There are three essential conditions for revenue management to be applicable:
If the resources available are not fixed or not perishable, the problem is limited to logistics, i.e. inventory or production management. If all customers would pay the same price for using the same amount of resources, the challenge would perhaps be limited to selling as quickly as possible, e.g. if there are costs for holding inventory.
Yield management is of especially high relevance in cases where the constant costs are relatively high compared to the variable costs. The less variable cost there is, the more the additional revenue earned will contribute to the overall profit. This is because it focuses on maximizing expected marginal revenue for a given operation and planning horizon. It optimizes resource utilization by ensuring inventory availability to customers with the highest expected net revenue contribution and extracting the greatest level of ‘willingness to pay’ from the entire customer base. Revenue management practitioners typically claim 3% to 7% incremental revenue gains due to revenue management activity. In many industries this can equate to over 100% increase in profits. A competent revenue management analyst with good decision support tools can generate $10,000 per hour..
Yield management has significantly altered the travel and hospitality industry since its inception in the mid 1980s. It requires analysts with detailed market knowledge and advanced computing systems who implement sophisticated mathematical techniques to analyze market behavior and capture revenue opportunities. It has evolved from the system airlines invented as a response to deregulation and quickly spread to hotels, car rental firms, cruise lines, media, and energy to name a few. Its effectiveness in generating incremental revenues from an existing operation and customer base has made it particularly attractive to business leaders that prefer to generate return from revenue growth and enhanced capability rather than downsizing and cost cutting.
I think it will make MTC more economically viable and more importantly - profitable!
hoping not to look too touristy but professional (1stop short of a tie and blazer) i took all these pictures from the car.
Malicious hackers are exploiting a zero-day (unpatched) vulnerability in Adobe’s ever-present PDF Reader/Acrobat software to hijack data from compromised computers.
According to an advisory from Adobe, the critical vulnerability exists in Adobe Reader and Acrobat 9.2 and earlier versions. It is being exploited in the wild.
[ SEE: How to mitigate Adobe PDF malware attacks ]
The company has activated its security response process but declined to offer any more details until an investigation is complete.
Unfortunately, the company did not provide any mitigation guidance for customers.
The folks at ShadowServer describe the situation as “very bad.”
We did not discover this vulnerability but have received multiple reports of this issue and have examined multiple different copies of malicious PDFs that exploit this issue. This is legit and is very bad.
Here’s what we know so far:
We can tell you that this exploit is in the wild and is actively being used by attackers and has been in the wild since at least December 11, 2009. However, the number of attacks are limited and most likely targeted in nature. Expect the exploit to become more wide spread in the next few weeks and unfortunately potentially become fully public within the same timeframe. We are fully aware of all the details related to the exploit but do not plan to publish them for a few reasons:
- There currently is no patch or update available that completely protects against this exploit.
- There is little to no detection of these malicious PDF files from most of the major Antivirus vendors.
With that said we can tell you that this vulnerability is actually in a JavaScript function within Adobe Acrobat [Reader] itself. Furthermore the vulnerable JavaScript is obfuscated inside a zlib stream making universal detection and intrusion detection signatures much more difficult.
In the interim, Adobe PDF Reader/Acrobat users are urged to immediately disable JavaScript:
Click: Edit -> Preferences -> JavaScript and uncheck Enable Acrobat JavaScript
Or, better yet, use an alternative PDF Reader software program.
[UPDATE: Adobe plans to patch this issue on January 12, 2010 ]
source: http://blogs.zdnet.com/security/?p=5119&tag=content;wrapper
Picture taken during the opening ceremony of the Bejing olympics - if you scroll down - it appears as though the same drummer is caught in various positions.Netbooks have grabbed a big chunk of laptop sales over the past couple years because they are small and inexpensive. Unfortunately, they also have squished keyboards and screens that make them difficult to use.
On the other end of the spectrum are the sleek premium laptops such as the MacBook Air and the Dell Adamo. Like netbooks, these machines are extremely light and portable, but they are much thinner, have attractive designs and have full sized keyboards and big, bright 13″ screens. The problem is that they cost $1500-$2500 and that would break the budget of the average laptop buyer.
However, there’s an alternative that is as thin as the MacBook Air, has nearly all of the features of the Dell Adamo, and has a price tag that is closer to a netbook. It’s the MSI X340 Slim and here is TechRepublic look at it from an IT and business perspective.
This will appeal to users who want a slim, highly-portable Windows laptop for under $1000, and don’t like the small keyboards and irregular screens that you find on most netbooks.
Ultra-slim laptops like the MacBook Air and the Dell Adamo are light, powerful, and attractive. However, you have to pay $1500-$2500 to get that combination of features. The MSI X340 delivers around 80% of the features and coolness for about $700.
If you really like the lightweight portability of the MacBook Air and the Dell Adamo but don’t want to pay a huge premium for it, or you like the small form factor of netbooks but don’t like the minimal keyboards and screens, then the MSI X340 Slim might be the product you’re looking for.
