Confused By All The Google/Verizon Network Neutrality Talk?
[ 2 Comments ]Posted on August 10, 2010 by admin in Technology
Tuesday, August 10th, 2010Don’t be. It’s simple. What Google and Verizon are trying to do is comparable to Henry Ford and Harvey Firestone supporting free and open competition of horseless carriages while guaranteeing themselves protected monopolies to make cars.
Confused by all the talk from Google and Verizon about their plans for protecting net neutrality? Don’t be. All the jargon, press releases, and proposals thrown around by both companies are classic strategies. Confuse the public with a flurry of conflicting hints, public statements and denials while doing your best to control the actions of the agency that might regulate you. The nutshell version of what these two companies are trying to do with the internet and wireless broadband access could be likened to Henry Ford and Harvey Firestone supporting free and open competition of horseless carriages while giving themselves protected monopolies of the yet-to-be defined automobile market. It’s dirty. But would you expect anything else from either company during economic times like this? And don’t get me going on the Google “don’t be evil” thing. We joked back in 2008 that Google’s got you covered top to bottom . And the irony of the words you’re about to read being surrounded by Google ads is not lost on me. But here’s the scary truth: if Facebook’s deceiptful privacy practices and attitude have caused you to be angry or concerned, Google’s attitude should trouble you exponentially more. Most recently, Google’s Eric Schmidt was quoted in this article as saying (in reference to the massive amounts of data compiled about you) that “The only way to manage this is true transparency and no anonymity. In a world of asynchronous threats, it is too dangerous for there not to be some way to identify you. We need a verified name service for people. Governments will demand it ” (emphasis mine). This is in line with his December 2009 remark that “If you have something that you don’t want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn’t be doing it in the first place.” Which may be true. But do you want a company like Google or Verizon to be the ones making these decisions? If this cavalier attitude doesn’t trouble you, and if – like many people – you have a Gmail account and use any of Google’s many free tools, try the following, if you haven’t already. Go to your Google Dashboard and see what they’ve been tracking. If you’re a light user of Gmail who just logs in and out to check mail, you’ll see little of interest here. But if you stay logged into your Google accounts all the time, you might be a little disturbed by how much information about you is compiled in one place. And now Google not only wants to know what you HAVE done, they think they can predict what you WILL do. By the way, if they’re so good at predicting the future, this begs the question: how did they not know that Facebook would kick their ass so bad on social networking? Read the rest of this entry »
Cell Phones In America: Can You Hear My Cow?
[ Comments Off ]Posted on July 1, 2010 by admin in Technology
Thursday, July 1st, 2010Why does American cell service suck so much, and why don’t we do anything about it?
 Can you hear my cow? Steve Jobs demonstrates the exact grip and physical location that will allow your new iPhone to function properly. |
As a Verizon customer, I can’t wait until next year when Verizon finally offers the iPhone so I can have a piece of crappy overpriced hardware to match my crappy overpriced service. Just what is it with cellular service in America? We pay more than any other country for service that’s so bad that we need a need a wireless bill of rights to defend ourselves. Call service is worse than ever, billing and contracts are insane (even the government is finally saying so ) but sadly, the most effective consumer activism I’ve seen so far has been as a result of New York Times blogger David Pogue’s Take Back the Beep Campaign. So why don’t we as consumers take more action? My theory is that we can’t get anything organized because of the dropped calls. What do you think? Are you happy with your service & pricing? If you weren’t, would you know what to do about it? A couple of resources you might try would be the Consumers Union’s HearUsNow.org or the FCC web site’s directory or direct complaint form. Or if your complaint is specifically about the new iPhone antenna problem, you could try the solution below.
And One Ring Shall Cool Them All: The Dyson Air Multiplier
[ 1 Comment ]Posted on June 25, 2010 by admin in Technology
Friday, June 25th, 2010Looking for a cool way to stay cool? Check out the Dyson Air Multiplier.
  Theremin players may be disappointed by the sound quality of the Dyson |
While sitting in a friend’s sweltering apartment the other day, I found myself staring mesmerized by his oscillating fan, wondering if anyone had thought about moving fan technology forward since I first did this at my grandma’s house when I was a toddler. Well, if you’re aware of how much James Dyson’s vacuums suck, you won’t be surprised to learn that his fans blow. I mean literally, because actually, they’re kind of, er, cool. And the 350 scientists and engineers that developed them might be offended at my calling them “fans”; Dyson actually has them trademarked as the Dyson Air Multiplier™
How To Archive Or Back Up Your Facebook Account
[ Comments Off ]Posted on June 19, 2010 by admin in Technology
Saturday, June 19th, 2010There’s no single simple way, but there are some free and cheap tools that will do the job.
Been looking for convenient and easy way to archive your Facebook account? Well, tough patooties. There’s no convenient and easy way to do it, but we’ll outline a few methods you can try below. Like many users, I’ve been pondering how Facebook fits into my life, and how I feel about Mark Zuckerberg’s longstanding arrogant disregard for our privacy. I’m not alone; although Quit Facebook Day was a bust, according to a recent Soros poll 60% of users are thinking about quitting, and 16% already have. And although “How Do I Delete My Facebook Account” spiked as a search term in May, there are no numbers to indicate a mass exodus from Facebook yet. I personally won’t be quitting, but Facebook is no longer the more closed, verified network it was when I joined, and that was what I actually valued most about it. As a result, I’ve decided to change how I use Facebook a little bit until something better comes along, and part of that meant archiving and deleting my wall. I might have just deleted it all, but my friends are just too darn witty, and their comments just too precious and ginormously highlarious to click into oblivion. So how do you archive these sentimental treasures? Unfortunately, you can’t just go to “File > Save As” with your Facebook wall. Because of the fact that the site makes such extensive use of proprietary AJAX-like code, you can save a page, but rarely with the comment threads and older posts expanded. Even if you could do it this way, you’d end up with one massive, browser-crashing web page. So I put several tools to use, because each had its own shortcoming. The first thing I tried was the Firefox plug-in ArchiveFB. It’s based on another plug-in called Scrapbook, and allows you to fairly easily Read the rest of this entry »
Star Trek Induced Tech Ennui
[ 2 Comments ]Posted on June 5, 2010 by admin in Technology
Saturday, June 5th, 2010Sure, I’d LOVE to boldly go where no-one has gone before. But not only do we not have the technology, that’s a split infinitive.
 Well, we’ve got the hardware worked out. Now we just need to work on the billing. |
I have a serious case of technology-induced ennui that I can only blame on Star Trek. Sure, iPads are nifty, and it’s really groovy that there are now affordable, terabyte-sized hard drives. Excuse me….*yawns*. I’m underwhelmed. I want some teleporation! And replicators! And a holodeck! And an android (no, not that
