December to November. For example, the 2007 fiscal year ended on November 30,2007, in 1989, Adobe introduced what was to become its flagship product, a graphics editing program for the Macintosh called Photoshop. Stable and full-featured, Photoshop 1.0 was ably marketed by Adobe, in 1993, Adobe introduced PDF, the Portable Document Format, and its Adobe Acrobat and Reader software. PDF is now an International Standard, ISO 32000-1,2008, in December 1991, Adobe released Adobe Premiere, which Adobe rebranded as Adobe Premiere Pro in 2003. In 1992, Adobe acquired OCR Systems, Inc, in 1994, Adobe acquired Aldus and added PageMaker and After Effects to its product line later in the year, it also controls the TIFF file format. In 1995, Adobe added FrameMaker, the long-document DTP application, in 1996, Adobe Systems Inc added Ares Software Corp. In 2002, Adobe acquired Canadian company Accelio, on December 12,2005, Adobe acquired its main rival, Macromedia, in a stock swap valued at about $3. Adobe released Adobe Media Player in April 2008, on April 27, Adobe discontinued development and sales of its older HTML/web development software, GoLive in favor of Dreamweaver. Adobe offered a discount on Dreamweaver for GoLive users and supports those who still use GoLive with online tutorials, on June 1, Adobe launched Acrobat. com, a series of web applications geared for collaborative work
26.
Apple Inc.
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Apple is an American multinational technology company headquartered in Cupertino, California that designs, develops, and sells consumer electronics, computer software, and online services. Apples consumer software includes the macOS and iOS operating systems, the media player, the Safari web browser. Its online services include the iTunes Store, the iOS App Store and Mac App Store, Apple Music, Apple was founded by Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak, and Ronald Wayne in April 1976 to develop and sell personal computers. It was incorporated as Apple Computer, Inc. in January 1977, Apple joined the Dow Jones Industrial Average in March 2015. In November 2014, Apple became the first U. S. company to be valued at over US$700 billion in addition to being the largest publicly traded corporation in the world by market capitalization. The company employs 115,000 full-time employees as of July 2015 and it operates the online Apple Store and iTunes Store, the latter of which is the worlds largest music retailer. Consumers use more than one billion Apple products worldwide as of March 2016, Apples worldwide annual revenue totaled $233 billion for the fiscal year ending in September 2015. This revenue accounts for approximately 1. 25% of the total United States GDP.1 billion, the corporation receives significant criticism regarding the labor practices of its contractors and its environmental and business practices, including the origins of source materials. Apple was founded on April 1,1976, by Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak, the Apple I kits were computers single-handedly designed and hand-built by Wozniak and first shown to the public at the Homebrew Computer Club. The Apple I was sold as a motherboard, which was less than what is now considered a personal computer. The Apple I went on sale in July 1976 and was market-priced at $666.66, Apple was incorporated January 3,1977, without Wayne, who sold his share of the company back to Jobs and Wozniak for $800. Multimillionaire Mike Markkula provided essential business expertise and funding of $250,000 during the incorporation of Apple, during the first five years of operations revenues grew exponentially, doubling about every four months. Between September 1977 and September 1980 yearly sales grew from $775,000 to $118m, the Apple II, also invented by Wozniak, was introduced on April 16,1977, at the first West Coast Computer Faire. It differed from its rivals, the TRS-80 and Commodore PET, because of its character cell-based color graphics. While early Apple II models used ordinary cassette tapes as storage devices, they were superseded by the introduction of a 5 1/4 inch floppy disk drive and interface called the Disk II. The Apple II was chosen to be the platform for the first killer app of the business world, VisiCalc. VisiCalc created a market for the Apple II and gave home users an additional reason to buy an Apple II. Before VisiCalc, Apple had been a distant third place competitor to Commodore, by the end of the 1970s, Apple had a staff of computer designers and a production line
27.