However, the X340 is made out of plastic, unlike the metal bodies you find on the Air and the Adamo, and that means it’s not going to be very durable. I wouldn’t recommend it for business users that need an industrial strength laptop and I wouldn’t plan for an X340 to last much more than two years.
In a security advisory , Microsoft acknowledged that a bug in SMB (Server Message Block), a Microsoft-made network file- and print-sharing protocol, could be used by attackers to cripple Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 machines.
The zero-day vulnerability was first reported by Canadian researcher Laurent Gaffie last Wednesday, when he revealed the bug and posted proof-of-concept attack code to the Full Disclosure security mailing list and his blog. According to Gaffie, exploiting the flaw crashes Windows 7 and Server 2008 R2 systems so thoroughly that the only recourse is to manually power off the computers.
At the time, Microsoft only said it was investigating Gaffie's reports.
Then on Friday, it took the next step and issued the advisory. "Microsoft is aware of public, detailed exploit code that would cause a system to stop functioning or become unreliable," Dave Forstrom, a spokesman for Microsoft security group, said in an e-mail. "The company is not aware of attacks to exploit the reported vulnerability at this time."
Forstrom echoed Gaffie's comments earlier in the week that while an exploit could incapacitate a PC, the vulnerability could not be used by hackers to install malicious code on a Windows 7 system.
Both SMBv1 and its successor, SMBv2, contain the bug. "Windows Vista, Windows Server 2008, Windows XP, Windows Server 2003 and Windows 2000 are not affected," assured Forstrom.
Attacks could be aimed at any browser, not just Internet Explorer (IE), Microsoft warned. After tricking users into visiting a malicious site or a previously-compromised domain, hackers could feed them specially-crafted URIs (uniform resource identifier), and then crash their PCs with malformed SMB packets.
Microsoft said it may patch the problem, but didn't spell out a timetable or commit to an out-of-cycle update before the next regularly-scheduled Patch Tuesday of Dec. 8. Instead, the company suggested users block TCP ports 139 and 445 at the firewall. Doing so, however, would disable browsers as well as a host of critical services, including network file-sharing and IT group policies.
Gaffie's vulnerability was the first zero-day reported and confirmed by Microsoft in Windows 7 since the new operating system went on sale Oct. 22.
From an NYTimes article
Herewith is a modest list of dos and don’ts for servers at the seafood restaurant I am building. Veteran waiters, moonlighting actresses, libertarians and baristas will no doubt protest some or most of what follows. They will claim it homogenizes them or stifles their true nature. And yet, if 100 different actors play Hamlet, hitting all the same marks, reciting all the same lines, cannot each one bring something unique to that role?
1. Do not let anyone enter the restaurant without a warm greeting.
2. Do not make a singleton feel bad. Do not say, “Are you waiting for someone?” Ask for a reservation. Ask if he or she would like to sit at the bar.
3. Never refuse to seat three guests because a fourth has not yet arrived.
4. If a table is not ready within a reasonable length of time, offer a free drink and/or amuse-bouche. The guests may be tired and hungry and thirsty, and they did everything right.
5. Tables should be level without anyone asking. Fix it before guests are seated.
6. Do not lead the witness with, “Bottled water or just tap?” Both are fine. Remain neutral.
7. Do not announce your name. No jokes, no flirting, no cuteness.
8. Do not interrupt a conversation. For any reason. Especially not to recite specials. Wait for the right moment.
9. Do not recite the specials too fast or robotically or dramatically. It is not a soliloquy. This is not an audition.
10. Do not inject your personal favorites when explaining the specials.
11. Do not hustle the lobsters. That is, do not say, “We only have two lobsters left.” Even if there are only two lobsters left.
12. Do not touch the rim of a water glass. Or any other glass.
13. Handle wine glasses by their stems and silverware by the handles.
14. When you ask, “How’s everything?” or “How was the meal?” listen to the answer and fix whatever is not right.
15. Never say “I don’t know” to any question without following with, “I’ll find out.”
16. If someone requests more sauce or gravy or cheese, bring a side dish of same. No pouring. Let them help themselves.
17. Do not take an empty plate from one guest while others are still eating the same course. Wait, wait, wait.
18. Know before approaching a table who has ordered what. Do not ask, “Who’s having the shrimp?”
19. Offer guests butter and/or olive oil with their bread.
20. Never refuse to substitute one vegetable for another.
21. Never serve anything that looks creepy or runny or wrong.
22. If someone is unsure about a wine choice, help him. That might mean sending someone else to the table or offering a taste or two.
23. If someone likes a wine, steam the label off the bottle and give it to the guest with the bill. It has the year, the vintner, the importer, etc.
24. Never use the same glass for a second drink.
25. Make sure the glasses are clean. Inspect them before placing them on the table.
26. Never assume people want their white wine in an ice bucket. Inquire.
27. For red wine, ask if the guests want to pour their own or prefer the waiter to pour.
28. Do not put your hands all over the spout of a wine bottle while removing the cork.
29. Do not pop a champagne cork. Remove it quietly, gracefully. The less noise the better.
30. Never let the wine bottle touch the glass into which you are pouring. No one wants to drink the dust or dirt from the bottle.
