Firefox Live Chat Support Launched

There's now a new form of help available to new and old users of the Firefox browser. It's a live chat support system, and it looks like a promising way to help beginners with the installation, use, and common problems that they may have with the browser, while at the same time giving another part of the open source community a way to contribute without having programming or more specialized skills available. As of writing this, the Firefox support site still lists the service as open and ready for questions.

If you feel you could lend a hand and have some fun at the same time, helping others out with their problems, you can find the steps here. The steps are pretty basic, although right now, I'm a little doubtful about the amount of traffic in need of help. It's in beta, so hopefully once it's officially released, the service will be better integrated into the services of Firefox.

This is just one of the many neat ideas that are constantly coming out of the open source community.

Source: Firefox Support Blog

16 Year old Murdered in "Honour Killing"

Aqsa Parvez, 16, was allegedly murdered by her father in an "honour killing". I am deeply saddened that Aqsa was not given a say in her religion and way of life, which is a constitutional right in Canada. It is such a senseless tragedy.

Privacy on the Internet

There are many people who take serious precautions in their day to day lives to secure their privacy, and keep their information out of prying eyes. While your probably careful with your paper documents, do you exercise caution with your online activities?

Search engines are powerful tools these days. A hacker with some skill can type in custom search engine strings to find insecure databases of information. Think of all the sites that you sign up for. Now think for a moment about what would happen if someone infiltrated just one of those sites. Chances are, if your like most people, you use the same password. If hackers were to obtain your password, they would have access to all your accounts! Security experts recommend using different passwords for your most important accounts, such as banking and subscriptions. This is very good advice.

As for information available about you on the web. I'm sure you've seen movies where a person says "I found all the information about you on the web." I'm not too sure how true that is, but I would like to warn you about usernames. You might think your basically anonymous on the web, but if you use the same username everywhere you go, chances are a quick search would show some very big tracks, with forums you visited, online stores you shopped at, and maybe even medical information you've divulged to others.

The internet is no longer a chaotic place, so that means you have to be. With the right tools and skills, there is lots of information available on the web, from security mistakes from the government to hacked databases of major internet companies. So remember, when your online, you don't have a complete cloak of invisibility. So take caution in information you would rather keep to yourself. With the right precautions, you can avoid your social security number and latest bank statements being plastered all over the net.

*By the way, there are many other security tips such as making longer passwords with characters in them, and not using common names that can be found in a dictionary, but I figured I would leave that stuff for a security novel and not bore you to death. And besides, that's why many websites now employ a system that will disable an account after so many guesses. So following the tips above, as well as any on the sites your signing up for, should prove secure enough. As always, remember to use proper security on your computer, such as anti-virus and spyware tools. And remember, don't follow links in your email. If you get a bank statement, type your banking site into the address bar in your browser yourself. Following a link does not ensure you've reached your intended site, even if it looks identical!

Tasers... Should We Be Scared of Police Encounters?

With the recent controversy over the death of Polish immigrant Robert Dziekanski, which seems to have resulted from the use of a taser, people have a right to inquire about the safety of the taser. People are questioning not just the health risks, but the overuse of tasers in situations that should not have required them.

I for one, am outraged at the death of Robert Dziekanski, and belive it could have easily been avoided had police taken proper precautions. For one, he wasn't causing any harm to anyone where he was. Incoming passengers could have been delayed briefly if that was the worry, and a translator could have been found. Someone, most likely a flight attendant, must have been able to speak polish, even at the least, a few words. I think the taser was used too quickly, and the police did not take time to survey the situation. Here is a video. I must warn you, it's not for the faint of heart.



As for tasers, I think the public is right to request more studies, and a moratorium should definitely be placed on tasers, at least until police officers are better trained and some strict guidelines are made. I don't think the studies on tasers have done their jobs. In my sole opinion, and having no expertise in the area, I believe tasers are dangerous in high stress situations. As well, I believe they are also dangerous in situations involving alcohol, and drugs. A recent study done by researchers in the UK (TASER is easy on the heart-requires you sign up for a free account) suggests that the use of tasers are safe. The studies were done on a human model and a guinea pig heart, hardly the stone cold evidence I would put my life in the hands of. For one thing, the heart does not take in to account the extreme stress and the affects of adrenaline on the heart. But it does mention that the use of alcohol and drugs could reduce the safety of tasers. Since alcohol is legal to consume in Canada among adults, this is a little troubling. And, from the article on tasers above, Kenneth Foster, professor of bioengineering and electrical engineering at the University of Pennsylvania, says "Given the controversy surrounding the use of the TASER, there has been astonishingly little research into its safety". Before I ever get tasered under pressure from police, or before police are even allowed to use tasers, I would like more independent studies done on the use of tasers. And hopefully, with a little more taken into account than the UK study did.

As for the police officers, this news article says they 'claimed Dziekanski attacked the officers and could only be controlled by the use of the taser'. I watched the video, and he may have been mildly able to do harm at one point, but was clearly not attacking the officers when he was tasered, nor did he actually come close to doing harm to anyone ever. He was simply in an unfamiliar place, scared, alone, and not able to communicate.

Police are now requesting permissions to go to Poland and further investigate, wanting to look at his health and criminal record. I don't believe they should be able to take any of his criminal history in to account in this situation, and am not really sure why it would apply. But as for the health, if the taser is truly not harmful, why would his health situation matter? And before you say it, his death didn't look to me like it was because of a health issue. It looked like it was due to the electrical shock. And it certainly sounded like it.

In Canada, there have been 20 deaths involving tasers since 2003 and many more in the United States. Coincidence? I don't think so. Here is a detailed map of the deaths in Canada. I find this horrifying. And to think, this happened in the country I live in! A United Nations committee has said the use of tasers can be a form of torture. I agree 100 percent.

The United Nations defines torture as "any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person for such purposes as obtaining from him or a third person information or a confession, punishing him for an act he or a third person has committed or is suspected of having committed, or intimidating or coercing him or a third person, or for any reason based on discrimination of any kind, when such pain or suffering is inflicted by or at the instigation of or with the consent or acquiescence of a public official or other person acting in an official capacity". The taser clearly coerces a person to obey the public official by causing severe pain and taking away motor function. Its a scary thought that police are torturing people all the time. Take this video for instance, where a man in Utah is tasered for not signing a paper, and without any warning, and without even being told he was under arrest. He was given no reasonable time to understand the officer, and was not even told he was under arrest. This occurred in September. CBS VIDEO (With subtitles, must watch a short ad before the video).

There have been several taser deaths in the last few weeks throughout North America. Clearly, there is a risk that has not been found about tasers. Also, under my interpretation, tasers are a form of torture to make people comply with public officials. And most importantly of all, in my opinion, there have not been an adequate number of independent studies to show the taser as safe. Taking into account scientific evidence, or lack of, would you trust the taser?

Berkeley Now Offers their Fall Course Videos On Youtube

I'm writing this a little late, but The University of Berkeley is now offering their course lectures available on Youtube (I believe the news about this went out in October). Many universities have joined the open-source like atmosphere of the internet and are giving away free course information and lectures. It's quite an amazing job from the universities, and enables people with interests in certain topics to learn while not necessarily spending thousands of dollars. And it's often those people who end up changing the world around us.

