Computer & Technology
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Online Proctoring Programs Try to Ease the Tensions of Remote Testing

John A. Ratliff

When many schools halted in-person teaching during the pandemic, they also stopped providing another function that has been perhaps less missed: giving tests under the watchful eyes of proctors.

Millions of college students facing final exams, professionals pursuing new qualifications and others were asked to take important tests at home using programs such as ProctorExam, Proctorio and ProctorU—software designed to fight cheating by getting a human or machine to remotely watch for suspicious behavior in test takers’ faces, rooms and audio levels.

It was a windfall for online proctoring companies, but thrust the pitfalls of the practice into the spotlight.

Being watched by a faceless stranger or artificial intelligence provokes anxiety or worse, according to some students and teachers. Educators and privacy advocates raised concerns about the software’s efficacy, invasiveness and potential to discriminate against some disabled candidates.

Online proctoring companies are now updating their user experiences, partly to

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Business
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Pandemic brings influx of remote workers to Wyoming

John A. Ratliff

CASPER, Wyo. (AP) — Ty Lunsford left Casper in 1998 — seeking, as he says, “bright lights, big city.” He was raised here, and moved out of his parents’ house to go chase the action in Denver.

In November, after his job at a Southern California tech startup went permanently remote, he packed up his home in Thousand Oaks and moved his family back to his hometown. This time, he intends to stay for good.

“I never thought I’d see the day,” Lunsford laughed. “But here I am.”

Lunsford is part of a trend that’s bringing Casperites back home to raise their families as the COVID-19 pandemic makes it possible for those with office jobs to work from anywhere. Casper, where the economy is heavily reliant on oil and other blue-collar industries, may benefit from this influx of diverse labor.

But in a state desperately in need of a financial

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Technology
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Lessons Learned About Remote Work, One Year In After The Great Dispersal

John A. Ratliff

March 2020 may seem like decades ago, but we are coming on the 12th month since the great corporate dispersal brought on by the Covid-19 crisis. That’s when every single office worksite broke up into a hundred smaller worksites ensconced within employees’ home offices, kitchen tables, spare bedrooms, or corners of bedrooms.

How goes this great Work-from-Anywhere experiment? So far, so good, and a lot of lessons have been learned. First, that remote work is sustainable, and doesn’t affect productivity. Second, the experiment has been uneven, mainly enabling the professional and managerial class to work from the comfort of their homes, while frontline workers have had to stick it out in the public space. Third, the tools and technologies available have proven themselves in stressful situations. Finally, even for professional, managerial and office workers, there’s still always going to

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Computer & Technology
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Remote Working Boosts Internet Software Industry Prospects

The Zacks Internet Software industry primarily comprises software infrastructure and application providers like F5 Networks (FFIV). Social media provider Twitter (TWTR) and online payments company Paypal (PYPL) are also notable companies in this industry.

The industry participants use SaaS-based cloud computing model to deliver solutions to end-users as well as enterprises.

Here are the four major industry themes:

  • The industry is benefiting from continued demand for digital transformation. Growth prospects are alluring primarily due to rapid adoption of SaaS, which offers a flexible and cost-effective delivery method of applications. It also cuts down on deployment time compared to legacy systems. SaaS attempts to deliver applications to any user, anywhere, anytime and on any device. It has been effective in addressing customer expectation of seamless communications across multiple channels, including voice, chat, email, web, social media and mobile. This drives customer satisfaction and increases retention rate, thereby driving the top line
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