RealNetworks
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RealNetworks, Inc. is a provider of Internet streaming media delivery software and services based in Seattle, Washington, United States. The company also provides subscription-based online entertainment services and mobile entertainment, RealNetworks was founded in 1994 by an ex-Microsoft executive, Rob Glaser and a management team including Phil Barrett, Andy Sharpless, and Stephen Buerkle. The original goal of the company was to provide a channel for politically progressive content. It evolved into a venture to leverage the Internet as an alternative distribution medium for audio broadcasts. Progressive Networks became RealNetworks in September 1997 and they announced streaming video technology in 1997. According to some accounts, by 2000, more than 85% of streaming content on the Internet was in the Real format. Despite this success, problems arose because Reals primary business model depended upon the sale of streaming media server software, as servers from Microsoft and Apple became more capable, Reals server sales inevitably eroded. On January 20,2000, RealNetworks, Inc. filed an injunction against Streambox, in 2002, a strategic alliance was formed between RealNetworks and Sony Corporation to expand collaboration. In October,2005, Microsoft agreed to pay RealNetworks $460 million to settle an antitrust lawsuit, in August 2003, RealNetworks acquired Listen. coms Rhapsody music service, and renamed it RealRhapsody. It offered streaming music downloads for a monthly fee, in January 2004, RealNetworks announced the RealPlayer Music Store, featuring digital rights management restricted music in the AAC file format. The domain real. com attracted at least 67 million visitors annually by 2008, on April 6,2010, Rhapsody was spun off from RealNetworks. In July 2013, RealNetworks acquired Slingo for $15.6 million, the company introduced a mobile phone app called Listen in April 2014 that plays custom ringtones to those calling the users phone. RealNetworks has its headquarters in Seattle, Washington in the Home Plate Center building in SoDo across from Safeco Field, sharing the building with King5 and Logic 20/20 Consulting. In 2000, one of the products, the download manager RealDownload, was already used for pushing small software, such as games. More content was added through deals with CBS for the reality show Big Brother, after the dot-com bubble, RealNetworks cut most of the resources. Some of the content was lost, some was limited to local markets, between 2003 and 2006, SuperPass included, for European subscribers, unlimited access to UEFA Champions League full-length game recordings. On September 30,2008, RealNetworks launched a new product called RealDVD, the software allows any user to save a copy of a DVD movie they own. The products distribution was barred by a court injunction, Real Alternative is a discontinued software bundle that allows users to play RealMedia files without installing RealPlayer
28.
Neil Stephenson
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Neal Town Stephenson is an American writer and game designer known for his works of speculative fiction. His novels have been categorized as fiction, historical fiction, cyberpunk, postcyberpunk. Stephensons work explores subjects such as mathematics, cryptography, linguistics, philosophy, currency, and he also writes non-fiction articles about technology in publications such as Wired. He has also written novels with his uncle, George Jewsbury and he is currently Magic Leaps Chief Futurist. His mother worked in a laboratory, and her father was a biochemistry professor. Stephensons family moved to Champaign-Urbana, Illinois, in 1960 and then in 1966 to Ames and he graduated from Ames High School in 1977. Stephenson studied at Boston University, first specializing in physics, then switching to geography after he found that it would allow him to more time on the university mainframe. He graduated in 1981 with a B. A. in geography, since 1984, Stephenson has lived mostly in the Pacific Northwest and currently lives in Seattle with his family. Stephensons first novel, The Big U, published in 1984, was a take on life at American Megaversity. His next novel, Zodiac, was a following the exploits of a radical environmentalist protagonist in his struggle against corporate polluters. Neither novel attracted critical attention on first publication, but showcased concerns that Stephenson would further develop in his later work. Snow Crash was the first of Stephensons epic science fiction novels, in 1994, Stephenson joined with his uncle, J. Frederick George, to publish a political thriller, Interface, under the pen name Stephen Bury, they followed this in 1996 with The Cobweb. Stephensons next solo novel, published in 1995, was The Diamond Age, or A Young Ladys Illustrated Primer, seen back then as futuristic, Stephensons novel has broad range universal self-learning nanotechnology, dynabooks, extensive modern technologies, robotics, cybernetics and cyber cities. It has subsequently reissued in three separate volumes in some countries, including in French and Spanish translations. In 2013, Cryptonomicon won the Prometheus Hall of Fame Award, the Baroque Cycle is a series of historical novels set in the 17th and 18th centuries, and is in some respects a prequel to Cryptonomicon. The System of the World won the Prometheus Award in 2005, following this, Stephenson published a novel titled Anathem, a very long and detailed work, perhaps best described as speculative fiction. It is set in an Earthlike world, deals with metaphysics, Stephensons novel REAMDE was released on September 20,2011. The title is a play on the common filename README and this thriller, set in the present, centers around a group of MMORPG developers caught in the middle of Chinese cyber-criminals, Islamic terrorists, and Russian mafia
29.