911 Dialing Woes With VOIP

I am one of those people who switched to voip (voice over IP) in response to the terrible land-line rates being charged. It hasn't gone trouble free, but I think it's worth it. So, this article is about one of my only problems with voip.

I go through Primus Talkbroadband, and have experienced the occasional mistakes on their side throughout my service. I haven't experienced any downtimes, although, many others seem to be. So anyway, today I went to call a number (9481180), and when I called, either my modem lagged, or there was a network error, but the phone skipped out the 4 and 8. So, of course, I was connected to 911.

How would you react if you heard "Hello, 911, what is your emergency?" when you were trying to call someone? I immediately said "Sorry, wrong number!". Then, I was called a hang-up, and transferred around to many other people. Try and explain to a dispatcher, then to the police, that you didn't call 911! I bet you wouldn't be having fun. Well, neither was I. They wouldn't give you any time to explain the situation, and acted like you called just to prank them.

I don't think there will be any fines, as I was not notified. It's quite a frightening experience, and this is the second time it has happened. So, a note to the wise, if you switch to VOIP, use your cell phone to call anyone who has the numbers 9 and 11 in them.

Verizon Now Offering A Symmetrical FiOS Package

Verizon is now offering a 20/20 internet package. Yes, 20 down and up! Aimed at the consumer, I guess they're trying to see what a consumer will ultimately go for. I think this is great news, considering the internet is now not only a source of information, but also a place where normal consumers put their information. With the recent surge in online backup solutions, I'm sure having a slow upload connection would have significantly hurt when you had to upload your data. As well, there are more and more devices coming out that utilize servers so a consumer can access their content across the internet. I can only hope that people will take advantage of this, and give a reason for more service providers to jump on the bandwagon.

|Source|

Apple Is Now Worth More Than IBM

Apple has finally managed to beat the beast Steve Jobs made a point of beating in the beginning. Steve Jobs is probably most pleased about the news that Apple surpassed IBM's worth after posting nice fourth quarter results (even if IBM's not really in to the sales of personal computers anymore). An excellent picture was posted on a comment on Wired's blog to basically sum up Steve Job's position.
|PICTURE|


Source:Wired

Our Future Privacy Risks

An anonymous comment in my previous article (Don't Block Our Torrents!) pointed out a p2p application, Share (P2P). There are many privacy concerns in the world today. Information is collected constantly about us. At our workplaces. At the stores we go to. And even online. Constantly, we are giving out information that is completely out of our control. The world's technology is integrating, and access to information is becoming global. This article examines risks to our privacy and concerns for the future. But first, a history of some anonymous file sharing applications that got me started on this topic.

It seems to have started at first with Winny. It was created by a Japanese man as an anonymous way to transfer files over a peer to peer network. It is non-centralized and supports swarm downloading (pretty much the norm in p2p apps now a days). The creator of Winny had his home raided and the source code confiscated. On May 10th, 2004, he was arrested for suspected conspiracy to commit copyright violation. After the halt on development of Winny, Share was created by an anonymous Japanese engineer to carry on with what Winny started. Winny and Share seem to work by keeping ip addresses secret and encrypting files before transfer, and then decrypting them upon successful file transfer.

Although there have been a few arrests with Winny, the police did not catch them entirely through the file-sharing network. It was not a security breach, but instead a system of elimination. The police obtained ip addresses through an integrated forum, after which they blocked access to all ip addresses except the ones obtained, allowing them to verify the sharing of files from the specific ip addresses.

The programs aren't too useful in many places outside of Japan as most of the rest of the world is still lacking in internet speed in comparison to Japan. Share limits download and upload speeds to a minimum of 50 KB/s. I expect encryption file sharing applications will gain popularity as the rest of the world's internet speeds increase.

There are arguments that anonymous file sharing applications only exist for the reason of sharing illegal files. I am a believer in privacy, and don't believe this to be true. I think people have a right to protect their identity online (as the internet wasn't built for privacy). With an ip address and an extensive network with no privacy, I believe it would be possible for people to keep tabs on others as to what their interests, jobs, and hobbies may be. Programs like this may become important in the future as our privacy is scraped away by the ever increasing online authorities watching our every moves. Another reason this mass documenting could be threatening for our privacy is because information is power. Marketers and business people would love to assemble such a network for these reasons. I think we should have the right to choose the knowledge we allow people to have about us, and the right to safeguard it.

Oh, and in a very funny turn of events, the Okayama Prefectural Police Force had a large leak of data over Winny. Data of over 1500 investigations was leaked, and is apparently the largest amount of information held by Japanese police to have ever been leaked. How ironic considering these police forces chase and track p2p users for their "crimes". The bad side, and another point proving that the archival and tracking of our private information is a threat to our privacy, is that the information included sensitive data, such as the names of sex crime victims!

I'm curious as to what other people think about our privacy in the future, and if we have a right to safeguard it. I must say as well, that an ip database profiling people of the internet would be quite a feat, as there are a variety of ip naming systems, with static and dynamic. I still believe it to be possible to accurately pin-point someones identity even with dynamic ip addresses if a time-stamp system is used (doesn't take much to integrate that, most programming languages have that built in). Internet service providers would have the proper information of which time a person had that specific ip address for police, while it wouldn't be as important for marketers. And although there is a large usage of dynamic ip address naming systems, I think we'll start to see this diminish as the practical use of home servers increases and people start to demand static ip's. Marketers already use things such as Google's Hot Trends, showing a list of the most popular search queries.

Our privacy is slowly eroding whether we acknowledge it or not.


The information for this article was obtained from these Wikipedia articles:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Share_(P2P)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winny
And a special thanks goes out to the anonymous poster who pointed me towards these amazing applications, working to safeguard our privacy (whether people think so or not).

Postcard Delivered 64 Years Later

Here's a cool story about a postcard being delivered 64 years later. The postcard was mailed in WWII from the battlefront. Read the article, it's a nice read! (ARTICLE HERE)

How Bacteria Nearly Destroyed All Life

Here's an interesting article on bacteria in the early days of the Earth, and how it nearly destroyed everything. It kind of sounds like humans are the new bacteria...

Link

Don't Block Our Torrents!

On MSNBC, I read an article about Comcast blocking some internet traffic. Tests show that Comcast is interfering with some peer to peer (p2p) network traffic. While I'll admit a lot of p2p traffic is of copyrighted material, it does have its major uses as well. For instance, pretty much all Linux Distributions can be acquired from a p2p network (usually through torrents). Internet companies should stay competitive, and neutral on data. Don't think for a moment that internet companies aren't being pressured by media companies either. I tend to rant about the media companies "not getting it". So here it goes.

Torrents provide a way for anyone, especially "the little guy" to provide content to others, while avoiding high costs of servers and bandwidth. Torrents are one of those revolutionary ways of distributing files, and I think some people just can't grasp it.

