The Internet & Google & The Issue of Free Speech

The issue of unregulated and uncensored web content seems to be becoming more and more of an issue.

Firstly, China attempts to regulat Google's search results - to the extent that Google has decided to pull their Chinese presence out. Now, the Vietnamese (government(?)) is accused of initiating cyberattacks to take down opinions contrary to the "party line".

This whole issue of censorship and freedem of speech - it is just too much to fathom the right answer.

The scary thing is that I think that this will even get more convoluted.

To what extent is the Web an open forum? Is it a place for idealism when one states that freedom of speech is the be all and the end all, or are there limits - must there be limits?

Defamation would clearly not be acceptable - or would it? If someone "attacked" (for instance) John Travolta's involvement in Scientology and made inaccurate claims - is this right? Is it justified? Can it be regulated in some manner? If not, where does this lead us? Do we end up with a Wild Wild West mentality where anything goes? Or are there "reasonable restrictions" (and how would this be quantified?) as to what is out there in the binary landscape.

I"m not sure that we'll ever have an true answer on this one.

See You Later - Alligator!

I read with not a small amount of bemusement about an alleged Amazon shipment that didn't arrive to the purchaser. Said purchaser called customer service asking what happened to the shipment and was informed by the CSR that the reason why the package didn't arrive is because it was...wait for it....eaten by an alligator.

Now - I don't know the authenticity of this story. If it's part urban legend, totally true, or perhaps the "eaten by an alligator" was just the CSR parlance or euphemism for "dude - we have no idea where the package is".

Still - I find it amusing to visualize what could have happened, in this universe or an alternate one. I can just imagine the delivery dude somehow notifying his superior that said delivery was no more and was nothing more than an appetizer for the 'gator in question.

Around the World in 80 Nanoseconds

With all due respect and apologies to Jules Verne, I ponder today how technology has affected the speed at which we can communicate.

It was often said that the invention of the airplane made the world “smaller”. Certainly, no-one ever took this literally, but the concept is that the world feels smaller. Instead of taking days to cross the Atlantic by steamship, this was
reduced to hours.

Whereas a sail across the Atlantic was a major undertaking due to the time involved, the advent of air travel made it much more feasible to just “pick up and go”.

In addition to air travel, the invention of the telephone revolutionized communications. What would have taken days, weeks, or even months, could now be talked about instantly. Being able to pick up the phone to call a family member or colleague and to ask a question and to be able to get a response back in real-time is a very powerful ability. Where telephone communications did not exist, perhaps two people located across the world were not able to communicate back and forth much more than a half dozen times.

The Internet has taken this further and not only are we able to chat in real time, but we can share information. The proliferation of social networking – the Facebooks, the Twitters and all of the other social environments has opened up new doors at being able to share information with loved ones.

Case in point, the distance between Toronto, Canada and Sofia, Bulgaria is approximately 4,800 miles. If one says, for the sake of argument, that it takes 2 seconds (an eternity in a digital age!) for data to transmit back and forth, that would work out to a “speed” of (if my math is right) of 8,400,00 MPH! Heady stuff being able to talk to someone across the Atlantic at such breakneck speed! What a wonderful way to be able to speak to a loved one who was born in the “middle of the last century”!

Along the same lines, business are starting to realize the benefit of this type of networking – of the ability to instantly communicate and share data with colleagues across the world.

Where instant messaging in the corporate world was once taboo, it is slowly becoming embraced by the big-wigs in the ivory tower as a way to increase productivity.
One tool that is becoming more common is Microsoft Sharepoint. Think of Sharepoint as being a “blank canvas” where companies can post content. Not only can files be posted in an easily accessible and secured area, but it lends itself quite well to collaboration. Instead of storing files locally on a LAN where others can update and maintain, Sharepoint allows collaboration of these documents regardless of their geographic location.

Think back to my analogy of how before the advent of the telephone, that communications were restricted to how ever many letters could be ferried back and forth.

One of the beauties of Sharepoint is that as a blank canvas, it easily adapts itself to how the organization works.

As an example of this, I recently left a large financial services organization. Their implementation of Sharepoint reflected their corporate culture. It was highly staged, regulated and was very methodical in nature. Not making any judgments on this – this is just the way that they did business. Contrast this to my new employer – a mid-size accounting firm that also has Sharepoint. The corporate culture here is much different and it lends itself to empowering the various teams to design a Sharepoint site that meets their individual needs.

The software development team here has some great sites on Sharepoint for managing defects, requested enhancements and also for sharing information among the developer team.

This is not an article about what is a good and what is a bad Sharepoint
implementation. In both cases, Sharepoint clearly reflects the corporate culture, and in my mind, that is one of the strengths of Sharepoint and it is precisely this characteristic that I think that any tool should have.

