• Consumers reported fraud losses totaling more than $1.1 billion; the median monetary loss was $500.
• Credit card fraud (25 percent) was the most common form of reported identity theft, followed by phone or utilities fraud (16 percent), bank fraud (16 percent), and employment fraud (14 percent).

Pew Internet and American Life survey, April 2006, http://www.pewinternet.org/pdfs/PIP_Internet_Impact.pdf

Phone survey of 3,011 adults, 18 and older, conducted November 29 - December 31, 2005

Rather than any single, readily fixed cause, the current IT power crisis is the result of a combination of subtle trends. At its core is what Jerald Murphy, COO and director of research operations at Robert Frances Group, refers to as the “dark underbelly” of Moore’s Law: As processor performance has doubled every couple of years or so, so too has power consumption and its side effect, heat.

That wasn’t a problem decades ago, when the latest and greatest chip consumed 8 watts, instead of the 4 watts of its predecessor. But as power requirements slowly grew over time, things changed, until we reached a tipping point of sorts in the past two or three years. Today’s chips require anywhere from 90 to 110 watts — twice as much power as the chips of just a couple of years ago. They also run hotter, which drives up the cost of datacenter cooling. And if that wasn’t enough, the growing use of blade servers — once viewed as a panacea to power and space limitations — is only making things worse.

"Coming up with the right brew wasn't easy. Heineken had to appeal to the light drinker's palate. For example, Bud Light has a pale, amber color and a crisp taste. Still, Heineken knew it needed to play to the strengths of its core lager brand, which has a full flavor and rich, tawny color. Ultimately, finding the right balance took 15 months and 20 different versions. "We've been able to deliver a beer that plays in the light beer sandbox but is true to the Heineken brand," says Heineken USA'schief, Andy Thomas."

Source: Gary Barnett, Research Director, Ovum, "The future of the mainframe," Oct 2005

In context:

"Despite the excitement that has surrounded the Web and new
programming models like Java and J2EE (as well as Microsoft’s .NET),
older, less ‘trendy’ technologies account for the vast bulk of computer
processing today.

"For example, Cobol remains the most widely deployed programming
language in big business, accounting for 75% of all computer transactions
– and it is not going to go away. Cobol is pervasive in the financial sector
(accounting for 90% of all financial transactions), in defence, as well as
within established manufacturing and insurance sectors. We estimate that
there are over 200 billion lines of Cobol in production today, and this
number continues to grow by between three and five percent a year."