One way for media companies to avoid many illegal downloads would be to provide a legal way of obtaining them. Of course, the prices should be void of any manufacturing, shipping, or packaging costs. The media companies that have tried to digitally distribute content can't seem to grasp this. Other than ease of use, why should you have to pay full price for half a product, when everyone else can get it with packaging? And, especially when a torrent of the full, non-protected content is a search away.

You must overlook the people who say, "Well, then get up and go buy it". These people can't seem to grasp the idea. Look at it this way. In a brick and mortar store, would you normally sell a product to someone at the normal sale price, even if it was missing its packaging or damaged? Any legitimate store would be negotiable with such an item. The damage in this case would be the extreme DRM (digital rights management).

So take this in mind next time you set prices on digital media:
"Digital Media = Open Box Content. Price accordingly."

TV-Links Raided and Shut Down!

Today, TV-Links was shut down. TV-Links was a site that provided links to movies and TV shows on popular media sharing sites, such as Youtube. Apparently the police in the UK have arrested the owner on charges of "facilitation" of copyright infringement.

Am I the only one who has a problem with these charges? Congratulations media companies, instead of going after the real copyright infringer's, you go after TV-Links. I think these charges might be a big deciding factor in the future of the present internet in the UK. Can anyone be charged for linking to TV-Links? And, are people in the UK going to have to be vigilant about who they link to? The media companies have gone and started a war between themselves and the rights of people on the internet. To me, the big companies are becoming dictators of what content we can link to.

As long as Tv-Links didn't physically help upload the content, there should be no charges for "facilitation". This is controlling who we can link to on the internet. It is completely destroying one of the fundamental parts of the internet, "The World Wide Web".

Hey, guess what? Google has links to all the content TV-Links provided. Why hasn't it been named in the charges? If these charges go through, the internet could be on its way to "The World Wide Marble Pile". It would be nothing more than chaos with no way to navigate.

So my question is this: Should a large corporation be able to dictate who we link to, and what the future of the internet should be? And second of all, if TV-Links can be charged for the links, shouldn't any major search engine also be responsible for their links, regardless of who (people) or what (robots) found and indexed them?

Robotic Cannon Kills 9

A software glitch may have resulted in the death's of 9 people, the South African Defense Force has said.

I think this is an important world event because as countries become more and more advanced, incidents like this will become more common place. Software developers are often rushed and products aren't given the testing time they deserve. Computer bugs are a very big problem for any country that uses software. There is the problem of hackers, and when you mix that in with what can happen with bugs by themselves, it's a wonder why bigger things don't happen more often... Or maybe they do and just get covered up?

Anyways, as we enter web 3.0, I guess we'll see what happens.

(wired article about the robotic cannon here)

The Newly Released Transformers Movie

I just picked up the newly released Transformers movie yesterday on dvd. I went to Best Buy for their exclusive with an action figure and 32 page book. For the increased price, I think the 35.99 CND price tag was worth it. The action figure is quite small, but all in all, its a pretty nice collection. As for the movie, for all the naysayers criticizing the director, I think he did an awesome job at having the movie come to life.

So, don't take my word on how great it is. Go see for yourself!

The Utility Time of Year Has Come Again

Yes, you heard me. That time of year has arrived again. It's almost time to get a new subscription to my security software. Now many people say to use the free programs, like the personal editions of AVG and Zone Alarm. Now, I can't put them down, they are a great option to choose if you have no desire AT ALL to purchase security software. For me on the other hand, I don't mind paying for quality. I like security suites that do exactly what they are supposed to do, with the ease of use to match it. I also prefer it all to be integrated into one and with similar looks and menus. Enter Norton Internet Security from Symantec. Symantec has been in the security game for a long time. They've got "street cred" in the security business (as some people would say).

I know some people are going to disagree, but Norton Internet Security has turned into one nice product. It has a firewall, fights virus's, spyware, and rootkits. The box also says it has "Intrusion prevention", "Web Site authentication", and "Eavesdropping protection". I'm not really too sure about those, I think they should fall under firewall and either anti-virus or spyware, but I guess it makes people feel more secure. And hey, whatever helps! Too many people get creeped out about using the internet, and hopefully this can help them.

So anyways, you all know the old versions of Norton. Those ones you loaded up, and they took forever to load or do anything, and made your computer grind its gears to do anything. Well, I think those days have changed. To me, since Norton 2007, they've done a complete makeover of their product. When I fist installed Norton Internet security 2007, it was noticeably faster. It seemed like a great product. Another good feature was for those people who get freaked out at the first question a firewall asks. Norton has a feature t0 manage the firewall alerts by itself, making yet another task automated. So basically, for the average user, Norton has become a self-sufficient, "let it do it's job and your computer will be safe" kind of program. The user-interface received a make-over and looks more friendly, telling you exactly what its protecting you against and if there are any problems.

So, with all that mumble jumble I just said, you also get a year subscription with Norton (pretty standard in the utility business). Now, what I just found out recently (wish I had looked sooner), was that, as long as you have a subscription to Norton Internet Security, you can receive the latest version. I have 30 days left (give or take) of NIS 2007, and I just got 2008 downloaded and installed. So, if you happened to just buy NIS 2007 and still have a year left, your not out of luck. You can just go to their downloads section of the Norton site, and click the version you have to get the newer one (direct link).

Now, I've been using Symantec software for a long time, and have a lot of trust in their stuff. One thing that might not be the best is their spyware, which I seem to find doesn't catch everything some other spyware scanners get. I'm not sure if the others just have a lot of false-positives or what-not, but Norton does get all the major ones you should worry about. I've had nothing but utmost quality from Symantec and their products. The only thing that has started to bother me recently is there subscription notification. As I said earlier, my subscription is starting to run out, and NIS 2007 and 2008 (tried both to see if they both do it), keep telling me to renew my subscription. As well, Norton looks like somethings wrong with it and keeps saying it needs attention. Now, this is very minor, and in no way affects any of the functionality of the product, nor is it intrusive. I just find it annoying. I like to see the green check mark saying all systems go. As well, 30 day notification will remind everyone to upgrade in order to keep protected. After all, we all know hackers love taking advantage of those who don't have the latest updates, whether of Windows, or while waiting for Microsoft to come up with a patch to fix a problem they promised to fix a week ago! Oh, one last complaint. In the 2008 version, there is no feature I could find to "Block all traffic". This could come in handy if your afraid you may have gotten trojan horsed, and are awaiting a virus scan to pick it up, or, if you just prefer to cut off access with the outside world for some privacy away from our instant technology world (I requested they add that feature back in before product release, but I guess they didn't listen or didn't have time to listen).

So all in all, if you have anything you would like to protect, or you would like to save some time and not have to format if you happen to get a virus, make sure to keep a security suite on your computer. For those who aren't as computer literate, or for people like me, who would prefer to do what they love on their computer, without having to tweak their security to its peek, buy Norton. The new Norton Internet Security experience has been a great one for me, and coming from a long time user of Symantec products, is a significant step up with performance and coverage compared to some of their other not so liked versions (although they have always did the job whether they were slow or not). Or you can use one of the free ones (AVG and Zone Alarm are some of the more popular free ones for personal use).

So, I'll leave it off at this: Use protection or you might give birth (give birth to a private information fiasco, not a baby silly!).

Half-Life 2: Episode 2!

