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If the BCEFM career field had a motto, it would be "Show me the money!" Without finances, defense acquisition programs would quickly stop. Fortunately, there is a new resource for the BCEFM career field--the BCEFM Special Interest Area (SIA) now online at the Acquisition Community Connection (ACC) Web site . A brief overview of topics covered in the BCEFM SIA follows:

* Cost Analysis -- Requirements for acquisition program cost estimates; estimating methodologies; learning curve; links to the Service cost analysis agencies.

* Defense Industry Business Management -- financial management from the perspective of the defense contractor; evaluating a company's financial condition; business strategies.

* Financial Management -- financial management from the government perspective, which includes topics on budget formulation (building a budget), budget enactment, and budget execution.

* Budget Policy -- DoD budgeting policies (full, incremental, annual, etc); link to the DoD Financial Management Regulation; other useful links; budgeting implications of contract types; working capital funds.

* PPBE -- The Planning, Programming, Budgeting and Execution (PPBE) System; Structure of the Future Years Defense Program (FYDP); budget exhibits.

* Budget Enactment -- Congressional budget enactment process; DoD acquisition program oversight report requirements; links to recent legislation affecting DoD; links to sites covering congressional activity.

* Budget Execution -- Apportionment of funds; execution process; fiscal law; reprogramming; obligation and expenditure plans; useful links.

* Earned Value Management -- Theory and application of Earned Value Management.

In addition to finding information about various BCEFM topics, the SIA also contains information and links about upcoming conferences and events, and links to online learning materials, policy updates, and related Web sites.

# posted by Medical Information : 2:15 AM  0 Comments

Bluetooth has all the advantages of wireless. Without fiddling around with cables or plugs, users can set up their own personal area network. Unfortunately, it also has some unpleasant disadvantages. Stealing data, such as numbers and diary entries, is as seamless on Bluetooth--if rather more painful for the device owner--as the setting up of a legitimate link. 'Bluesnarfing', the euphemism for stealing other people's confidential information via Bluetooth, is not, however, inevitable. People are starting to work out ways to prevent it.

What sort of animal is it?

Bluetooth is a telecom industry specification that enables mobile phones, computers, and other devices to interconnect with each other over a short-range wireless connection. The basic connection process involves device discovery, type and server enumeration, bonding/pairing between devices (using a 1-16 digit password) and, finally, the connection of services. Within this process, there are three 'security' modes:

* no security -- a non-secure mode which will not initiate any kind of security;

* application/service based (L2CAP) -- this provides a service level enforced security mode. It is a flexible access security method which allows multiple applications to use different security requirements in parallel; and

* ink-layer (PIN authentication/MAC address security/encryption) -- the Bluetooth device will initiate security procedures before the link is set-up. What may surprise most general users is that this is the most vulnerable connection and has caused the most concern.

# posted by Medical Information : 2:14 AM  0 Comments

Of all of America's institutions, surely we can rely on the nation's hospitals to treat us fairly. Right? Wrong! At least according to a Virginia entrepreneur whose 11-year crusade is reaping huge profits.

Picture this: you've just come home from the hospital and already there's a bill waiting on your kitchen table. You open it and your jaw drops open: it seems you're being charged $2,500 that wasn't covered. That can't be, you think, my coverage is supposed to be the best. You look closer...and that's when the errors appear.

You've been charged for an operating room you've never used...medications never given...doctor visits that never occurred. All in all, you figure there's $5,000 in overcharges. And that doesn't include all the things the insurance company is disallowing. But the biggest surprise is - you shouldn't be surprised at all! Studies show that over 90% of hospital bills typically yield mistakes (Two-thirds of which are in the hospital's favor). Often these errors amount to thousands of dollars.

The Start of a Revolutionary New Home Business

One such medical victim was Pat Palmer's dad. Pat got curious when her father's hospital bill seemed too high. After requesting an itemized bill and sticking to her investigation, Pat found and recovered thousands of dollars in overcharges.

That's when Pat envisioned a brand new business.

Within three months, Pat had uncovered thousands of dollars in overcharges for her neighbors alone. Excited, she split the recovery with them, quit her job and began auditing medical bills on a full-time basis.