Snow Crash
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Snow Crash is a science fiction novel by American writer Neal Stephenson, published in 1992. Like many of Stephensons other novels it covers history, linguistics, anthropology, archaeology, religion, computer science, politics, cryptography, memetics, Stephenson explained the title of the novel in his 1999 essay In the Beginning. Was the Command Line as his term for a software failure mode on the early Apple Macintosh computer. Stephenson also mentioned a book by Julian Jaynes, The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind, the book presents the Sumerian language as the firmware programming language for the brainstem, which is supposedly functioning as the BIOS for the human brain. According to characters in the book, the goddess Asherah is the personification of a linguistic virus, the god Enki created a counter-program which he called a nam-shub that caused all of humanity to speak different languages as a protection against Asherah. Snow Crash was nominated for both the British Science Fiction Award in 1993, and the Arthur C. Clarke Award in 1994, the story begins in Los Angeles in the 21st century, no longer part of the United States. The federal government of the United States has ceded most of its power and territory to private organizations, franchising, individual sovereignty, and private vehicles reign supreme over the landscape. Mercenary armies compete for national defense contracts while private security guards preserve the peace in sovereign, highway companies compete to attract drivers to their roads and all mail delivery is by hired courier. The remnants of government maintain authority only in isolated compounds where they transact tedious make-work that is, by and large and this arrangement resembles anarcho-capitalism, a theme Stephenson carries over to his next novel The Diamond Age. Hyperinflation encouraged people to use electronic currency which is exchanged in encrypted online transactions and is hence untaxable, for physical transactions, they resort to alternative, non-hyperinflated currencies such as yen or Kongbucks. Hyperinflation has also affected much of the rest of the world. The Metaverse, a phrase coined by Stephenson as a successor to the Internet, resembling a massively multiplayer online game, the Metaverse is populated by user-controlled avatars as well as system daemons. Hiro Protagonist is a hacker and pizza delivery driver for the Mafia, a young skateboard Kourier, during a failed attempt to make a delivery on time. Within the Metaverse, Hiro is offered a datafile named Snow Crash by a man named Raven who hints that it is a form of narcotic. Hiros friend and fellow hacker Da5id views a bitmap image contained in the file which causes his computer to crash, Juanita advises him to be careful and disappears. The Mafia boss Uncle Enzo begins to take a paternal interest in Y. T, impressed by her attitude and initiative, he arranges to meet her and offers her freelance jobs. Juanitas research showed that the ancient Sumerian ur-language allowed brain function to be programmed using audio stimuli in conjunction with a DNA altering virus, Sumerian culture was organized around these programs which were administered by priests to the populace. L. Bob Rife had been collecting Sumerian artifacts and developed the drug Snow Crash in order to make the public vulnerable to new forms of me which he would control
30.
Burning Man
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Burning Man is an annual gathering that takes place at Black Rock City—a temporary city erected in the Black Rock Desert in Nevada. Burning Man 2016 was held between August 28 and September 5,2016, at Burning Man the community explores various forms of artistic self-expression, created in celebration for the pleasure of all participants. Participation is a key precept for the community – selfless giving of ones unique talents for the enjoyment of all is encouraged, the event takes its name from its culmination, the symbolic ritual burning of a large wooden effigy that traditionally occurs on the Saturday evening of the event. In 2010,51,515 people attended Burning Man, attendance in 2011 was capped at 50,000 participants and the event sold out on July 24, the attendance rose to 70,000 in 2015. Harvey has described his inspiration for burning these effigies as an act of radical self-expression. The event did have earlier roots, though, sculptor Mary Grauberger, a friend of Harveys girlfriend Janet Lohr, held solstice bonfire gatherings on Baker Beach for several years prior to 1986, some of which Harvey attended. When Grauberger stopped organizing it, Harvey picked up the torch so to speak and he and Jerry James built the first wooden effigy on the afternoon of June 21,1986, cobbled together using scrap wood, to be torched later that evening. In 1987, the effigy grew to almost 15 feet tall, Harvey has stated that he had not seen the 1973 cult film The Wicker Man until many years after and that it did not inspire the action. In 1990, an event was planned by Kevin Evans and John Law on the remote and largely unknown dry lake known as Black Rock Desert, about 110 miles north of Reno. Evans conceived it as a dadaist temporary autonomous zone with sculpture to be burned and he asked John Law, who also had experience on the dry lake and was a defining founder of Cacophony Society, to take on central organizing functions. In the Cacophony Societys newsletter, it was announced as Zone #4, meanwhile, the beach burn was interrupted by the park police for not having a permit. After striking a deal to raise the Man but not to burn it, event organizers disassembled the effigy, shortly thereafter, the legs and torso of the Man were chain-sawed and the pieces removed when the lot was unexpectedly leased as a parking lot. The effigy was reconstructed, led by Dan Miller, Harveys then-housemate of many years and he took the name Danger Ranger and created the Black Rock Rangers. Thus the seed of Black Rock City was germinated, as a fellowship, organized by Law and Mikel, based on Evans idea, along with Harvey and James symbolic man. Drawing on experience in the business and with light sculpture. In its first years, the community grew by word of mouth alone, the annual, several weeks-long event, was held over summer Solstice at various fertile hot springs surrounding the desert. Participants built art and participated in self-directed performances, some key organizers of Burning Man were also part of Desert Siteworks and William Binzen was a friend of Larry Harvey. Hence, the two events saw lots of cross-pollination of ideas and participants, the Desert Siteworks project ran for three years
31.
