iTechSpeak :::...

Introduce Your Child to Business with Hotshot Game
Forget those shoot em up, aliens and race car games. This is a fun fast paced game that gives kids skills they can use for life. Hot Shot Business is a simulation game for budding entrepreneurs, where kidscan open their own spa, skateboard factory or comic shop.

Teenagers and Young Adult Aspiring Entrepreneurs

Gazillionaire is the award-winning simulation game. Explore new worlds, build your business, and make a fortune. Gazillionaire is full of memorable characters and exotic places to visit. You'll run your own company, manage a feisty crew, and, if you're clever enough, make billions of kubars!

JA Titan
Test your skills running a business in this ultimate business simulation! As CEO, you will match wits in the competitive, technologically advanced industry of the Holo-Generator.

JA Worldwide™ (Junior Achievement) partnered with the Best Buy® Children’s Foundation to launched JA Titan. Set in the year 2035, JA Titan creates a world in which players are CEOs of their own companies. Originally conceived in the 1980s as the Management and Economic Simulation Exercise, or MESE, JA Titan is a widely recognized business simulation for high school students.

JA Titan version 3.0 incorporates the concept of charitable giving, challenges students with sub-decisions, and adds voices to the characters, among other improvements.

Cashflow Game by Robert Kiyosaki
This is a game for Tweens or Young and Mature Adults. earn how to get out of the Rat Race and onto the Fast Track where your money works for you instead of you working hard for your money. Use this game to practice real world investing with play money!

CASHFLOW® 101 is an educational board game that teaches accounting, finance, and investing at the same time - and makes learning fun.

"Move over Monopoly. A new board game that aims to teach people to be rich is gaining fans the world over." -The New York Times article on the CASHFLOW games



Adult Aspiring Entrepreneurs

Informist Business Simulation Game
Informatist is a revolutionary online multiplayer Business Simulation -- a business game with a difference. Informatist is ideal for budding entrepreneurs and veteran tycoons alike. Test your business skills against hundreds of other players running thousands of companies.

The Informatist Game will sharpen your business skills as you play to win in five different categories. Experience the ups and downs of 16 dynamic business areas. Hire employees, set salaries, set product price, manage inventory, buy and sell land, trade stock, make business deals and dominate markets by applying the right resources at the right time. Do you have what it takes to succeed against cutthroat business competition? Find out in this unique business simulation!

SimVenture
SimVenture is ideal for anyone wanting to learn about business and enterprise. The software can be used in a range of environments where people are learning about business and want to develop entrepreneurial skills.

Virtual Worlds Review describes a virtual world is an interactive simulated environment accessed by multiple users through an online interface. Virtual worlds are also called "digital worlds," "simulated worlds" and "MMOG's." There are many different types of virtual worlds, however there are six features all of them have in common: 1. Shared Space: the world allows many users to participate at once. 2. Graphical User Interface: the world depicts space visually, ranging in style from 2D "cartoon" imagery to more immersive 3D environments. 3. Immediacy: interaction takes place in real time. 4. Interactivity: the world allows users to alter, develop, build, or submit customized content. 5. Persistence: the world's existence continues regardless of whether individual users are logged in. 6. Socialization / Community: the world allows and encourages the formation of in-world social groups like teams, guilds, clubs, cliques, housemates, neighborhoods, etc. Read more . . .


Virtual Worlds Review Directory lists quite a few different types of virtual worlds to live by such categories as:

• Children
  
• Technocrats
• Free Access
• Tweens
• Virtual World Newbies
• 20 & 30 somethings
• Graphic Artists
• Trend setter Ages 40+

Some of the popular virtual worlds are Second Life, There, The Sims Online. The media has been giving an extraordinary amount of coverage to Second Life. There have been reports of a young lady making $1million dollars selling real estate within this virtual world.

There was another story in the Wlall Street journal that asked the question "Is This Man Cheating on His Wife?". This is a bizzare question, because this man has a wife in real life, but has married and is playing house with his virtual wife in second Life. He has never met the actual woman in real life playing his virtual wife. He is maintaining his virtual marriage in

Circuit City has been kind enough to provide an excellent public service announcement on their web site. The Congress has now passed legislation requiring all conventional "analog" TV broadcasting to stop on February 17, 2009. After that date, your local television broadcasters will be making only "DTV" broadcasts. If received via an antenna these broadcasts will require different TV tuners. Read more . . .