You heard the title. Half-Life 2: Episode 2 is finally out! I played it today, and as I suspected, it was a complete success. I enjoyed it immensely, and urge anyone who's into the Half-Life series to go catch up with it. It's well worth it. The story is deep, and I'm guessing a lot of thinking goes into the story, with elements that appear to come from many great pieces of work.

So, login to steam, and grab this game. If your a fan of Half-Life, you will not be disappointed!

Another thing, when you purchase off of steam, you'll enjoy the benefits of digital downloading that Valve is helping to push main-stream. Steams ease of use has gotten better, and as more games become available on it, it is eliminating the need for those annoying CD-keys and CD's that are so widely despised throughout the gaming community.

My Start-Up Life

I was in my local bookstore the other day, and decided to pick a book I hadn't heard of before. The book tells the story of Ben Casnocha, a very young entrepreneur who started Comcate in 2001 when he was only 14 years old. Ben talks about his experiences in Silicon Valley, and about problems he had to overcome in order to triumph; personal and business wise. All in all, I found it to be a great book. It also brings up the question that has been floating around recently (because of the reality TV show Kid Nation), that asks if children are being protected too much, and are prevented from "integrating into the real world" as quickly as they are capable of. Anyways, enough rambling from me, if you come across this book, pick it up and give it a read (My Start-Up Life by Ben Casnocha).

Internet Ad Controversy

I am growing very tired of people whining about advertising revenue being lost due to ad blocking. I guess they've been bothered by the television stations going bankrupt from lost advertising, and the loss of the lawsuit in 1979 that allowed it... Err, wait a minute. Television stations are still selling advertising space, and last time I checked, it's not cheap either. So, what is the big difference from VCR's to web advertising?

Well, to start off, web advertisers are addicted to clicks. And this is one primary reason people are blocking ads in the first place. Advertisers enjoy routing their customers through their servers, instead of just putting it on the primary server the web page is on. Many of these advertising companies must not be in touch with their watchers. Most people, whether they know it or not, have suffered terrible load times due to advertisements on a page. These are not things they wanted to load, but instead, things forced at them for profits and exposure. They could at least maintain their servers and keep load times quick. Take a lesson from Google's ads and servers. And, after saying this, I must clearly state my opinion on the internet advertising business. I completely agree with the role advertising plays, and that it is there for a reason. It's not practical to get rid of it. It helps consumers get the information they want, while it helps web site owners pay for their hosting and maybe make some additional profit to keep them working on their sites. Web advertising still must evolve a lot (and if any high traffic site wants to hire me, I'd gladly help your advertising evolve!).

One thing that helps keep advertising on a page is entertainment. They have learned this time and time again with television, yet, when it comes to the internet, many ads are still dull. Anything more than text, should be entertaining. Any time spent watching an ad is good or bad exposure, depending on the reaction of the consumer to the ad. If it's a fast loading, entertaining ad, people are more likely to spread it, talk about it, and remember it. That is the nature of the internet. One of the best things for an advertiser is for their ad to go viral.

I'm not worried about anyone blocking Firefox (at least anyone worth while on the internet, the people blocking Firefox might as well not exist). Lets face it, there isn't an easy way of telling if someone is using an ad-blocking program, and blocking all of a group of users is lost profits, exposure, and potential purchases. Anyone interested in keeping a good image with users, while at the same time keeping their focus on profits, would not cut Firefox users off.

Now, lets pretend that for some odd reason, everyone who uses the internet suddenly learned how to install ad-blocking software and plug-ins, and suddenly the world wide web became straight to the point. I seriously doubt it would be the downfall. It may affect a few, but, I guess that would be Darwinism at work. Weeding through websites, and deciding what worthy few would stay around. And another thing, I seriously doubt if everyone had ad-blocking software, that it would be the downfall of internet advertising. Nope, we would still have to live with it. Thats when creative individuals come up with alternative ways of advertising. Even I have many ideas that are certainly implementable and profitable, for web 2.0 sites, as well as the ordinary static sites.

Big advertising sites such as Google have smartly decided not to comment on this issue as it may bring up too much publicity for ad-blocking software and do damage. They think the best way to keep everything the way it is, is to keep quiet and let all the fuss about advertising die down. I think that is the best move for this situation.

Now, lets look at one of these few individuals who seem to not be worried about advertising revenue in the first place because they blocked all Firefox users, but still raise a fuss. According to New York Times, only 2.5 million people use Adblock Plus, one of the more popular ad-blocking plugins, and Firefox has been downloaded more than 400 million times. This site, whyfirefoxisblocked.com, is a site some people redirect Firefox users to. The latest post on the site seems rather mad towards all German people (the developer of Adblock Plus is German), saying as a German, the developer doesn't understand the concept of standing up for their rights. It goes on to say that German people "placidly" allowed Hitler "to turn their nation into his own personal toilet...". He also says that Americans had to come in and rescue the world from their mess. He also goes on to say that as an American, he has to stand up for what's right. Well, he is one of those few that will end up going extinct going by his attitude. He is obviously against open source software, seeing how he expects Mozilla to disallow the Firefox plugin (obviously he picks and chooses which rights to stand up for). And while I'm talking about his comments, let me just point out that it was America who sat "placidly" around when the world was already in war. It was America who decided it wasn't its problem, and it was America who wrongly made that decision. And don't get me wrong, I love America, I just felt I had to point that out.

To end on an educational, yet humorous point, I noticed that at the end of the latest post on whyfirefoxisblocked, the word cohorts is used. Well, I just had to point this out. While taken out of context, the word cohort in computer science means; to quote wikipedia, "A cohort in computer science is a group of proximate data and/or operations. It is a mean for scheduling to achieve greater performance." So thank you whyfirefoxisblocked, at least you see why some of us block ads; the developer is trying to achieve greater performance!!

Anyone else have an opinion about the state of web advertising and the future of it? Leave a comment, I'd love to hear!

Minor Template Changes

As I'm sure you've noticed, I just changed my template look. I said I was working on a template for the blog a while back, and this is actually not the one. I'm still working on a template, but the plainness of the blog was getting to me and I just decided to change a few parts. So, any comments? I would love to hear what anyone has to say.

Quote of the Week

"Imagination rules the world." - Napoleon Bonaparte

Quote of the Week *BioShock -Could be Spoilers*

Sorry I missed the quote of the week this weekend. Blame it on BioShock. I've been playing it non stop, and it's an awesome game. So I figured I'd just put a couple of quotes from the game here. No idea if someone would consider these a spoiler.. Some people like to enjoy every single line of the game. So, you've been warned.

"There is no god or king. Only man."
"Altruism is the root of all wickedness."

Apple Wants to Slash Prices, I Agree

Apple wants to slash their tv show prices on iTunes to 99 cents. This would be a great way to encourage the adoption of legal downloads over the internet. I'm certain consumers (including me), would take it very well. I don't have tv show downloads available here in Canada from iTunes though (if I'm mistaken, please tell me!). There are many problems with lowering the prices, including the people from Hollywood. I don't think they will take this very well.

