New Facebook job-hunting features challenge LinkedIn

Facebook on Wednesday began letting businesses in the US or Canada post jobs and take applications from jobseekers, posing a challenge to Microsoft-owned LinkedIn.

The platform's users will be able to find help-wanted posts at business pages on Facebook or by looking in a new 'jobs' bookmark on the leading social network's mobile application.

"Businesses and people already use Facebook to fill and find jobs, so we're rolling out new features that allow job posting and application directly on Facebook," the California-based internet giant said in an online message.

Data guru Hans Rosling dies at 68

Data guru Hans Rosling, a Swedish public health expert famous for combating scientific ignorance with catchy YouTube videos in his mission to promote a "fact-based world", has died at the age of 68, his foundation announced.

Rosling, who described himself as an "edutainer", was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer a year ago and passed away on Tuesday surrounded by his family in Uppsala, Sweden, the Gapminder foundation said.

A professor of international health at Stockholm's Karolinska Institutet, in 2007 Rosling decided to "drop out" to devote his time to promoting "a fact-based world view by converting the international statistics into moving, interactive, understandable and enjoyable graphics".

Facebook, Google join drive against fake news in France

Giant Internet firms Facebook and Google joined forces with news organisations on Monday to launch new fact-checking tools designed to root out "fake news" stories in France ahead of the country's presidential election.

Social networks and news aggregators came under fire during the U.S. presidential vote when it became clear they had inadvertently fanned false news reports.

Facebook, said it would work with eight French news organisations, including news agency Agence France-Presse (AFP), news channel BFM TV, and newspapers L'Express and Le Monde to minimise the risk that false news appeared on its platform.

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Nigeria’s manufacturing index declines in January

The Manufacturing Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) stood at 48.2 index points in January 2017, indicating a decline in the manufacturing sector during the review period.
The index averaged 45.2 in the last twelve months, and had grown in December 2016 after recording declines for 11 consecutive months.

The PMI is an indicator of the economic health of the manufacturing sector.
The January 2017 PMI report released by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) tuesday, showed that 10 of the 16 sub-sectors surveyed recorded decline in the review month in the following order: primary metal; transportation equipment; paper products; electrical equipment; fabricated metal products; printing & related support activities; cement; furniture & related products; plastics & rubber products; and chemical & pharmaceutical products.

FG - "Foreign investors can now get Nigerian visa in 48 hours"

Okechukwu Enelamah, the minister of industry, trade and investment, says anyone interested in doing business in Nigeria can now get a visa in 48 hours.

The minister said the federal government had issued a directive to this effect, noting that it was important to make it easy for potential investors to do business in Nigeria.

THISDAY reports that the minister made this known at an event on Tuesday.

Enelamah said the federal government was carrying out series of reforms in the business environment to make it less difficult to do business in the country.

He said President Muhammadu Buhari had already launched the presidential enabling business environment council( PEBEC) whose purpose was to identify and reduce bureaucratic processes and regulations that impede the private sector

Amaechi- "China’s $1.5bn loan ready"

Rotimi Amaechi, the minister of transportation, has urged the national assembly to approve the federal government’s borrowing plan so as to begin the construction of rail projects in the country.

The minister said the China Exim Bank was ready to loan $1.5bn to Nigeria for the Lagos-Ibadan rail line but approval was needed before the agreement can be signed.

Amaechi made this known on Tuesday in Abuja when he appeared before the senate committee on land transport.

The minister also said the foundation of the Lagos-Ibadan segment of the Lagos-Kano rail line will be ready before the end of the first quarter of 2017.

Women protest in Abuja, ask EFCC to arrest Fayose

Some protesters under the aegis of “Patriotic Mothers Without Borders”, on Friday stormed the EFCC Abuja headquarters calling for the “arrest, investigation and prosecution” of Ayo Fayose, governor of Ekiti State, over his involvement in the $2.1 billion arms deal scandal.

Chanting “Fayose must go”, the women numbering about 300 carried various placards and banners with inscriptions like: “EFCC Must Prosecute Fayose”, “Corruption is Corruption”, “Fayose is being tormented by the blood of innocent Nigerians slaughtered by Boko Haram”.

Convener of the group, Nnenna Jideofor, accused Fayose of stealing part of funds meant to equip the military in the fight against terrorism.


She said: “The gravity of the crime does not permit that we wait indefinitely for Fayose to leave office; he would have finished spending his share of the loot by then, and he has all the time to destroy evidence.”

Police arrest 27-year-old woman with 16 children

The Police in Plateau has intercepted a 27-year-old woman for allegedly being in possession of 16 children at Gada Biyu Motor Park in Jos.

The command’s spokesman, ASP Terna Tyopev, said on Wednesday that the woman was arrested on Tuesday night.

According to him, the woman, identified as Rifkatu Bello, was conveying the children from Bauchi to Anambra.

How to Subscribe to Airtel Unlimited Download Plan

If you are a heavy internet user or you download heavy files online, then Airtel night plan is the data plan for you. The best thing about this plan is that it’s also unlimited.

It’s a hard time in the country right now because of the recession. Not online has goods and commodities become expensive, data plans are too. Airtel night plan allows you to browse and download unlimitedly, meaning you can download and stream movies for as long as you like.

Wole Soyinka-"If we don’t tame religion, it’ll kill Nigeria"

Nobel laureate, Prof. Wole Soyinka, has warned that religion will kill the country if it is not tamed.


Soyinka stated this in Abuja on Thursday at the presentation of a book, Religion and the Making of Nigeria, written by Prof. Olufemi Vaughan.

He said President Muhammadu Buhari had said if Nigeria did not kill corruption, corruption would kill the country.

Condemning killings in the name of religion, the Nobel laureate stated, “I would like to transfer that cry from the moral zone to the terrain of religion. If we do not tame religion in this nation, religion would kill us.