That was eleven years ago. Since then, Pat helped her fellow Virginians recover overcharges they had neither the time nor the training to spot. Her clients can't thank her enough for her help. The beauty of her business is...

It Works Equally Well with Patients and Insurers

First off, most people with health insurance coverage generally pay 20-30% of their bill, plus the deductible, which can easily total thousands of dollars - making them top prospects for overcharge recovery.

But the really interesting part is - many insurance companies (including HMOs) will split with you 50/50 on any overcharges recovered...and that includes their share of the bill too!

That's not to mention those patients working for firms that self-insure and must bear the full brunt of a big hospital bill!

# posted by Medical Information : 2:13 AM  0 Comments

Home Shopping Network (HSN) has announced plans to deploy the world's largest speaker verification system based on technologies from Nuance and Edify Corp., enabling HSN to identify and authenticate frequent shoppers by voice automation and provide enhanced security and ease-of- use to customers placing orders. HSN's voice-enabled e-commerce, or V- Commerce, system will begin commercial rollout later this month.

"The future of secure V-Commerce has arrived," says Ronald Croen, CEO of Nuance. "And HSN's system provides benefits to both consumers and businesses. Consumers gain greater security and convenience without the need to remember passwords or provide personal data, and businesses significantly reduce fraud and streamline the ordering process. These benefits will drive entire industries to adopt similar V-Commerce solutions, and dramatically change the way we conduct business via the phone."

Nuance Verifier, the company's flagship speaker verification product, verifies a person's identity by comparing his/her voice against his/her pre-registered voiceprint, eliminating the need for hard to remember IDs and passwords.

To achieve even greater security, Nuance Verifier is tightly integrated with the Nuance 6 speech recognition engine. The combination provides two forms of security on the same utterance because it enables the system to test the person's knowledge of personal information while simultaneously verifying their voice pattern.

While companies can build systems based on separate verification and recognition, an integrated system can simultaneously identify and verify a caller, reducing the time it takes for the system to allow entry while lowering the demand for processing power (for a demonstration of the system, .

HSN's speech system, powered by Nuance, will work in tandem with Edify's Electronic Workforce, a platform that allows enterprises to create and deploy Internet and V-Commerce applications that build stronger relationships with customers. HNS says the Nuance/Edify solution "dramatically increases customer service levels and lowers the cost of maintaining the call center" by reducing call times and the number of calls handled by live agents.

# posted by Medical Information : 4:08 AM  0 Comments

Phone.com, Inc., a leading provider of mobile Internet software and services, Tuesday announced it has signed a definitive agreement to acquire Paragon Software Ltd for approximately $500 million in stock. Headquartered in Newbury, United Kingdom, Paragon Software is a pioneer of synchronization technology allowing PC-based personal information to be easily transferred to mobile devices. Paragon Software's product, FoneSync, enables users of PC and Internet-based personal organizers such as Microsoft Outlook, Lotus Notes, Excite@Home, and Yahoo to download and synchronize contact information to over 240 digital mobile phones from 20 major manufacturers including Alcatel, Ericsson, Nokia, Panasonic, Philips, Samsung, Sanyo, Siemens, and Sony.

"We have licensed our market-leading UP.Link Server Suite to over 50 wireless network operators worldwide," said Alain Rossmann, chairman and chief executive officer of Phone.com. "With the acquisition of Paragon Software Ltd we add significant new value to our Wireless Application Protocol (WAP) platform by leveraging the power of data synchronization. Mobile phone users are demanding touch-of-a-button information management between the mobile phone, PC applications, and Internet information services whether or not they are on-line. The combination of Paragon Software and Phone.com will rapidly drive this technology to market."

"FoneSync is firmly established as the leader in PC to mobile phone synchronization. We have marketing agreements in place with numerous partners including Nokia, Ericsson, AT&T Wireless, Microsoft, and Lotus," said Colin Calder, chief executive officer of Paragon Software Ltd. "Extending our technology to WAP-based over-the-air synchronization will revolutionize the way people use their phones. The synergy with Phone.com's marketing, sales channels and development organization makes this a powerful combination."