Virtual reality
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VR also simulates a users physical presence in this environment. A person using virtual reality equipment is able to look around the world, and with high quality VR move about in it. Virtual reality is displayed with a virtual reality headset, VR headsets are head-mounted goggles with a screen in front of the eyes. Programs may include audio and sounds through speakers or headphones, advanced haptic systems may include tactile information, generally known as force feedback in medical, video gaming and military training applications. Some VR systems used in games can transmit vibrations and other sensations to the user through the game controller. Virtual reality also refers to remote communication environments which provide a presence of users with through telepresence and telexistence or the use of a virtual artifact. The immersive environment can be similar to the world in order to create a life-like experience grounded in reality or sci-fi. In 1938, Antonin Artaud described the nature of characters and objects in the theatre as la réalité virtuelle in a collection of essays. The English translation of book, published in 1958 as The Theater. The term artificial reality, coined by Myron Krueger, has been in use since the 1970s, the term virtual reality was used in The Judas Mandala, a 1982 science fiction novel by Damien Broderick. Virtual has had the meaning being something in essence or effect, the term virtual has been used in the computer sense of not physically existing but made to appear by software since 1959. A dictionary definition for cyberspace states that word is a synonym for virtual reality. Virtual reality shares some elements with augmented reality, AR is a type of virtual reality technology that blends what the user sees in their real surroundings with digital content generated by computer software. The additional software-generated images with the virtual scene typically enhance way the real look in some way. Some AR systems use a camera to capture the surroundings or some type of display screen which the user looks at. The Virtual Reality Modelling Language, first introduced in 1994, was intended for the development of worlds without dependency on headsets. The Web3D consortium was founded in 1997 for the development of industry standards for web-based 3D graphics. The consortium subsequently developed X3D from the VRML framework as an archival and these components led to relative affordability for independent VR developers, and lead to the 2012 Oculus Rift kickstarter offering the first independently developed VR headset
32.
IPad
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IPad is a line of tablet computers designed, developed and marketed by Apple Inc. which run the iOS mobile operating system. The first iPad was released on April 3,2010, the most recent iPad models are the 9. 7-inch iPad Pro released on March 31,2016, the user interface is built around the devices multi-touch screen, including a virtual keyboard. The iPad includes built-in Wi-Fi and cellular connectivity on select models, as of January 2015, there have been over 250 million iPads sold. IPad tablets are second most popular, by sales, against Android-based ones, since 2013, an iPad can shoot video, take photos, play music, and perform Internet functions such as web-browsing and emailing. Other functions – games, reference, GPS navigation, social networking, as of March 2016, the App Store has more than one million apps for the iPad by Apple and third parties. There have been six versions of the iPad, the first generation established design precedents, such as the 9. 7-inch screen size and button placement, that have persisted through all models. The third generation added a Retina Display, the new Apple A5X processor with a graphics processor, a 5-megapixel camera, HD 1080p video recording, voice dictation. The fourth generation added the Apple A6X processor and replaces the 30-pin connector with an all-digital Lightning connector, the iPad Air added the Apple A7 processor and the Apple M7 motion coprocessor, and reduced the thickness for the first time since the iPad 2. The iPad Air 2 added the Apple A8X processor, the Apple M8 motion coprocessor, an 8-megapixel camera, and the Touch ID fingerprint sensor, there have been four versions of the iPad Mini. The first generation features a screen size of 7.9 inches and features similar internal specifications as the iPad 2 except it uses the Lightning connector. The iPad Mini 2 features the Retina Display, the Apple A7 processor, the iPad Mini 3 features the Touch ID fingerprint sensor. The iPad Mini 4 features the Apple A8 and the Apple M8 motion coprocessor, Apple co-founder Steve Jobs said in a 1983 speech that the companys strategy is really simple. What we want to do is we want to put a great computer in a book that you can carry around with you. And we really want to do it with a link in it so you don’t have to hook up to anything and you’re in communication with all of these larger databases. Apples first tablet computer was the Newton MessagePad 100, introduced in 1993, powered by an ARM6 processor core developed by ARM, Apple also developed a prototype PowerBook Duo based tablet, the PenLite, but decided not to sell it in order to avoid hurting MessagePad sales. Apple released several more Newton-based PDAs, the one, the MessagePad 2100, was discontinued in 1998. Apple re-entered the mobile-computing markets in 2007 with the iPhone, smaller than the iPad, but featuring a camera and mobile phone, it pioneered the multi-touch finger-sensitive touchscreen interface of Apples iOS mobile operating system. By late 2009, the release had been rumored for several years
33.