“I do not say kill religion, though, I wouldn’t mind a bit if that mission could be undertaken surgically, painlessly perhaps, under anaesthesia, effectively sprayed all over the nation or perhaps during an induced pouch of religious ecstasy.

Dabiri Erewa-Those who keep looted funds are also criminals

The Senior Special Assistant to President Muhammadu Buhari on Foreign Affairs and Diaspora, Abike Dabiri-Erewa, has called for the unconditional return of Nigeria’s looted funds.

According to her, those who keep such funds are as guilty as those who looted them.


She said this on Thursday at a media event organised by the Presidential Advisory Committee Against Corruption and her office, the News Agency of Nigeria reported.

Dabiri-Erewa decried the uncooperative attitude of the countries where the stolen funds were being stashed.

So, they are giving out free condoms in the Philippines

Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte has ordered government agencies to provide free contraceptives and other reproductive health services to 6 million women, despite a temporary ban by the Supreme Court.

The Philippines is a predominantly Catholic country with a population of more than 100 million, and the move will likely draw strong oppositon from the Catholic Church.


But in his executive order signed Monday, Duterte stressed the need for the government to implement reproductive health and family planning programmes as part of efforts to reduce poverty.

“This order aims to intensify and accelerate the implementation of critical actions necessary to attain and sustain `zero unmet need for modern family planning’ for all poor households by 2018, and all of Filipinos thereafter,’’ the order said.

BAIDU Home Assistant (A.I) on it's Way to the Top

Amazon’s Alexa and Google’s virtual assistant have already made their way into our living rooms, but Chinese tech giant Baidu is betting that verbal answers may not always be enough. The company is launching a new home-centric computer that includes a screen for displaying helpful information in response to voice commands.

Baidu is teaming up with Chinese consumer tech company Ainemo to launch the device, called Little Fish, which is being positioned as a voice-centric home robot. Ainemo created the hardware, while Baidu created the operating system that powers it. The computer, about the size of a lamp, is designed to handle many of the same tasks one might expect from such a device: managing calendars, answering questions, getting news updates, and ordering food, among other tasks. It does so by dictating responses in addition to pulling up relevant information on its tablet-like display.

New AI taking over... " Say Hello To ALEXA"

Companies like Apple, Google, Samsung, and Microsoft have all vied for control over the phones we carry in our pockets, the computers at our desks, and even the watches on our wrists. But over the past year a new arms race has emerged in Silicon Valley: competing to develop the most sophisticated virtual assistant. And Amazon is winning.

The most convincing evidence of the Seattle-based giant’s advantage? Alexa, Amazon’s voice assistant, is dominating this year’s CES. That’s the annual Las Vegas tech confab where gadget makers, auto manufacturers, and app developers gather to flaunt their latest and, they hope, greatest. Although Amazon didn’t officially attend the conference, Alexa showed up in car infotainment systems, new smartphones, robots, lamps, and even laundry machines.

Happy New Year. Here’s a 3¢ Raise

Academics and labor groups in Thailand have expressed their anger and dismay at the latest hike in the minimum daily wage. At most, it works out to the equivalent of just under 3¢, or 10 baht in local currency, depending on region.

The maximum raise is only applicable to the capital Bangkok and its surrounding provinces, the Bangkok Post reports. In other provinces, the raise will be as low as 1.5¢. Eight provinces will see no adjustment in the minimum wage at all.

THOUGHT FOR THE DAY

A very poor man lived with his wife whose hair was very long. One day the wife asked her husband to buy her a comb for her long hair so that it can continue to grow well and to be well groomed.
The man felt sorry and said he didn't have money even to fix the strap of his watch which had just broken. The wife did not insist.
On his way to work that day the man passed by a watch shop, sold his damaged watch at a low price and went to buy a comb for his wife. He came back home in the evening with a comb in his hand ready to give to his wife. He was surprised to see his wife with very short hair. She had cut and sold her hair and bought a brand new watch for her husband. 

Two Nigerian Artiste You Never Knew Had Tech Background

MR. EAZY

The name does not sound very familiar at first, but is easier to relate with when you hear “It’s your boy Eazi” and see a picture of the straw-hatted songster. Mr Eazi is one of the biggest kids on the music block in Africa right now, and is currently signed to Wizkid’s Starboy Worldwide record label.

The 2016 breakout star’s “Life is Eazi” concert shut Lagos down. He also won the Next Rated award at the just concluded Headies Awards. He achieved all these without even releasing an album yet

International Conference for Research, Innovation and Development for Africa to Hold in June

EAI International Conference for Research, Innovation and Development for Africa will hold in June 20–21, 2017 at Victoria Falls Zimbabwe.The Conference Theme is: “Moving Africa forward through Engineering, Technology and Innovation”. The conference seeks to bring together academics, researchers and industrialists across many disciplines, in particular those that have the most impact in Africa’s Development.

Most conferences on the continent have covered limited disciplines and therefore the opportunity has been lost sharing information, results and knowledge in a way which can solve the many contentious issues, most of which can be solved through a multidisciplinary approach. The Call for Papers will invite papers from areas of Electronics, Communications and Computer Systems, Energy and Power Systems, Multi-discipline approach to the solution of problems and application of innovation in industrial Production, Mining, Transportation, Engineering Education and participation of youth and women in Engineering and Technology.

Nokia, Vodafone and Telit collaborate to expand the IoT ecosystem

Nokia has deployed a fully integrated NB-IoT system at Vodafone’s ‘Open Lab’ in Dusseldorf, Germany using its radio access network and elements from its Cloud Packet Core solution. The system leverages IoT technology from Telit and will be used by device manufacturers and applications developers in trials of innovative products and solutions to expand the IoT ecosystem.