Just recently, NBC left iTunes because they couldn't get the prices they wanted for their shows. Apple claims NBC wanted to charge 4.99 per episode! What is happening to the entertainment industry? Do they really think they can screw the consumer that bad, and not expect consumer retaliation or increased pirating? If anything, prices should drop. Apple is on the right track. What are we paying the same price as retail for? Packaging? I don't think so. So what for?

I've talked before about increasing media downloading. Its the way of the future, and the industry has to start getting on board. So, I hope NBC has fun being the supreme loser of the online industry. Thanks for stopping legitimate watchers from obtaining shows with THE multimedia downloading powerhouse. No one minds multi-platform show downloading. So, have fun losing profits NBC. And this should be a lesson for the rest of the industry.

On the other hand, I applaud Apple for sticking to the prices, and not letting anyone screw the consumer. This of course, has a business reason as well. It wouldn't make the top dog of music and video downloading look good if they charged the outrageous price of 4.99. People would have blamed the price on Apple.

The Chaser Group Pulls Prank On APEC

The Chaser team pulled a pretty good joke on the security at APEC, getting through security checkpoints with one of them dressed as Osama bin Laden. They got within meters of President Bush, and apparently were also very close to being shot by sniper teams. The security teams are lucky it wasn't really terrorists. Here's a news clip covering the incident. Enjoy.

Quote of the Week

"Attack life, it's going to kill you anyway." -Steven Coallier

Virgin Galactic, And the Path to Space

Pioneering a commercial space company is not easy. Impossible as it may sound, Virgin Galactic believes it can get commercial passengers into space as soon as 2009 or 2010, eventually making space adventures affordable to the average person. We are approaching the private space age, which in my opinion, was bound to come, as NASA's innovations have been somewhat lacking after a few terrible accidents. The time is ripe for a commercial space race.

However great, and affordable, the new age space flight sounds, it does have
its costs. Not just money, but like anything truly pioneering, it has a cost of lives. Accidents are bound to happen in unexplored fields. Recently, it has come to knowledge that Virgin Galactic's partner, Scaled Composites, LLC had an accident when it was secretly testing a cold-flow test of nitrous oxide. A cold-flow test is a test on a rocket engine without actually firing the rocket, in order to test its proficiency. Concerning the accident, Virgin Galactic has said "We have heard the news of a serious incident at Scaled Composites at Mojave Airport. We extend our deepest sympathies to those involved and their familes.". They have said they will await investigations before making anymore comments.

I truly feel for the families of those killed, and wish the injured a quick recovery. Although accidents such as these are terrible, I hope it does not effect the advancement of space travel. The people working for space companies know the dangers, and I believe they wouldn't want their deaths to be taken for granted. More then anyone else, I think they wanted to be a part of the evolution of man-kind, and will be forever engraved in space history for their sacrifices in helping bring space travel to life. Virgin Galactic has also said the accident has not affected the customers booked for flight, and 4 new customers have even signed up.

In end to this story, here's a few videos from Virgin Galactic that I think you'll find interesting:





-CNN article: Virgin Galactic keeps low profile after explosion
-Virgin Galactic's Website
-Scaled Composites, LLC's website

Taking A Stand

There are many injustices in the world. On our home front, in the country next door, they are all around. These injustices, most of the time, feel too large for a single soul to make a difference. I recently read a blog about "Images That Changed The World?!". It reminds me of all the people who are willing to sacrifice their lives for the common good. Selfless people who show that it is possible to change the world, or at least the way we view it. And it shows that we as a human race must still make major improvements.

I would just like to share a photo from the blog. It was during the Tiananmen Square protests, when the Chinese government sent in tanks to crush the protesters. Time Magazine named the "unknown rebel" one of its "100 most influential people of the 20th century" in 1998. In 2003, Life Magazine named the photo one of the "100 Photos that Changed the World". I think the photo is very powerful and inspiring, showing what one man can do against an army. It also reminds us of our freedoms we take for granted everyday. If you haven't seen it for some reason, take a look:

-Link to "Images That Changed The World?!" blog
-Link to the Wikipedia article about the "tank man"

Quote of the Week

"There are some people who live in a dream world, and there are some who face reality; and then there are those who turn one into the other." -Douglas H. Everett

Apple Leopard Introductory Video Leaked!

What appears to be the new Leopard introductory video has been leaked on to the internet. We never really will know if this is the real deal until launch, because Steve Jobs likes to throw people off track and is vigilant about leaks. It looks really well done. Here is the apparent leak:

Why don't they make commercials like this more often?

Heres a Sprint BlackBerry Advertisement. Check it out!

Awesome Slip And Slide

Was just browsing and saw a post about this. This Youtube video is a little old, but if you haven't seen this yet, check it out!

My Mid-Range Computer Dream

I've talked a lot about technology that is entering our society. I haven't mentioned much about what I like to do. When I'm not reading news, I like to enjoy some high end gaming. The power of our computers are increasing fairly rapidly, consumers have been able to get quad cores for a while now! I'll be using the Canadian site NCIX since, apparently, Newegg doesn't allow shipments to Canada. If anyone knows any places with cheaper parts, feel free to share! Well, here is my Dream Mid-Range Computer system:

CPU: Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 Quad Core Processor LGA775 Kentsfield 2.40GHZ 1066FSB 8MB Retail Box Price: $329.99

Motherboard: EVGA Nforce 680I SLI LGA775 Conroe ATX DDR2 2PCI-E16 2PCI SATA2 RAID Sound GBLAN 1394 Motherboard Price: $245.68

Videocard: EVGA E-GEFORCE 8800GTS 500MHZ 640MB 1.6GHZ GDDR3 Dual DVI-I HDTV Out HDCP DIRECTX10 Video Card
Price: $438.12

Memory: Corsair XMS2 TWIN2X2048-6400C4 2GB 2X1GB PC2-6400 DDR2-800 CL 4-4-4-12 240PIN Dual Channel Memory Price: $134.99

Hard Drive: Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 250GB SATA2 8.5MS 7200RPM 16MB Cache Hard Drive 5YR MFR Warranty Price: $73.98

Case: Antec P180 ATX Advanced Mid Tower Aluminum Case 4X5.25 1X3.5 6X3.5INT No PS W/ USB & Audio Ports Price: $144.04

Soundcard: Creative Labs Sound Blaster X-FI Xtremegamer FATAL1TY Professional Series Sound Card 7.1 PCI Retail Price: $169.99

Optical Drive: Samsung SH-S203B Black SATA DVD+RW 20X8X16 DVD-RW 20X6X16 DL 18X/12X INT DVD Writer OEM W/ Vista SW Price: 37.99

Power Supply: PC Power & Cooling Silencer 750 Quad 750W ATX V2.2 EPS12V 24PIN SLI Active PFC Power Supply Black Price: $183.52

Operating System: Microsoft Windows Vista Home Premium Edition 32BIT DVD OEM Price: 130.59

Reasons for choosing:

CPU: I chose the Core 2 Quad Q6600 because of the price. For a mid range computer, 300ish dollars isn't a bad deal. Then, there's the quad core part. A few month's ago, this beast was priced at around 600, then, Intel decided to halve it with the release of some of its newer processors. While many games aren't multi-threaded, expect to see most of the new ones using multiple cores. So, to me, it's a lasting investment that allows you to prepare for the future, while at the same time, telling your friends your cores pwn their cores hardcore.