Application software
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An application program is a computer program designed to perform a group of coordinated functions, tasks, or activities for the benefit of the user. Examples of an application include a processor, a spreadsheet, an accounting application, a web browser, a media player, an aeronautical flight simulator. The collective noun application software refers to all applications collectively and this contrasts with system software, which is mainly involved with running the computer. Applications may be bundled with the computer and its software or published separately. Apps built for mobile platforms are called mobile apps, in information technology, an application is a computer program designed to help people perform an activity. An application thus differs from a system, a utility. Depending on the activity for which it was designed, an application can manipulate text, numbers, graphics, some application packages focus on a single task, such as word processing, others, called integrated software include several applications. User-written software tailors systems to meet the specific needs. User-written software includes templates, word processor macros, scientific simulations, graphics. Even email filters are a kind of user software, users create this software themselves and often overlook how important it is. The delineation between system software such as operating systems and application software is not exact, however, and is occasionally the object of controversy. As another example, the GNU/Linux naming controversy is, in part, the above definitions may exclude some applications that may exist on some computers in large organizations. For an alternative definition of an app, see Application Portfolio Management, the word application, once used as an adjective, is not restricted to the of or pertaining to application software meaning. Sometimes a new and popular application arises which only runs on one platform and this is called a killer application or killer app. There are many different ways to divide up different types of application software, web apps have indeed greatly increased in popularity for some uses, but the advantages of applications make them unlikely to disappear soon, if ever. Furthermore, the two can be complementary, and even integrated, Application software can also be seen as being either horizontal or vertical. Horizontal applications are more popular and widespread, because they are general purpose, vertical applications are niche products, designed for a particular type of industry or business, or department within an organization. Integrated suites of software will try to handle every aspect possible of, for example, manufacturing or banking systems, or accounting
34.
Blocksworld
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Blocksworld is a physics-based, 3D sandbox video game for the iPad and later in 2016 the iPhone released by Second Life creator Linden Lab. In Blocksworld, players can create their own games and experiences from 3D building blocks that can be combined to construct simple or complex creations in unique 3D environments, players can also use “action blocks” and a drag-and-drop visual programming tool to add interactivity and gaming to their creations. Examples include drivable cars, flyable jets, and playable games with win/loss conditions, health systems, due to the creative and building aspects of Blocksworld, some game critics have compared the game to Minecraft, Roblox, and Lego. In this free-to-download app, players can share and play their creations with other Blocksworld players around the world, coin rewards serve as in-game currency that can be earned as player creations are liked by the community or featured within the game. These coins can also be purchased and used to buy a variety of themed building “sets” including original offerings, such as Heroes of Aero, City Blocks, and Star Rangers. There are also officially-licensed set themes based on established properties such as My Little Pony, Transformers, Legends of Oz, Dorothys Return, and G. I. The blocks are sorted into categories known as blocks, models, props, textures, colors, blocksters, gear, action blocks, actions, blocksters are blocksworld humans, that are in different kinds. Models are made by blocksworld but can also be made by the player, action blocks are blocks with their own actions, although other blocks may have unique actions as well. Actions are placed in a panel with infinite space to all actions needed although colors, textures. Loads of players create games and models to share, Blocksworld was initially developed by Swedish independent video game developer Boldai, which was acquired by U. S. -based Linden Lab in early 2013. An earlier version of the game was available in 2012 in Sweden, Iceland, Finland, Denmark. Virtual coins serve as the currency, which can be either purchased via the in-app shop or rewarded through various community actions such as having creations liked by other players. Players have the option to pay 6.99 or dollars for Blocksworld Premium, since its initial U. S. release, Blocksworld has reached number one on iTunes in the Education category for the iPad and number three in the overall Games category for the iPad. In addition, the game has found high visibility on YouTube with over 45,000 user-created gameplay videos, official website Blocksworld HD - Itunes Store
35.
