Haiyah: March 2011

Need for Speed ? Get Firefox 4 now

Do you use Firefox as your daily web browser ? If you do, what version do you currently use ?

On March 22, 2011, the Mozilla team has released the latest version of Firefox 4, replacing the previous version of Firefox 3.6.

Lots of new and improved features are included in Firefox 4 to make it more and more powerful. If you read from its official website, the discussion of such features are classified into several categories, such as “Browsing Made Easy’, “High Performance”, “Advanced Security”, “Powerful Personalization”, “The Cutting Edge”, and “Universal Access”.

Within the Browsing Made Easy section, you’ll find the Awesome Bar. Using this feature you may get to your favorite sites quickly – even if you don’t remember the URLs. Just type your term into the location bar (aka the Awesome Bar) and the autocomplete function will include possible matches from your browsing history, bookmarked sites and open tabs.

Another features which I concern mostly of this browser are the improvement of security and protection of user’s privacy while browsing the web. If you explore further into the Security section, you’ll find several encouraging reasons to trust this browser that it will always keep you in a really secure zone. For instances, the Content Security Policy in Firefox, as explained, is designed to shut down cross-site scripting attacks by providing a mechanism for sites to explicitly tell the browser which content is legitimate. The browser can then disregard any content that has not been blessed by the site, keeping you protected in the process. This really sounds good to me. Another good feature is the Anti-Virus Integration. Firefox integrate elegantly with your Windows anti-virus software. When you download a file, your computer’s anti-virus program automatically checks it to protect you against viruses and other malware, which could otherwise attack your computer. Besides, the browser also provides you with the Anti-Phising, Anti-Malware, Clear Recent History, Do Not Track, Parental Controls, Secure Updates and also the Securing Website Connections features.

What about the speed ? Are there any improvement of speed of Firefox 4 comparing to the previous version ? Definitely. They promise you the super speed performance with faster start-up times, rapid graphics rendering and an improvement of page load speed. Even you can get more than 6X faster of velocity. Wow!

So, wait no more. Go to the official site of Mozilla and start downloading Firefox 4 to try and proof it by yourself. Or just click the following firefox image to bring you directly to the download page.

(Updated on March 30, 2011) Here is a good article posted in lifehacker.com about Firefox 4 : Why I’ve Switched From Chrome to Firefox 4

Professor of Harvard ringing a bell on crisis potential in 2012

The global economic crisis is predicted to be back again in 2012. This is consistent with the 15-year crisis cycle with the capital inflow as one of the indication.

Harpel Professor of Capital Formation and Growth Harvard University Jeffrey Frankel in an event of “IMF-BI-BKPM Joint Conference Coping with Asia’s Large Capital Inflows in A Multi-Speed Global Economy”, held in Bali on Friday, 11 March 2011 stated that the cycle of crisis occurred in a tendency of 15-years at a time. And observing that inclination, then we will face a crisis again in 2012.

He also stressed that the emerging market countries should aware of the potential of such symptom. Because, the tendency of the impendent of economic crisis is often associated with the swift flow of foreign funds (capital inflow) to developing countries.

The first crisis occurred in 1982 resulted by the capital inflow that came about in 6 years (1975-1981), while the second crisis took place in Asia in 1997 with capital inflow which also happened during the 6 years of time span (1990-1996).

Noting from the above phenomenon, he is anxious that there will be another global crisis in the coming 2012, concerning that the flow of foreign capital already get in since 2003.

In addition, he also noticing that the rate of inflation in most developing countries already started to give pressure on the economic condition of such countries. India, China, Indonesia and Singapore are in threat of overheating.

Thus, he asked the emerging countries, including Indonesia to keep caution to the possibility of such potential indication.

For information, based on data of Institute of International Finance (IIF) submitted by the Director of Economic Research and Monetary Policy of Bank Indonesia, Perry Warjiyo, the amount of capital inflows that will enter to the emerging markets of Asia countries reached around US$400 billion, of which approximately US$13-15 billion will go to Indonesia.

(This article was freely translated from the original article published in Inilah.com : Profesor Harvard Ingatkan Potensi Krisis di 2012)

The 2011 World’s Richest Tycoons (Forbes.com)

Forbes has announced on Wednesday, March 9, 2011, the list of its 25th annual World’s Billionaires. Among the list, Carlos Slim Helu & Family ranked at #1 for a second year as the wealthiest tycoon in the universe.

With a net worth of $74 billion at age 71, Carlos Slim, a Mexican business magnate and philanthropist who is also the chairman and CEO of telecommunications company Telmex and America Movil beat the Microsoft founder Bill Gates and the remarkable investment guru Warren Buffett.

Bloomberg in its today publication reported that Slim’s America Movil SAB is the biggest mobile-phone company in the Americas, with 225 million wireless subscribers. The company also controls Mexico’s largest landline phone carrier, Telefonos de Mexico SAB, and the largest TV and long-distance operators in Brazil, as well as phone and video carriers in Colombia, Peru and other South American countries.

His holdings in Mexico extend from retail, with the Sanborns department store chain, to banking and construction. He holds stakes in U.S. companies including the New York Times Co. (publisher), Saks Inc. (department store operator), Bronco Drilling (oil services company) and also BlackRock Inc. (money manager). Slim’s gains in 2010 included his bank Grupo Financiero Inbursa SAB, which surged 42 percent as it expanded its branches, and Grupo Carso SAB, which almost doubled as it prepared for spinoffs of its mining and real-estate units.

Bill Gates, 55, chairman of Redmond, Washington-based Microsoft Corp., was spotted at the second place again as his net worth rose $3 billion to $56 billion. While Warren Buffett, 80, chief executive office of Omaha, Nebraska-based Berkshire Hathaway Inc., ranked at #3 with $50 billion of net worth.

Forbes.com commented that Gates is no longer the planet’s richest person, but that’s because he’s given away $30 billion to his foundation, The Gates Foundation.

Behind of Buffett on the Forbes list, ranked from #4 to #10 are Bernard Arnauld ($41 billion), Larry Ellison ($39.5 billion), Lakshmi Mittal ($31.1 billion), Amancio Ortega ($31 billion), Eike Batista ($30 billion), Mukesh Ambani ($27 billion) and latest of the top ten list, Christy Walton & family with net worth of $26.5 billion.

Bloomberg.com in its article “Carlos Slim Tops Forbes List of Billionaires for Second Year” reported that there were a record number of billionaires in 2011, with 1,210 in total, compared with the previous high of 1,125 in 2008. Of the 214 newcomers this year, 54 were from China and 31 from Russia. The Asia-Pacific region had more billionaires than Europe for the first time in more than 10 years and gained the most billionaires of any region, with 105 newcomers. Moscow displaced New York as the city with the greatest number of billionaires with 79, compared with New York’s 58.

Explore the complete list from Forbes.com : The World's Billionaires