This acquisition is in line with Phone.com's strategy to create the leading platform for the delivery of Internet services and personal information to mobile phones. "Paragon's success with FoneSync demonstrates the tremendous value that synchronization brings to users of mobile phones," said Alan Black, chief financial officer of Phone.com. "We will further differentiate our platform by integrating this technology into our UP.Link Server Suite and UP.Browser, adding a service which drives usage and increases customer loyalty."

# posted by Medical Information : 4:06 AM  0 Comments

Rising real estate values in Miami-Dade County translate to rising employment--not only in the construction industry, but also in the financial services sector. Miami-based TotalBank, for example, which has 13 offices and 250 employees spread around the county, plans to hire up to six additional loan officers in 2004--largely to keep up with demand for mortgage loans to buy or refinance housing.

"We still think that reconstruction and rebuilding, and new building of housing developments, is going to be strong," says Bill Heffernan, president and chief executive of Miami-based TotalBank. He also expects strong local demand in 2004 for smaller office/showroom properties and apartment buildings in the Miami area. "We feel pretty good about that market."

Local lending has been supported by solid deposit growth at the local branch offices of financial institutions. Deposits at the Miami-Dade offices of banks and savings associations insured by the FDIC (Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.) increased to $56.3 billion last June 30, up 9.7 percent from a year earlier, according to the FDIC. Bank of America was the leader in Miami-Dade with about $9.3 billion in deposits (or 16.5 percent market share), followed by Wachovia (with 12.8 percent market share), Citibank (7.7 percent), SunTrust (6.9 percent) and Ocean Bank (6.5 percent).

Deposits also rose at foreign bank agencies in Florida, which are mostly clustered in the Miami area. Foreign bank agency deposits totaled $14.9 billion Sept. 30, 2003, compared with $13.3 billion a year earlier, according to the Florida Division of Banking. As of mid-2003, the dominant player among state-licensed foreign bank agencies was United Kingdom-based Barclays Bank, with $8.4 billion of deposits (or 56 percent market share), followed by Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria (with 6.1 percent market share), Royal Bank of Canada (5.6 percent) and ABN-AMRO Bank N.V. (5 percent).

# posted by Medical Information : 4:04 AM  0 Comments

Buy a Volkswagen this weekend and no more credit card debt. If it snows more than four inches on New Year's Day, the SUV you purchase this week is free. Come in and buy a Ford truck today, and we'll send you on a shopping spree.

It's how they lure the customer through the doors. It's how they compete. It's all about the best deal in town. Sometimes it's hokey, but it works and it's real, said Kirk Oleson, the chief operating officer of Graham Advertising, a Colorado Springs advertising agency that works exclusively with automobile dealerships and auto manufacturers.

Oleson said there are two reasons for the aggressive and colorful campaigns: Auto dealers need to meet daily, weekly and monthly quotas, which is production driven. They need to get the inventory out of the dealership, he said. Manufacturers will reimburse the dealers for added inventory for a couple months. After that, Oleson said there is a carrying charge so it moves the dealer to move the inventory. Second, he said the auto industry is incentive driven. The 0-percent thing has been a big deal across the board, so that's not the big thing to attract the people, Oleson said.

And the occasional whacky ads promoting snow-day give-a-ways and a weekend in Las Vegas do attract the people. For example, Oleson said January is a month when many people have overextended financially from the holidays. That's where the credit card thing comes in, he said. We might promote the auto dealer by saying we'll pay off the credit cards if you buy a car. And that's a real deal - the 21 percent interest rate on the credit card is now erased. Seems like a good plan to me.

Oleson said spring incentive revolve around April 15. Buy a car and the dealer will pay the tax bill. During the summer, an automobile dealer might spring for a customer's round-trip gas fare for a vacation. They have to support the current mindset of the individual buyer, Oleson said. That's why it's important that the dealers know the demographics of their target consumer. The truck consumer is different from the hybrid buyer, and each local dealer has to know what the manufacturer is doing on a national level.

# posted by Medical Information : 3:38 AM  0 Comments

While working out of your home can be a great convenience, it can also be a colossal pain if the space in which you work isn't properly planned.