31. Never remove a plate full of food without asking what went wrong. Obviously, something went wrong.
32. Never touch a customer. No excuses. Do not do it. Do not brush them, move them, wipe them or dust them.
33. Do not bang into chairs or tables when passing by.
34. Do not have a personal conversation with another server within earshot of customers.
35. Do not eat or drink in plain view of guests.
36. Never reek from perfume or cigarettes. People want to smell the food and beverage.
37. Do not drink alcohol on the job, even if invited by the guests. “Not when I’m on duty” will suffice.
38.Do not call a guy a “dude.”
39. Do not call a woman “lady.”
40. Never say, “Good choice,” implying that other choices are bad.
41. Saying, “No problem” is a problem. It has a tone of insincerity or sarcasm. “My pleasure” or “You’re welcome” will do.
42. Do not compliment a guest’s attire or hairdo or makeup. You are insulting someone else.
43. Never mention what your favorite dessert is. It’s irrelevant.
44. Do not discuss your own eating habits, be you vegan or lactose intolerant or diabetic.
45. Do not curse, no matter how young or hip the guests.
46. Never acknowledge any one guest over and above any other. All guests are equal.
47. Do not gossip about co-workers or guests within earshot of guests.
48. Do not ask what someone is eating or drinking when they ask for more; remember or consult the order.
49. Never mention the tip, unless asked.
50. Do not turn on the charm when it’s tip time. Be consistent throughout.
http://boss.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/10/29/one-hundred-things-restaurant-staffers-should-never-do-part-one/?
Hot on the heels of the ikee worm, a second piece of iPhone-related malware has appeared, which enables hackers to connect to any device that has been jailbroken and still has an unchanged root password.
Jailbreaking is a term used to define iPhones that have been hacked by users to enable software other than that available through the App Store to be installed.
The new malware takes advantage of the same vulnerability in the iPhone as the ikee worm and has been dubbed iPhone/Privacy.A by Mac security software house, Intego, which first discovered its existence.
The company explained on its blog that hackers use the tool by installing it on either their own or compromised third-party Macs, PCs, Unix and Linux-based machines - or even on iPhones themselves. The program scans networks that are accessible to it and, when it finds a jailbroken iPhone, breaks into it, steals data including email, contacts and music files, and copies them.
Unlike the ikee worm, which indicates its presence by changing the iPhone’s wallpaper, there is no obvious sign that Privacy.A has been installed. Standard, non-jailbroken, iPhones are not at risk but estimates suggest that between six and eight per cent of all such devices are jailbroken.
Intego indicated that it was not possible to protect iPhones from exploitation by the tool at this time and therefore advised users to stick to stock configurations or risk exposing themselves to known vulnerabilities being exploited by code circulating in the wild. The supplier has developed VirusBarrier X5 to detect and eradicate the hacker tool on potential host Macs, however.
The release of Privacy.A comes the day after a poll by security software vendor Sophos indicated that a huge three-quarters of respondents believed that the Australian student who wrote the ikee worm was justified because he helped raised awareness of security issues.
But Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant at the vendor, was proved right in saying at the time that the move had let the genie out of the bottle, increasing the likelihood of others writing “a far more dangerous version of the worm, which could have a much more dangerous payload”.
http://www.v3.co.uk/v3/news/2252939/iphone-malware-spotted
Security experts have warned Facebook users to be on the alert after the discovery of a new password malware scam linked to the Bredolab Trojan.
Email security firm Websense claimed yesterday to have seen 90,000 instances of the attack, calling it a "new wave of malicious spoof email attacks".
The messages purport to come from Facebook and are designed to appear as a simple password reset confirmation. However, a .exe file in the mail contains a hidden virus with a nasty payload.
Websense said in a security alert that the .exe file connects to two servers in order to download additional malicious files. The victim's PC then joins the Bredolab botnet, giving hackers full control.
"This spam email attack is designed to play on the subject at the forefront of users' minds: their password security," said Carl Leonard, Websense security labs manager.
"Falling for this scam could lead to the unsuspecting user becoming part of a botnet. With therecent hack of web email accounts, users would feel more compelled to open an attachment that purports to hold their new password, as they'd be worried who changed it in the first place.
"Our advice for users is to always go directly to the web address you have an account with and reset passwords there."
Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant at Sophos, confirmed that the malicious emails have been spammed out widely across the internet.
"The 'from' address has been forged, and the attached file is in fact a piece of malware. Sophos detects the malware as Troj/BredoZp-M or Mal/Bredo-A," he wrote in a blog post.
"Don't make life easy for the hackers hell-bent on infecting your computer, stealing your identity and emptying your bank account. Exercise caution when you receive unsolicited emails, and protect your computer with up-to-date security software."
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