God help us; we're in the hands of engineers.

Those that fail to control technology will be controlled by it.

This summarizes my current feelings about information technology in general, and today Google in particular. Yesterday I wrote in another blog about Google’s new browser, Chrome. It is fast, uses few computer resources and has some interesting features. It is also very new. As people start to delve into how it works, concern now is being expressed about the abilities it grants to Google to track everything you do, and track back to your IP address, and cross reference that information to your physical location...its a technology wonder that is a privacy nightmare. The early release of chrome included in the End User License Agreement (EULA) provisions to allow Google access to you computer for any reason they wanted...when privacy groups cried foul, that provision was removed, but one has to wonder if the technology supporting that OOPS! in their policy wasn't left in place?

In a world where news and entertainment blur together, reality and lies are thrown together with abandon, people need to be able to trust something. Trust in government is nil, trust in the news media is nearly nil, and trust in internet news is suspect at best. I honestly think that people have a level of trust in the sanctity of the privacy they cherish while online have been duped, as nearly every browser I have tested (Internet Explorer, Firefox, Safari, Opera and Chrome) have provisions in the EULA for tracking of some of the things you do online.

What is really worrying about Chrome is the suspicion that Google is now venturing into wholesale Deep Packet Inspection, which is known to be used by them to assist the Peoples Republic of China to block searches offensive to the interests of the state. DPI has been used in this country by our government "for national security". That is worrisome enough, now do we really want to trust a private entity to have that level of control, with no oversight what so ever?

In addition to using DPI to secure their internal networks, Internet Service Providers also apply this technology on the public networks provided to customers. Common uses of DPI by ISPs are lawful intercept, policy definition and enforcement, targeted advertising, quality of service, offering tiered services, and copyright enforcement.

(DPI information from Wikipedia)

Oh Politics is ...

What Jesse Really Said About Obama - Funny video clips are a click away

September 07, 2008 - Google to control the Internet?

Those that fail to control technology will be controlled by it.

This summarizes my current feelings about information technology in general, and today Google in particular. Yesterday I wrote in another blog about Google’s new browser, Chrome. It is fast, uses few computer resources and has some interesting features. It is also very new. As people start to delve into how it works, concern now is being expressed about the abilities it grants to Google to track everything you do, and track back to your IP address, and cross reference that information to your physical location...its a technology wonder that is a privacy nightmare. The early release of chrome included in the End User License Agreement (EULA) provisions to allow Google access to you computer for any reason they wanted...when privacy groups cried foul, that provision was removed, but one has to wonder if the technology supporting that OOPS! in their policy wasn't left in place?

In a world where news and entertainment blur together, reality and lies are thrown together with abandon, people need to be able to trust something. Trust in government is nil, trust in the news media is nearly nil, and trust in internet news is suspect at best. I honestly think that people have a level of trust in the sanctity of the privacy they cherish while online have been duped, as nearly every browser I have tested (Internet Explorer, Firefox, Safari, Opera and Chrome) have provisions in the EULA for tracking of some of the things you do online.

What is really worrying about Chrome is the suspicion that Google is now venturing into wholesale Deep Packet Inspection, which is known to be used by them to assist the Peoples Republic of China to block searches offensive to the interests of the state. DPI has been used in this country by our government "for national security". That is worrisome enough, now do we really want to trust a private entity to have that level of control, with no oversight what so ever?

In addition to using DPI to secure their internal networks, Internet Service Providers also apply this technology on the public networks provided to customers. Common uses of DPI by ISPs are lawful intercept, policy definition and enforcement, targeted advertising, quality of service, offering tiered services, and copyright enforcement.

(DPI information from Wikipedia)

September 06, 2008- 11 minutes to load?

