December 2008
Welcome to Quicksilva's monthly newsletter with thoughts from Quicksilva staff.
New Year – New Mindset
I have always found the festive season a bit "difficult"- all the gifting madness, buying food for a siege, kissing strangers at midnight... but this year end has been different. As I have been hosted and entertained by others for the last couple of weeks I've had plenty of time for reflection and with three months of our business year still to go it's been enlightening to have time to stop and think. The hype around the country's financial difficulties are affecting so many - it's hard to imagine that some of the people who were pushing an shoving in the sales last week will be out of work soon...
Every cloud has a silver lining they say and it certainly seems so for Sainsbury's - sales up over Christmas. I have a theory that people who wouldn't normally, usually treat themselves to M&S food for the festivities, however this year they haven't pushed the boat out and have gone for the Sainsbury option instead - a one notch belt-tightening exercise?
Anyway, one more depressed mind isn't going to help so I've decided to stay so cheery that it's going to be impossible to work in the same office as me without it rubbing off... either that or the rest of Quicksilva will find excuses to avoid me.
Have you had a go at our Xmas Game yet? Bottle of champagne for the winner (it's not Sainsbury's).
Gayna
Play Quicksilva Xmas Game
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Quicksilva joins e-Skils UK board
Gayna Hart, managing director of Quicksilva, an independent provider of software and services to the public and private sector, has been appointed to the board of e-skills UK, the employer-led, Sector Skills Council for Business and Information Technology. Quicksilva will help to represent the voice of Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SME) on the Board, contributing to an increased focus on training and skills for SMEs.
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Salts Healthcare safeguards business with ETP 2 Compliance from Quicksilva
Salts Healthcare Ltd, one of the countries leading providers of Stoma Care appliances, orthotic footwear and sporting insoles, is to become ETP 2 compliant and secure its market share by entering into a managed services agreement with Quicksilva, an independent provider of software and services to the public sector.
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Christmas Masked Ball
Twas the night before Christmas, (well actually the week before), when all through the Quicksilva offices, not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse. That's because all the Quicksilva staff were getting ready for the annual Christmas party, donning their best attire and making sure they all had some interesting masks to wear.
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In the News... |
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NHS boss says IT programme at 'pivot point'
From eHealth Insider
NHS chief executive David Nicholson has said the National Programme for IT in the NHS is at a "pivot position" and that the DoH would not tolerate continued delays, "we can’t go on and on like this."
Quicksilva thoughts...
The programme has always been seen as challenging and will continue to be so. However, real progress has been made and with continued support, this is a challenge that can be overcome. We are seeing a steadily increasing demand for our NHS Spine connectivity testing and compliance services, Compliance-in-a-Box®. The issues which drives the call for a joined up government are still very much with us. I believe this momentum and motivation will tip the balance and lead to success.
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Shake up in Informatics Planning
From eHealth Insider
Local health communities have been instructed to move towards "information-led rather than service-led planning" and to create new structures to plan and deliver the IT needed to do it.
Quicksilva thoughts...
I am sure that we can all hear the sighs when we read about another shake-up in informatics planning that brings a refresh and re-focus of their 3 year plans – can you remember the ‘spreadsheet from hell’ followed by the planning blight as a result of establishing Connecting for Health?
There appears to be little new on the agenda. The ‘Clinical 5’ only groups the themes we, as patients, have all eagerly awaited for years. The move to information-led design is brilliant news for patients and clinical safety. Shared information is critical in the protection of the young and vulnerable. We need information at the point of care NOW and it needs to be shared across the Local Health Communities.
Yes, think big (grand vision), implement small (incremental and pragmatic), but we need strong leadership to insist that we start now to connect, through information, local agencies for the good of the cared for. We owe that to Victoria Climbie (2000), Toni-Ann Byfield (2003), Ukleigha Batten-Froggatt (2005) and Baby P (2008)...