Motherboard: Well, what can I say. First of all of course, it's an SLI board, with 2xPCI-e x16 slots, so there's room for the future if I ever decide to go SLI. And also, I hear it's a good overclocker. It has plenty of other slots for more components, and lifetime warranty.

Videocard: While this card isn't the best out, it's a direct X10 card, and it's the 640MB version. Again, it's got a lifetime warranty. You can easily drop a hundred bucks or more by downgrading to the 320MB version, which should be enough to play new games with, for a while yet at least. Or, as I would do, wait until around Christmas for the next gen Nvidia cards to come out. By then, compatibility issues with Vista will hopefully be figured out, and you'll get a much better card (albeit, you may have to wait longer for the mid-range cards to come out).

Memory: Here, I got 2GB's of ram. If you wanted to spend a little more, you could go with 4GB's to future proof your rig, but it's not needed right now, not to mention, it won't do any good on a 32bit system. So here, I basically just got a decent pairof 1 GB modules that will last until I need to upgrade to 4 gigs or to a new system, which ever comes first.

Hard Drive: One of the reasons I picked this is for the 5 year manufacturers warranty and the price. 250 gigs is decent right now for me, and I have some other drives sitting around. But you could easily put another hundred in and get a much bigger drive, or, put around 450 in and get a terabyte drive.

Case: I was looking for simplicity when choosing this case. This is an elegant looking case, with plenty of room inside for the massive directX10 cards. If you move your case a lot, this may not be the one for you, since it's quite heavy.

Soundcard: The Fatal1ty sound card is a premium card. I enjoy my sound, and want the best quality, whether I'm playing a game, listening to music, or watching a dvd. As well, it has something called X-ram which might give some extra performance in supporting games, but probably not a noticeable one, seeing as how this system is powerful enough on its own.

Optical Drive: I didn't really pick this drive over any other one, and I could just as easily have gone with any other. I went with this one for sata, and the 20x speed (if you can find any blank media capable of that speed).

Power Supply: One of the most important parts of the system. Always put up an extra buck to ensure you get a quality PSU. This one has rave reviews, and, is a PC power and Cooling model. This, to me, is THE brand for power supplies.

Operating System: This is a picky one. While it would be nice to get the retail version and be able to use it on future systems, I went with the OEM copy solely because of price. Who knows when Microsoft will throw their next OS at us? As well, I went with 32 bit because 64bit still has many compatibility issues with our current software, and it will be some time yet before 64bit becomes mainstream (probably because of people thinking the way I am).

There were some assumptions I made. I assumed the use of your older keyboard, mouse, and monitor. This wasn't meant to be a best of the best system, but instead, a system that does what you want, and presents (hopefully) the least problems. While some of the components are higher end, they can just as easily be substituted for cheaper ones, which is what I would do if I was buying one. The total price for the components is: $1888.89 (Canadian dollars), not including applicable taxes or shipping. It would be more beneficial to pick the parts up in a store. The price can be easily lowered many hundreds of dollars by waiting for some sales, and substituting parts for cheaper ones. Although I recommend waiting for sales, I don't recommend piecing your system together sale by sale, as you could end up with dOA parts and not know it.

So, there you have it. My dream Mid-Range rig. Feel free to send it to me!

The Final Frontier

Like it or not, space travel is here to stay. Traveling into the unknown is the ultimate risk, and has some foreseeable benefits in the future. With some large private sector entries into space travel, an unprecedented surge in space travel technology is on its way.

Forget about sky diving, that's for people with no adventure. Why not take a rocket into space and dive back from there? Or, if your not an adrenaline junkie like me, why not at least go to the edge of space with Virgin Galactic. These are two of many attempts to give anyone a trip into space. Of course prices will be out of range for the average person, but they will continue to drop as people continue to use the space services.

As for benefits, think asteroids. They have many valuable resources that are just sitting there waiting to be exploited. Nickel, iron, and platinum are some of the mineral deposits. Space Mining could some day be a major industry, and, if space travel is handled properly, in the future, we should have no mineral shortages. It is estimated that an asteroid with a diameter of 1 kilometer has aproxmately 150 billion dollars worth of platinum on it alone! (more info here)

Planets also are the key to our history. We can try to make educated guesses, but by examining our neighboring planets and other parts of the solar system and universe, we can find more clues to our past, present and future.

If we can break through a few barriers, the possibilities for space travel are almost endless. One of the largest barriers to overcome is speed. How can we possibly get anywhere with our current speed? Even 1 light year would take us a long enough time. Our major break through in space travel will come when we break that barrier. In my opinion, its not a question of will we achieve speeds close to the speed of light, but a question of when? And even light speed does not seem sufficient to explore all the realms of existence. I also believe that it is possible to travel at speeds faster than the speed of light. The private space companies popping up everywhere will surely expand our technologies and views of space. After all, slow advancements are slow profits!

So, with lack of major space advancements from NASA for many years, I say, give it a go private sector! Look what the private sector did for computers! And for anyone interested, theres a book about the great minds of our starting private space age. I haven't come across this book yet, but it seems very interesting. So check it out, and let me know how it is! Rocketeers: How a Visionary Band of Business Leaders, Engineers, and Pilots Is Boldly Privatizing Space

Quote of the Week

"Too many people are thinking of security instead of opportunity. They seem to be more afraid of life than death." -James F. Bymes

Sorry, took a little while to think of a quote worth posting.

Quote of the Week

"If you asked me to name the three scariest threats facing the human race, I would give the same answer that most people would: nuclear war, global warming, and Windows." - Dave Barry

Digital Downloads: The Grass Is Greener On the Other Side

Digital downloads are starting to take off, as technology makes it easier for the everyday consumer to download content without any deep understanding of technology. Content is starting to appear more and more on the internet, and is available to anyone at the click of a mouse. Larger companies are starting to see the benefit of the digital age, even if, they still insist on digital rights management. Media companies are always afraid of jumping to new methods of distribution, if you want a definition of conservative, look no further. In this article, we shall examine a couple benefits of digitalization, as well as some possible downsides. In the end, it will hopefully be clear, that going digital favors everyone.

Ease of use is one of the reasons why technology is being developed so rapidly. The computer is now becoming the central controller of media in households. Whether your streaming video to an Apple TV, downloading music, or watching the latest trailer or political campaign on websites such as Youtube, a computer can be used as the final destination for anything media. This central hub is eliminating the use of physical media, no more getting up and putting that damn disc into a player. So it's only logical to start putting the major media on it.

The most significant benefit of digitalization has to do with earth itself. As our population grows, our needs and wants are starting to impact the earth's resources in a large way. Forests are being cut down at an enormous rate, our small supplies of fresh water are being polluted by industries and deemed unsafe. Littering from excess packaging is starting to cover our land. Digitalization of media can help slow down the process of destroying our planet. There would be no more need to package DVDs, music cds, software, or games. Stopping this excessive, and unnecessary mass production could be a big helping hand to returning earth to a better state. And who knows, it might help a few people tidy up their cluttered homes!