By mere coincidence, I clicked on the Yahoo toolbar icon for this page at exactly 8:00 AM this morning. I got three error pages, saying the server unavailable try again later, and finally navigated to the 360 Product blog, and then clicked My Page and got here, after the page loading icon spun around on Firefox 3 for what seemed like forever...I actually left the room, walked down the hall to the kitchen, poured a cup of coffee, walked back (a round trip of 60 feet) and it was still loading...I opened another tab, and loaded MSN in 3 seconds, and launched another tab to load igoogle in 1 sec. When I returned to Yahoo tab....it was still loading.
This would be intolerable in a commercial organization, to have your profit making application take so long to load that potential customers simply left, to look for another vendor.
But Yahoo 360 is a for profit site...ads on the page generate revenue for Yahoo!, and the more users of 360, the more revenue...so Yahoo's decision to crap on the user community seems to have been not well conceived. As a friend of mine (who is also her company network administrator) "I used to like 360, but now its like a big steaming pile of crap!"
People like her and I make decisions about networking tools, and lately both organizations have discussed using IM tools to enhance communications and collaboration quicker than using email...and we both are skeptical about Yahoo. Why? Because if they can launch a product that is widely hailed as the best in class (which 360 was), and then turn around and dump it, why would I recommend using anything they came up with?? Why would I put a lot of resources into deployment of a tool from a vendor(Yahoo) that has a reputation for making such poor decisions???
Honestly, both organizations are looking at Microsoft Messenger, which has been around for years, and constantly improved, and Google Talk.

While mentioning Google, check out Google's new browser, Chrome. Its a very low resources user on you computer, I think its Java based. I tried it out the other day, and will probably use it once they add a few more features. I really like the incognito browser feature, which masks your browsing trail, and deletes browse history when closed. While they say its so you can shop for gifts and then not have to worry about the other party accidentally finding what you looked at, I personally think there are other reasons people will like that feature, like looking at porn on the home computer and being somewhat more confident that the kids wont accidentally find the page daddy was looking at. Or that Big Brother wont download your browse history and see you were looking at How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb (Which is a very good album by U2 by the way).

September 02, 2008..the end of this page?

I am surprised that this page is still going, but it seems like its on its last legs.

I have migrated most of my blogs to Multiply, and i think that as much as i will miss my closer correspondents here, it just isn't working out anymore. I have tried blogger, and it is OK, but leaves me kind of bored...I think in the order of my experience, i would say

yahoo 360 gets a 9: AOL Journal a 3; Blogger a 5, Multiply a 7, and MSN Spaces 6. Windows live Space and Yahoo Mash were both duds, at least Yahoo pulled the plug.

The other thing is some of my friends here have hurt me, not physically, but emotionally. Nothing monumental, but i need to focus on positive...
If you care to share your opinion, please do.

When your day is long
And the night
The night is yours alone
When you're sure you've had enough of this life
Well hang on

Don't let yourself go
Cause everybody cries
And everybody hurts
Sometimes

Entry for Arcade Fire

I like to listen to all kind of music, and i like this band

September 01, 2008

Labor Day...

Like many people I did things today like go to the store, eat lunch out, and basically not much more. Which gave me a lot of time to reflect on things.

Like internet chat. Its kind of boring. It was fun when I first did it 10 years ago, but now seems so blah blah blah. Voice chat...like talking on the phone, only through a webcam microphone set up...sounds like a snooze to me. Let me be clear here, its not that I don't like people, but spending hours online chatting is about like spending hours on the telephone to me, an experience I can do without. No, instead I will waste countless hours alone working on this friggin blog that is now visited by a whopping 6 people a week...and i am not sure about that either, but thats what my hit map program says...

Some of my readers, when I had any, seemed to like some of my fictional work. Others probably hated it, as juvenile or untalented. Whatever.

If God had a name, what would it be
And would you call it to his face
If you were faced with him in all his glory
What would you ask if you had just one question

And yeah yeah

God is great

yeah yeah God is good
yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah

What if God was one of us
Just a slob like one of us
Just a stranger on the bus
Trying to make his way home

If God had a face what would it look like
And would you want to see
If seeing meant that you would have to believe
In things like heaven and in jesus and the saints and all the prophets

And yeah yeah God is great yeah yeah God is good
yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah

What if God was one of us
Just a slob like one of us
Just a stranger on the bus
Trying to make his way home
He's trying to make his way home
Back up to heaven all alone
Nobody calling on the phone
Except for the pope maybe in rome

And yeah yeah God is great yeah yeah God is good
yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah

What if god was one of us
Just a slob like one of us
Just a stranger on the bus
Trying to make his way home
Just trying to make his way home
Like a holy rolling stone
Back up to heaven all alone
Just trying to make his way home
Nobody calling on the phone
Except for the pope maybe in rome