When one of my clients started her home-based business, she tried to work out of her kitchen/family room area and quickly discovered that without a properly designated space, inefficiency and frustration were at the top of the in-tray every morning.

Once she decided she could give up her spare bedroom to dedicate the space to an office, I was presented with a real challenge. With this room's kiddie-print wallpaper, it was not only aesthetically unprofessional but didn't function well in terms of storage and workspace.

So the first thing I did was map out what my client wanted to be able to do in her home office. She told me that she needed an efficient spot to work at her desk, on a computer and phone, and also be able to meet clients. This dictated that the space had to have a certain level of aesthetic professionalism. Armed with this information, I got down to business.

Out went the old wallpaper, and the room was painted a rich mushroom color, soothing and calming to work in while stylish enough to impress clients. The cream-colored carpet was in excellent shape, so we didn't touch it.

The small desk she'd been using was tossed, and in its place I had a birch desk custom-built. This was the biggest investment we made in this space, but was well worth it since it served her needs exactly and was to be the single most important piece of furniture in the room.

Considering that people can spend eight hours a day or more in their home office, I'm always surprised by the lack of attention that is paid to lighting. We put in recessed lights around the perimeter of the room to provide a soft overhead glow and to focus on awards and art on the walls. Over the desk we hung a contemporary three-spot pendant fixture that was strategically focused on her main work area.

I brought in varying types of storage units to suit my client's needs. Some open storage was put up to display files and allow for easy access. Closed cabinets were also provided. Because space was at a premium, I hung folders on the available wall space.

After we'd set up my client's computer, fax machine, phone and Internet connection, we made sure to hide all the unsightly cords -- a quick trick to help give a room a clean, professional appearance.

# posted by Medical Information : 3:37 AM  0 Comments

The so-called cocooning trend is spreading beyond sofa dwellers and is catching on with success-oriented entrepreneurs. While re-evaluating priorities and seeking balance as well as opportunity, this new species of franchise is tapping into home-based businesses' long-term appeal. Fortunately, franchises are rising to meet the need; more and more of them are allowing franchisees to work from the comfort of their homes.

Want to run a thriving business without stepping outside your door? This year's top 101 homebased franchises are listed in order of their ranking in Entrepreneur's 2002 Franchise 500[R], the world's most comprehensive ranking of franchise companies (Franchise 500[R] ranking appears in parentheses).

This ranking is not intended to endorse, promote or recommend any particular franchise company. Instead, it's meant to be a tool you can use while doing your personal franchise research, which should include interviews with existing franchisees, counsel from your attorney and accountant, and literature such as the Uniform Franchise Offering Circular. As with any business purchase, a thorough, independent investigation must always be your first step toward success.

# posted by Medical Information : 3:36 AM  0 Comments

Despite increasing clutter, home buyers and sellers can find HELP IN CYBERSPACE.

THERE IS NO doubt about it: The Internet has changed the home-buying and -selling experience. It is now possible to waste more time fooling around with realty Web sites than you spend looking at houses.

While there are some useful sites, cyberspace is overflowing with empty promises. Some sites that promise to link you up with a real estate agent or deliver a quote on a homeowners insurance policy just dump you into online classified ads--after you've answered pages of questions about yourself, your home and even (for an insurance quote that failed to materialize) the avoirdupois of the family pooch. Despite such clutter, a few sites are well worth a visit:

IOwn.com. This all-purpose site is the best one overall, with a broad range of useful features for buyers and sellers. IOwn is licensed as a mortgage lender or broker nationwide (except in New Jersey) and searches for loans from among 25 lenders. You can apply online free or, if you get cold feet in cyberspace, you can call a toll-free number (877-669-4696) and apply over the phone. First-timers will especially appreciate the logical arrangement of home-buying information, starting with tips for estimating how much you can afford and ways to pull together a down payment.

Want to check your credit status? You can instantly download a copy of your Experian credit report for $8. For $29.95, you can have that report--plus reports from the two other major credit bureaus--mailed to you. It's a good idea to review your reports before you apply for a mortgage so you have time to correct mistakes or close unneeded lines of credit that might cause a lender to boost your interest rate.