With every positive solution comes negative ideas. Because of the internet architecture of openness, some people enjoy downloading content without paying, or in any way benefiting the producers/owners. Now, some say this is killing the industry. I stick with the idea that the people who watch the content without giving back their support would not have payed for it in the first place. While people argue that this is a very ignorant way of looking at it, I believe this to be true. The market is not affected if the people who watch the illegally downloaded content were not going to buy it in the first place. I also think of the content as a free trial. Chances are, if someone enjoys the content, they will likely want to support the provider to create more of it. And they might not have otherwise seen it if they hadn't downloaded it. Its a give and take circle that, in my opinion, benefits everyone.

Maybe, we're accusing people of stealing without looking further into the issue. Perhaps the downloading of illegal content is the result of lacking a decent, easy to use, unobtrusive service. Take a look at iTunes. Before iTunes, music was taken off the internet from peer to peer programs like Kazaa. If all people were taking music off the internet with the sole intention of theft (which companies try to make it look like), would iTunes have then boomed? There are many other services coming with the same idea in mind, provide a service with a legal means of downloading content. Yahoo Unlimited is a promising idea based on renting music. There are some services in the works that plan to give away music for free, using instead, advertising revenue to pay for it.

Most of the technology is here already. Most people have a computer in their household. Hard drive storage space is increasing, and bandwidth is becoming cheaper everyday. Consumer internet speeds are increasing as content on the internet demands more speed. We are approaching a tipping point, one which will fall towards virtual instead of physical content. Even if downloading times aren't instant, you can see there is a demand by looking at systems such as netflix. If people wanted their movies right now, they would go to a movie rental store and rent them. Instead, they order online, and are willing to wait for it to arrive in the mail. So, with this attitude in mind, people wouldn't be bothered much if they had to wait a few hours for downloads to finish. Digital content is the future. Its environmentally friendly, and people want it. So, the only question that remains is, how long will the corporate world keep consumers waiting, trying to push away the inevitable? How much money will companies lose staying out of these new markets that are being created across the internet, one of the few markets that has little regards to borders?

The Unfortunate State of Democracy in the 21st Century

Here we are, a little past the beginning of the 21st century. We have made many great leaps, we are doing the previously impossible. Indeed, we are a constantly changing civilization of freedom and liberty. But, with all these advancements, we cannot be so naive, for there exists something stronger than our civilization, and it has existed since the first of man. We call it power.

Power is the main driving force behind any political system. Democracy is dependent on a balance of powers, to make sure that a single individual doesn't gain too much. Thomas Jeffferson once said "I hope our wisdom will grow with our power, and teach us, that the less we use our power the greater it will be". There will always be those who will seek power. As history teaches us, power corrupts.

As with everything else, voting is being transformed by newer technology. Voting is not like other technology. Voting is one of the major driving forces behind democracies. And this, is where democracy is being attacked. At its foundation. Electronic voting machines are starting to gain popularity. These machines are not being taken seriously enough. There are no computer systems in our age that are perfectly safe. They mostly have been proven unreliable, and, if they have not, then its only because they have not revealed the "brains" of their machine. Machines have been in use for quite a while, but until recently, they were still in little use. Now, with them dreadfully becoming widespread, we are going to see more problems become visible, but by then, it may be too late.

Machines are not alive, they are not magical, they are logical. Unlike humans, machines do not have a sense of patriotism, guilt, or reluctance. They do exactly what they are told. Just recently, a group from the University of Berkeley were given full reign on a variety of voting machines, and they were all hacked successfully. There are those who believe that the United States elections of 2004 had votes altered. A group of people formed the organization Black Box Voting, fighting to stop ballot tampering. There is an HBO documentary on ballot tampering, where Black Box Voting uncovered some scandalous facts.

While I don't live in the United States, it makes me sick to see the power of democracy falling out of the people's hands. Lives were given in its name, and the power is being whittled away from we, the people. Here in Canada, the use of electronic systems are starting to come about. I have yet to encounter one, but it seems only inevitable as the seducing flood of "apparently reliable and safe" technology comes about. For an underlying foundation of our political systems, our approach to new technology is a joke. In Canada, I believe the ballot counting should remain the way it mostly is, in peoples hands, not machines.

Voting is a time for people to put their heads together, and to decide on the fate of their country. It is one of the few times that direct democracy almost occurs. It's a process of openness. We, the people, see how the process works while we control the counting. When we use machines, we cannot see how their "brains" work, the doing of proprietary code. We are depending on a select group of people. Are we slowly on our way to a dictatorship? After all, we can consider the select few as an "elite group of people" at the forefront of decision making.

Edit: Kate pointed out this article - Surprise: U.S. Electronic Voting Systems Fail Security Tests!, showing some of the actual security exploits. Thanks Kate!

Quote of the Week

"There is no good or evil: only power and those too weak to seek it." - J. K. Rowling

Quote of the Week

"I see my path, but I don't know where it leads. Not knowing where I'm going is what inspires me to travel it." -Rosalia de Castro

Quote of the Week

"It is never too late to become what you might have been." - George Eliot

Quote of the Week

"Why join the navy if you can be a pirate?" - Steve Jobs

Linux is Ready for Mainstream

In recent years there has been a small change in desktop computers. Users that are getting tired of Microsoft and their proprietary technology are slowly converting to Linux. Linux has been improving rapidly, and is coming to the point where it's ready out of the box for consumer use.

Manufacturers like Dell, sense a demand for the Unix based operating system, and have started offering it. There are many distributions of Linux, tailoring to specific needs. And Linux has evolved. You no longer need to know how to compile the kernel, or how to partition your hard drive. For the average home user, the Linux Desktop is starting to be just as easy, if not easier, than Windows.

After I began to use Linux, every time I needed Windows, I was becoming increasingly annoyed. I saw Windows Update for what it was, slow, redundant (think Windows Genuine Advantage), and inefficient. When you install an update, Windows has to be restarted. And damn, if you choose not to, those messages to reboot harass you until you go insane. Not to mention, Windows Update mostly updates Windows itself, there aren't very many other things that use it. Move over to Linux, where they have package managers, and there auto update will check for not only operating system updates, but application and package updates as well. The only time you have to restart Linux is when you patch your kernel.

Open source technology is coming to the main stream. It is easily accessible, and its ease of use is increasing. If you don't believe me, google open source switch. Many governments and business's are looking for ways to benefit from open source technology. There are even other industries taking advantage of the open source way. There are open source car ideas(1) (2), and even a gold company took advantage of mass collaboration to find gold (crowd sourcing).
By the way, as I said before, if you can get a hold of Wikinomics, it's is an interesting read.

CNN fudging the facts, then accusing Michael Moore

Being an occasional watcher of CNN, I found most of their stuff to be on par with the truth. I hadn't seen a Michael Moore news broadcast with CNN before though. I was recently pointed towards a clip from CNN about the latest documentary, Sicko. I watched the clip, and Michael Moore did not make it boring. I like Moore's attitude, and his ability to stick up for what his documentary was about, as well as what the facts are.