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Google hints at the End of Net Neutrality
From The Register
Network Neutrality, the public policy unicorn that's been the rallying cry for so many on the American left for the last three years, took a body blow on Sunday with the Wall Street Journal's disclosure that the movement's sugar-daddy has been playing both sides of the fence.
Quicksilva thoughts...
We are a nation that seems to love technological change, and the broadband boom is a great example of this. It took just a few years to get to the point where over 65% of the homes in the UK now have a high speed internet connection.
With this love of change comes the predictable continuous quest for quicker speeds. Providers like Virgin Media are striving to meet customer demands by rolling out ever bigger lines, with speeds now up to 50Mb. But are quicker residential lines going to solve the speed limitations of the internet? The answer in my opinion is no.
File download speeds will be dramatically improved - having a chunky 50Mb connection will allow a home user to download an entire album in an estimated 11 seconds. The restriction however will still be on browsing speeds, streaming videos and other content online as the servers that host websites have their own limitations.
Google seem in theory to have the answer to this and their solution would potentially increase download speeds further, however Network Neutrality proponents including the US Government might make implementing this slightly difficult for them.
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Facebook users hit by virus
From BBC Newsbeat
Facebook's 120 million users are being targeted by a virus designed to get hold of sensitive information like credit card details.
Quicksilva thoughts...
In the aftermath of the festive season I feel rather smug in the fact that 80% of my Christmas shopping was done online. With the retailers crying out for sales, Joe public have been able to take advantage of free shipping, massive online discounts, free gift wrapping, extra points and a host of other offers. At one point I did begin to doubt whether online shopping took some of the enjoyment out of getting prepared for the festivities but after a shopping trip to Bath on a Saturday in early December I soon changed my mind!
There are downsides to the online shopping sensation that is sweeping the nation, doing a quick calculation I have my personal and credit card details logged with over a dozen retailers and it only takes something like the virus that targeted Facebook to inadvertently supply credit card details to fraudsters. I now routinely clear down the browsing history which deletes all temporary Internet files and cookies (in Internet Explorer go to > Tools > Delete Browsing History). I am a long way off being paranoid but the last thing you need at Xmas time is for someone else to do their shopping with your money!
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Nine in ten emails now spam
From The Register
Nine in ten emails are now spam with an estimated 200bn junk mail messages a day clogging up the internet, according to a new report by networking and security giant Cisco.
Quicksilva thoughts...
Anyone who has used email services for work or pleasure will have experienced the Spam epidemic, from emails regarding free music, pills, life tips to computer protection these stats are proof that the problem is huge! With email spam taking up 9 out of 10 emails it no wonder we spend all day checking our inboxes deleting the rubbish.
There are easy methods that can help curb the influx of Spam you may receive and sometimes the simplest of things make the biggest differences.
Never reply to a spam email – this will just indicate the email address is valid and more spam will be sent.
Signing guestbooks - if you are signing a guestbook on a website, or use a public discussion forum, don't include your email address, spammers crawl websites looking for these email addresses. My suggestion is to create a separate, free email account specifically for these sites; if it does become infested with spam it can be completely emptied!
Ordering online – when ordering anything online pay attention, particularly to anything requiring a tick box. Many companies will want to send you special offers, and in most cases you may well want to receive them. However they may also want to send your information on to third parties.
Following these 3 simple rules will prevent much of the spam received into your inbox and hopefully allow for more working and less deleting!
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Quicksilva Caption Competition 9
How to enter
Email captions to captions@qxlva.com
Deadline: 29th January 2009.
We will include our favourite(s) in next month's newsletter!
Our favourite from last month
Pizza Huts introduction of magic tricks during your meal didn't go well
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I have travelled the length and breadth of this country and talked with the best people, and I can assure you that data processing is a fad that won't last out the year. - The editor in charge of business books for Prentice Hall, 1957 |
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a: Quicksilva, Langley Gate, Kington Langley, Wiltshire, SN15 5SE. United Kingdom |
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