BranchOut
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BranchOut was a Facebook application designed for finding jobs, networking professionally, and recruiting employees. It was founded by Rick Marini in July 2010, and was, as of March 2012, the company sold its assets to HR Software Company 1-Page in November 2014 and the staff was picked up by Hearst. BranchOut launched in June 2010 as a Facebook app, Rick Marini, the founder and CEO of SuperFan, received a call from a friend asking if he knew anyone at a particular company. Marini knew he had a connection, but couldnt remember the person specifically. He was unable to find the connection by searching on Facebook, Marini saw potential in the application and pivoted SuperFans team to begin development on the product. In July 2010, Marini launched BranchOut, in January 2011, BranchOuts userbase grew by a factor of 25, increasing from 10,000 to 250,000. In May 2011, BranchOut raised $18 million in a Series B round of funding from Redpoint Ventures, Accel Partners, Norwest Venture Partners, and Floodgate. In May 2011, BranchOut listed 3 million open jobs and 20,000 internships and was active in 60 countries and is available in 15 languages, despite raising a total of $49 million, BranchOut users dropped and the company relaunched as a workplace chat application. The current company is not related to the 20th century incarnation, the site started at Ivy League schools only, then opened up to the general public in 1998. BranchOut is a free Facebook application which allows users to create professional profiles that include their work history, once the user installs the application, a dashboard is displayed that shows the users corporate relationships. BranchOut has three types of products for job seekers and recruiters, job postings, CareerConnect. The social job postings feature enables companies to publish job listings on their Facebook fan pages, CareerConnect publishes job posts on a companys Facebook page. RecruiterConnect allows recruiters and hiring managers to search through BranchOuts database, RecruiterConnect allows recruiters to search through their network of Facebook friends by job title and company. BranchOut generates revenue from job posts and enterprise solutions, BranchOut has been profiled in The Wall Street Journal, The Independent, CNET, The Washington Post, USA Today, and ABC News. The company was selected to FASTech50, a given to the most innovative start-ups across the technology industry. BranchOut was also named one of the Top 10 Facebook Apps by Electronic Business Group
36.
WordPress
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WordPress is a free and open-source content management system based on PHP and MySQL. WordPress is installed on a web server that is part of an Internet hosting service or a network host in its own right. The first case may be a service like WordPress. com, for example, a local computer may be used for single-user testing and learning purposes. Features include a plugin architecture and a template system, WordPress was used by more than 27. 5% of the top 10 million websites as of February 2017. WordPress is reportedly the most popular website management or blogging system in use on the Web, WordPress was released on May 27,2003, by its founders, Matt Mullenweg and Mike Little, as a fork of b2/cafelog. WordPress is released under the GPLv2 license from the Free Software Foundation, WordPress has a web template system using a template processor. Its architecture is a front controller, routing all requests for non-static URIs to a single PHP file which parses the URI and this allows support for more human-readable permalinks. Once downloaded, WordPress installation files have a size of about 20 MB, WordPress users may install and switch between different themes. Themes allow users to change the look and functionality of a WordPress website without altering the code or site content. Every WordPress website requires at least one theme to be present and every theme should be designed using WordPress standards with structured PHP, valid HTML, and Cascading Style Sheets. Themes may be installed using the WordPress Appearance administration tool in the dashboard, or theme folders may be copied directly into the themes directory. The PHP, HTML and CSS found in themes can be modified to alter theme behavior, or a theme can be a child theme which inherits settings from another theme. WordPress themes are generally classified into two categories, free and premium, many free themes are listed in the WordPress theme directory, and premium themes are available for purchase from marketplaces and individual WordPress developers. WordPress users may create and develop their own custom themes. The free theme Underscores created by the WordPress developers has become a basis for new themes. WordPress plugin architecture allows users to extend the features and functionality of a website or blog, WordPress has over 49,394 plugins available, each of which offers custom functions and features enabling users to tailor their sites to their specific needs. Not all available plugins are always abreast with the upgrades and as a result they may not function properly or may not function at all, native applications exist for WebOS, Android, iOS, Windows Phone, and BlackBerry. WordPress also features integrated link management, a search engine–friendly, clean permalink structure, the ability to multiple categories to posts
37.