I wandered over to his site after the clip, and looked at the facts that CNN "fudged". I haven't seen any of Michael Moore's other documentaries, not out of lack of interest, but because of lack of time. From what I've seen, the film Sicko is a must see (and I will make time). And clearly, if the facts are shown in the movie like Michael Moore portrayed, I'm sickened by CNN's lack of checking the facts. For a news station, especially "the most trusted name in news", this doesn't seem like they're very reliable. Maybe Michael Moore is right, and it has fallen pray to the world of pharmaceuticals. I think it was just a thrown together set of mistakes they made, but still, to be that catastrophic, I would expect CNN to make an apology.

So, if anyone reading this knows if CNN made an apology, could you point me in the right direction? If not, I think I'll write a letter. I invite everyone else who has the same opinion as me to do the same. One letter might not do much, but if enough are written, maybe it will make CNN respond to their mistakes. More information on writing a letter is at the bottom of this article.

By the way, heres the link to the CNN vs the facts page on Michael Moore's site: http://www.michaelmoore.com/sicko/news/article_10017.php

To contact CNN, you can use this web form: http://www.cnn.com/feedback/forms/form6a.html?2
Or the method I like, send a hand written letter to them.
I'm not sure if this address is right, I couldn't find a contact us link on CNN's page, so I used Google maps. Here is what the address appears to be:

190 Marietta St NW
Atlanta, GA 30303, USA

(404) 827-2300

Always On

A slow but steady cultural transformation is occurring. People are adopting the values of an "always on, always available" world. The internet is at the middle of this transformation, a behemoth of information that continually grows, and allows easy collaboration at any time. More then ever before, are we able to harness people in an integrated network as the world's largest human supercomputer. When you put the millions of people on the internet together to complete specific tasks, there are endless possibilities. An example is chacha.com, which lets you use a live search guide to help you find what you're looking for. Chacha pays people 5 to 10 dollars an hour to help assist its customers.

The power of the internet is just beginning to be harnessed. If every idle moment of time people spend on the internet could be put towards a purpose, much could be accomplished. The time can be taken from many things people already do everyday, and wouldn't affect anyone's day on the internet by much. Take for instance the ReCAPTCHA project. Captchas are common in our internet world. They act to deter the efforts by spammers and hackers (or crackers, whatever your prefer to call them) to create accounts. Captcha's helped prevent these spammer attacks, which were significantly hurting server loads around the world. Now, bot algorithm's are getting more complex, and some are able to determine some captcha's. The ReCAPTCHA project helps by making the text a little harder to read, thus throwing off the bots. But the main point of ReCAPTCHA is to help document pre-computer age books that could not be read by text recognition software. It's done by using two words for the captcha. The first, an unrecognizable word that the person filling in the captcha determines, and the second word, a known word by the computer to verify you aren't a bot. When quite a few people fill out the first word, the word is known because a few people helped to verify what it is. There are similar ideas in the work for things like videos, pictures, and all sorts of digital content. As the internet expands, these are only going to become more common.

The planet is the most powerful supercomputer, and I can't wait to see what kind of things will be done with this massive power in the future.

A new era.

We are on the brink of a technological revolution. This will be no small change. It will change the entire world around us. How we live, work, play, and inform. It is known as the "web 2.0". It is changing our world into one of mass scale collaboration, a world of openness. Companies, large or small, will have to adapt.

In recent years, companies that are defining the "web 2.0", have flourished. Sites like Digg, Myspace, and Facebook, are changing the way we communicate; sites like Wikipedia, changing the way we store and use information.

Myspace and Facebook are changing the way advertisers work. Before, incentives (contests, etc) had to be given to get information from people -- things like age, work, education, hobbies, and interests. Now, people freely give this away, making it public for all to see.

The idea of a wiki; a source of information available for people to use and edit freely; allows for companies to put together a massive collection of information for their employees to make use of. Some companies are even taking mass collaboration to the next level, showing all their companies hidden secrets, and providing an incentive to help collaborate with them. Incentives vary from employment with the company, to cash prizes for the best solutions or ideas.

Some, however, are against this change in the roles of society. There are those that would rather the people of the world stayed out of business. They believe that giving information away only works against them. They say proprietary company holdings are the only way to go, providing hard earned value for work.

No matter who is right, one thing is certain. The ball has been set in motion, and there is no way to stop it. The era of mass collaboration is upon us, where the consumer is almost another subsection of companies, helping to create things ranging from instruction guides, to mods and other add-ons to products.

Welcome to a new era. Welcome to the "Web 2.0".

The resurgence of Yahoo!?

The CEO of Yahoo!, Terry Semel, was recently replaced by co-founder Jerry Yang. Many people jumped with excitement at the thought that maybe, after all this time of torture, Yahoo! might be able to turn things around. Even after being sent into a never-ending tail dive by their biggest competitor Google, they're still around at least, right? I for one am hoping for a revival of Yahoo!. I think some good old competition might help kick things up another notch on the internet, and that is when we will start to see some unimaginable technologies evolve for our use.

One major downside is that Jerry Yang hasn't had much experience in dealing with corporate workings. Even though he was CEO of Yahoo! in their 'startup' days, he was never CEO when Yahoo! went public. Even more, according to the London Times, Yang was a big supporter of Terry Semel, and a consultant in some important decisions (I'm assuming one of them to be the rumored failure to buy out Google years back), that left Yahoo! tailing behind Google. So, with that said, there has been some action to merge their search and display advertising departments, and an overall attempt to oil the gears and restructure the company.

I think they need to start taking lessons from the masters, and assign a "cultural manager", someone who keeps things going at Yahoo!, giving the feeling of a startup company, and motivating the employees. One would think that after many years of working for a company, your motivation would start to plummet, especially in the case of a failing company.

With the recent redesign of its advertising platform, Yahoo! is thought to have a boost in sales and start climbing back up as early as this year. So, please Yahoo!, take it slow, steady, reassuringly, and if something as good as Google falls into your lap next time, jump for it!

Did you notice?

My blog has now moved to www.KyleJorgensen.com. Google offers some awesome hosting services, and I felt it was time to get a new web domain.

Wikinomics

I just bought the book "Wikinomics". I've been reading it with great interest. The book brings up a lot of great points, and tries to show that there is a revolution going on among corporate entities. It argues that companies must learn to collaborate on a massive scale in order to stay competitive and refreshing, because if they don't, another will. Sharing all of a companies well kept secrets might seem like corporate suicide at first, but the book raises some very good arguments as to why collaborating with others outside a company can be beneficial. A great read if your into books on economics, even better if your into the way technology is changing the way the world works.

Google phone! MYTH OR REALITY?

Some pretty exciting things are happening, and the pace seems to be quickening. First, the announcement of Apple's iphone, now rumors of a Google phone? If the rumors are true, the Google phone isn't a high end phone, but rather a phone with web connectivity that is meant to lower the price and better integrate the web to keep the world connected.

April Fools

While I can't ever come up with something worth while on April Fools, I found Google's quite enjoyable (Google Tisp, Gmail Paper). Leo Laporte also had an enjoyable post (You won't really get it unless you remember the G4 Tech T.V. merger).

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