As of March 1, 2007, all new TVs must include digital tuners.

The bad news is TVs manufactured before 1998 will no longer receive TV broadcasts, if only an antenna is being used to receive free (advertiser sponsored) TV shows. A digital converter will have to be purchased and attached to these older television sets.

The good news is Congress has allocated funds for households, with pre 1998 televisions, to apply for a $40 coupon. With a maximum of two (2) $40 coupons per household, the coupon can used towards the purchase of a digital converter.

The details of the digital converter coupon program will be announced later in 2007. Click here to keep up with the latest on transition to digital TV transmissions February 17, 2009.

June 4-6, 2006 is the Home Entertainment Show at the Sheraton Gateway Hotel in Los Angeles, CA.

Products manufactured for the audio/video home entertainment market, make it easier for people to reproduce movie theatre quality experiences. Many products require specialized knowledge to setup and operate. Something as simple as tuning the right TV picture coloration, may not be that straight forward.

In walks many opportunities for home entertainment professionals. There are various aspects to installing the home entertainment, which may not be obvious. Setting up a system requires consideration for room layout design, correct cabling as well as engineering skills. A project manager may need to be hired for elaborate home entertainment systems, which can cost upwards to over $200,000.

Long term analytical and problem solving skills also come into play. This insures a continuous source of referrals. The key is to design home entertainment systems which are scalable. How can the current system be expanded or modified when new technology comes out, with a minimal amount of expense?

This is a profitable niche market for "inspector gadget" types, who have a solid skill level in operating various audio/visual equipment. Training owners of home entertainment equipment means extra money, after the design and setup. Make sure you enjoy working with people, before making the plunge into this market. Your clients may not get it as easily or quickly as you. So, patience is a big plus to making this business profitable.

I would recommend bolstering your skills with some formal training. A starting point can be CNET's Home Entertainment Clinics. As with any industry, people who specialize always make more money, than those who generalize. Identify which products are in big demand, but few people have the required knowledge to setup and operate them.
Category 1_ Category 2_ Category 9_

Before you watch or get involved with FiOS TV, I recommend you put your seat belt on. This technology is the Autobahn of lightening fast broadband services.

Wikipedia seems to provide the most accurate definition as "FiOS (Fiber Optic Services, though the carrier denies this is the source of the acronym in published news stories) is a fiber to the premises (FTTP) telecommunications service offered in the United States by Verizon."

According I4U News, outstanding user reviews indicate FiOS TV is delivering, as promised.

Before those of us who are savvy technology professionals get all dreamy eyed about the employment or consulting opportunities for this new technology, do your homework. Run your career like a business and perform "due diligence". Research the market. Verizon appears to be the only FiOS TV player. Check with the The Fiber Optic Association for referrals to certified training schools.

You will have to crawl (learn standard cabling technology) before you learn how to run (learn fiber optic technology).

For any Spanish speaking IT professionals in New York City, I know a school in the area that provides Free fiber optic classes only in Spanish, if they are a member of LISTA.
Category 1_ Category 2_ Category 5_ Category 7_

This past Friday I attended a post holiday party at a bleeding edge telecommunication cable studio. They gave a tour of their technology readiness for the coming sunami of Internet Protocol TV subscribers.

IPTV uses a two-way digital broadcast signal, sent through a switched telephone or cable network by way of a broadband connection. A set-top box is programmed with software to handle viewer requests to access a plethora media sources, with high speed delivery.

According to a new Light Reading Insider report, “IPTV: Where the Money Is,” technology vendors, and especially the likes of Alcatel (NYSE: ALA - message board; Paris: CGEP:PA), stand to make a killing.

There are significant drivers forcing telecom operators to adopt those defensive strategies, most notably the increasingly intense competition they're facing from ISPs and cable and satellite operators. As a result, the IPTV market is set to explode in the coming five years and beyond, finds the report.

By 2010, IPTV will have captured 65 million subscribers worldwide, predominantly in North America, Europe, and Asia. To deploy the systems needed to deliver those services, carriers will spend a total $21 billion in the 2005 to 2010 timeframe. Read more . . .

Stay on top of IPTV Developments:

IPTV News.net

Your IPTV and TV Over Internet News Resource

category 5_ category 7_ category 9_