Avatar (computing)
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In computing, an avatar is the graphical representation of the user or the users alter ego or character. An icon or figure representing a person in a video game, Internet forum. It may take either a form, as in games or virtual worlds, or a two-dimensional form as an icon in Internet forums. Avatar images have also referred to as picons in the past. It can also refer to a text found on early systems such as MUDs. The term avatar can also refer to the personality connected with the name, or handle. Common avatars may be Internet memes, the word avatar originates in Hinduism, where it stands for the descent of a deity in a terrestrial form. The earliest use of the avatar in a computer game was the 1979 PLATO role-playing game Avatar. The use of the avatar for the on-screen representation of the user was coined in 1985 by Richard Garriott for the computer game Ultima IV. In this game, Garriott desired the players character to be his earth self manifested into the virtual world, Garriott did this because he wanted the real player to be responsible for the characters in game actions due to the ethical parables he designed into the story. Only if you were playing yourself Garriott felt, could you be judged based on your characters actions, the term avatar was also used in 1986 by Chip Morningstar in Lucasfilms online role-playing game Habitat. Another early use of the term was in the pen and paper role-playing game Shadowrun, in Norman Spinrads novel Songs from the Stars, the term avatar is used in a description of a computer generated virtual experience. In the story, humans receive messages from an alien galactic network that wishes to share knowledge, the humans build a galactic receiver that describes itself, The galactic receiver is programmed to derive species specific full sensory input data from standard galactic meaning code equations. By controlling your sensorium input along species specific parameters galactic songs astral back-project you into approximation of total involvement in artistically recreated broadcast realities, the use of avatar to mean online virtual bodies was popularised by Neal Stephenson in his cyberpunk novel Snow Crash. In Snow Crash, the avatar was used to describe the virtual simulation of the human form in the Metaverse. Some forums allow the user to upload an image that may have been designed by the user or acquired from elsewhere. Other forums allow the user to select an avatar from a preset list or use an algorithm to extract one from the users homepage. Some avatars are animated, consisting of a sequence of images played repeatedly
38.
Waltham, Massachusetts
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Waltham is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States, and was an early center for the labor movement as well as a major contributor to the American Industrial Revolution. The city is now a center for research and higher education, home to Brandeis University, the population was 60,636 at the census in 2010. Waltham is commonly referred to as Watch City because of its association with the watch industry, Waltham Watch Company opened its factory in Waltham in 1854 and was the first company to make watches on an assembly line. It won the medal in 1876 at the Philadelphia Centennial Exposition. The company produced over 35 million watches, clocks and instruments before it closed in 1957, as most would pronounce in the British way, Walthum, when people came to work in the mills from Nova Scotia, the pronunciation evolved. The local version became a phonetic sounding to accommodate French speakers who could not pronounce in the British way, Waltham was first settled in 1634 as part of Watertown and was officially incorporated as a separate town in 1738. The Waltham–Lowell system of production derives its name from the city and the founder of the mill. and the Lyman Estate, a 400-acre estate built in 1793 by Boston merchant Theodore Lyman. In 1857, The Waltham Model 1857, was a made by the American Watch Company in the city of Waltham, Massachusetts. In the late 19th and early 20th century, Waltham was home to the brass era automobile manufacturer Metz, another first in Waltham industrial history involves the method to mass-produce the magnetron tube, invented by Percy Spencer at Raytheon. During World War II, the magnetron tube technology was applied to radar, later, magnetron tubes were used as components in microwave ovens. Waltham was also the home of the Walter E. Fernald State School, the storied and controversial history of the institution has long been covered by local and at times, national media. Waltham is located at 42°22′50″N 71°14′6″W, about 11 miles north-west of downtown Boston, Massachusetts, the city stretches along the Charles River and contains several dams. The dams were used to power mills and other endeavors in the early years of the industrial activity. According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has an area of 13.6 square miles. As of the census in 2000, there were 59,226 people,23,207 households, there were 23,880 housing units at an average density of 1,880.3 per square mile. The racial makeup of the city was 82. 98% White,4. 41% African American,0. 16% Native American,7. 29% Asian,0. 06% Pacific Islander,3. 20% from other races, and 1. 89% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 8. 49% of the population. There were 23,207 households, of which 20. 3% included those under the age of 18,41. 3% were married couples living together,8. 9% were headed by a single mother, and 46. 3% were non-families
39.