IOwn.com allows you to do a free search of recent sale prices in neighborhoods you're considering. Its "Find a Neighborhood" feature offers detailed reports on three local schools; the reports are free if you agree to let one of the sponsors contact you by phone or e-mail (otherwise, you'll pay $39.95). We took the free offer, but we answered "no" to questions about plans to sell or move, and were not contacted--at least not in the week after getting the report.

The site's HomeWatch service offers e-mail notification of new listings, but it draws on a database of only 600,000 homes--fewer than listings leader Realtor.com, which claims more than 1.3 million, and runner-up HomeAdvisor. com, which claims 800,000.

# posted by Medical Information : 4:29 AM  0 Comments

A group of technology and business associations today released a series of recommendations for minimizing the threat of cyber-crime and hacker attacks, including a request for congressional funding of an early warning alert network and a national media campaign to promote safer Internet use at home.

The National Cyber Security Partnership, which includes the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the Business Software Alliance and the TechNet lobbying group, also asked Congress to provide money to help develop a cybersecurity information clearinghouse for the business community.

"This process has been extremely rewarding as we brought to the table some of the brightest minds for solving some of the most serious cybersecurity challenges as outlined in the national strategy," said Harris Miller, president of the Information Technology Association of America, a member of the partnership. "These recommendations are transitioning talk to action."

The extensive list of recommendations -- including a "Home User Cyber Security Tool Kit" and the recommendation to designate a "cyber security month" -- are some of the first to come from the partnership. They form a response to criticism from government officials and some private security experts that businesses are not responding quickly enough to President Bush's cybersecurity plan.

The White House's "National Strategy to Secure Cyberspace," which was released in February 2003, requires federal agencies to better secure their computer networks, but does little more than recommend that the private sector work with Homeland Security officials to strengthen their systems against the growing problem of hackers, viruses and other online threats.

The "Early Warning Alert Network" proposed today would allow the companies that oversee some of the nation's most critical computer systems -- ones that control dams, the electricity grid and communications networks -- to better cope with cyberattacks.

The clearinghouse, which would be known as the "National Crisis Coordination Center," would be a centralized version of 22 existing "information sharing and analysis centers" (ISACs) created to share threat and vulnerability data within different industries.

# posted by Medical Information : 4:28 AM  0 Comments

Recognizing the growing number of households with multiple computers, Bell Atlantic will test a service that will give consumers a high-speed local area network (LAN) in their home without the need for costly new wiring.

About 30 Bell Atlantic.net customers with Bell Atlantic Infospeed DSL (Digital Subscriber Line) service will participate in the trial throughout the Washington metropolitan area.

The trial will enable family members and people with home offices to connect multiple PCs to the Internet simultaneously. After networking hardware is installed in their computers, participants will simply plug multiple computers into different phone jacks to network their computers together. Participants will also be able to network other equipment such as fax machines, printers and scanners.

"Home networking will put an end to family disputes about who can go online when there is only one high-speed Internet connection in a household," said Amy McIntosh, president of consumer data services for Bell Atlantic. "Consumers will be able to enjoy the high-speed access that our Infospeed DSL service affords, and they will be able to swap files between PCs, enjoy multi-player games and share additional hardware."

This revolutionary application of new technologies grew from Bell Atlantic's participation in the Home Phoneline Networking Alliance (HomePNA). In June, Bell Atlantic became the first regional Bell company to join HomePNA, a consortium of industry leaders committed to establishing a universal standard for high-speed home networking using existing copper phone lines.

Bell Atlantic Infospeed DSL, which is Bell Atlantic's brand name for Digital Subscriber Line technology, will allow those participating in the trial to access the Internet at speeds up to 126 times faster than that afforded by a 56 kilobits per second (Kbps) modem. The digital high-speed service provides an "always-on" link to the global Internet. By taking advantage of unused capacity available in existing telephone lines, the technology allows consumers to use a single phone line to send faxes or make phone calls while they are surfing the Internet.

HomePNA partners Tut Systems, Lynksys, 3Com and Diamond Multimedia will provide adapters, network interface cards (NICs) and other networking hardware for the trial.

# posted by Medical Information : 4:27 AM  0 Comments