Open-source model
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Open-source software may be developed in a collaborative public manner. According to scientists who studied it, open-source software is a prominent example of open collaboration, a 2008 report by the Standish Group states that adoption of open-source software models has resulted in savings of about $60 billion per year to consumers. In the early days of computing, programmers and developers shared software in order to learn from each other, eventually the open source notion moved to the way side of commercialization of software in the years 1970-1980. In 1997, Eric Raymond published The Cathedral and the Bazaar and this source code subsequently became the basis behind SeaMonkey, Mozilla Firefox, Thunderbird and KompoZer. Netscapes act prompted Raymond and others to look into how to bring the Free Software Foundations free software ideas, the new term they chose was open source, which was soon adopted by Bruce Perens, publisher Tim OReilly, Linus Torvalds, and others. The Open Source Initiative was founded in February 1998 to encourage use of the new term, a Microsoft executive publicly stated in 2001 that open source is an intellectual property destroyer. I cant imagine something that could be worse than this for the software business, IBM, Oracle, Google and State Farm are just a few of the companies with a serious public stake in todays competitive open-source market. There has been a significant shift in the corporate philosophy concerning the development of FOSS, the free software movement was launched in 1983. In 1998, a group of individuals advocated that the free software should be replaced by open-source software as an expression which is less ambiguous. Software developers may want to publish their software with an open-source license, the Open Source Definition, notably, presents an open-source philosophy, and further defines the terms of usage, modification and redistribution of open-source software. Software licenses grant rights to users which would otherwise be reserved by law to the copyright holder. Several open-source software licenses have qualified within the boundaries of the Open Source Definition, the open source label came out of a strategy session held on April 7,1998 in Palo Alto in reaction to Netscapes January 1998 announcement of a source code release for Navigator. They used the opportunity before the release of Navigators source code to clarify a potential confusion caused by the ambiguity of the free in English. Many people claimed that the birth of the Internet, since 1969, started the open source movement, the Free Software Foundation, started in 1985, intended the word free to mean freedom to distribute and not freedom from cost. Since a great deal of free software already was free of charge, such software became associated with zero cost. The Open Source Initiative was formed in February 1998 by Eric Raymond and they sought to bring a higher profile to the practical benefits of freely available source code, and they wanted to bring major software businesses and other high-tech industries into open source. Perens attempted to open source as a service mark for the OSI. The Open Source Initiatives definition is recognized by governments internationally as the standard or de facto definition, OSI uses The Open Source Definition to determine whether it considers a software license open source
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Desura
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Desura is a digital distribution platform for the Microsoft Windows, Linux and OS X platforms. The service distributes games and related media online, with a focus on small independent game developers rather than larger companies. Desura contains automated game updates, community features, and developer resources, the client allows users to create and distribute game mods as well. Desura sells many games that were included in Humble Bundle initiatives. Desura also provides several freeware and free software games, originally, the platform was developed by DesuraNET, it was later sold to Linden Lab, and then to Bad Juju Games, which filed for bankruptcy in June 2015. In October 2016, Desura was acquired by Danish company OnePlay, desuras website is currently suspended in transition, pending redevelopment by its new owner. The Desura client is heavily tied to its website through the use of the Chromium Embedded Framework, most of its services are provided through its online interface, with the exception of the game launcher, installer, and update features. This means that the Desura interface remains consistent across multiple platforms, however, Desura itself is DRM-neutral, and publishers and developers can sell games that require such technologies to be used. Desura makes sure users purchasing these titles are aware of the DRM it ships with, Desura competes in the same market as Valve Corporations Steam platform. However, Scott Reismanis, the founder of DesuraNET, did not consider it a competitor, Desura primarily hosts indie games, which are games by smaller developers who do not have enough popularity or power to negotiate deals with Steam. Desura believes that its tighter links to a community will foster better relationships between players and developers. Desura used to be tied to the Mod DB community, as both were run by the same company, Desura therefore highlighted content distribution for mods as one of its features. Desura was initially developed in secret by DesuraNET for many years, the project was first publicly announced on December 16,2009. Near its launch, it publicized itself by offering free keys for games to augment the purchases of the games made through Humble Indie Bundle #2. The Desura Windows client was released to the public on December 18,2010, on July 10,2013, Desura was bought by Linden Lab. Development on a Linux client was announced during the Summer of 2011, utilizing wxWidgets and GTK+ as the toolkit, the client was publicly available for download and execution, but users could not log into the online service unless they were a selected beta tester. On November 16,2011 the Desura Linux client was released with an initial offering of over 65 games. The Ubuntu Software Center began selling commercial software packages just prior to the Linux Desura client release, however, the account login feature is only available to some testers, as of November the 10th,2011
204,389 (April 2014[update])[2]