The truly scary thing is that I think that the world will just continue to get smaller and smaller. Will our children and grand-children scoff at our “primitive” 100mbps access? Will they wonder how archaic our methods of communication were – and will they marvel at how we were actually able to get anything done.

The mind boggles.

My New Word to Add to the High Tech Lexicon

As I came into work on the subway this morning, I noticed a gentleman watching a movie on a handheld device and then noticed the guy to his left subtly "cine-peeking" as he watched over the shoulder :)

Big Brother? Hollywood Plot? Naw - Just a Good Healthy Sense of Paranoia

Sitting here, I'm starting to get a phobia of webcams. There's one hooked onto my monitor at work, and I just can't help thinking - what IF....what if the webcam is on and I don't know. Not bloody likely, but there's no light on the webcam to show if it's on or not, so I come back to the same question - what if....

Of course, right now, if my paranoia was legitimate, someone is getting a nice view of the top of my desk :)

A Grave Concern

I was bedazzaled, amused and somewhat concerned over a story this past week on how technology is used (much akin to my earlier dog-twitter blog entry).

Apparently, one of the newer uses of technology is to imbed a microchip into one's headstone.

Why? You ask?

Well - this chip contains audio clips, photos and other miscellaneous tidbits from the deceased (of course - before the grim reaper knocked on the door!).

Then, a dearly beloved could put their smartphone up to the chip and get this content.

Talk about how there could be some interesting "last words" from those to chicken to say so when they're alive. "Bernice, I never loved you - I was just in it for the money".

Call be cynical, but holey-moley, what's next? The marriage of internet ready fridges meet the gravestone, so one can surf the web while visiting their loved one? Perhaps an embedded monitor to view the deceased Facebook memorial page? Hmmm, I might just be on to something!

Geolocationing...Apparently a New Fad - and More than Apparently - Perhaps Not such a Good Idea!

It astounds me how people seem to jump on the latest technological fad without giving due consideration to the impact. One of the "hot" technologies is that of geolocationing which is a service which tells your friends - automatically and in real time - where you are at the moment.

I guess the general thought is "gee - wouldn't it be great if everyone could see if I was at the closest Mickey-Dee's - stuffing my face? Maybe one of my friends will pop by!"

Among the things that I think that people DON'T think about are:
- who else than my friends can see where I am - and do I want that to be such public knowledge?
- and more more importantly - by knowing where I am, one can also tell where I am NOT. I am not at home - home could be unattended. I am not in my car, if I'm at the latest Starbucks.

I'm betting that the people that are the most in favour of geolocationg systems are those who are more interested in where you're not - rather than where you are.

I'm Guessing That Cyberspace is Prone to Dumbasses Too - But That Should Really Go Without Saying

Recent article on Associated Press where this yahoo (note: lower case - not Yahoo-cased!) in Mexico was posting in Facebook how he was having a great time - despite being wanted on sundry charges in the good old U S of A. Well - the latest thing in law enforcement is (and this should be no surprise to anyone) that the good guys with badges use every tool at their disposal - including social networking. Sure 'nuff, this twit (note: twit - not Twitterer) had a new "friend request) from someone who he didn't really know that well. Well - one thing led to another - now he has PLENTY of time to consider that intelligence is no less important in cyber-space than in the real world.

Censorship - In The News Yet Again

Let's see if I can get this right without cheating...

A couple of days ago, the President(?) of Venezuala(?), Mr. Chavez(?) (okay, feel free to add in the correct title, country and name! The rest of the information is correct - and even accurate!, went on record that saying that the Internet should be "regulated" and censored. As one example, he had stated that his opponenets had published blatantly false accusations against him.

For one thing, I don't see how it can be possible to regulate the Internet. It will always be the Wild Wild West and no sooner will they have one hole in the dyke plugged then another will occur (to mix some metaphors I guess!). That having been said - even if they found a way to regulate the Internet - to pass legislation about what can and cannot be said - how on earth to they plan on enforcing the regulations? Will each government body be responsible for their own citizens? Just sounds very pie-in-the-sky to me.

SxSWi - Am I DeGeeking?

Saw an article on the SxSWi today. At first, I confused it with the annual(?) South by Southwest Music Festival and quickly discovered that this is apparently a "spin-off" of SxSW (aka the Music Festival).

I realized then, that perhaps I am degeeking myself when I would be more excited to attend SxSW than SxSWi!

Virtual "Red Light District"

There has been news lately about a proposal to create a virtual "red light district". The current proposal submitted to ICANN (international organization whose responsbility it is to approve and reject domain naming issues such as these) is that the adult content sites would be able to have a .xxx domain extension.

However, this would strictly be voluntary and it certainly doesn't mean that all adult content will be hosted here, so in a respect, this very well might just be a panacea for all things sex-related, but I suppose that it's a start.

Still - even if this proposal is accepted and implemented, treading carefully will always be the motto when navigating the world wide web.

Let's not even get into the topic of what is pornography and what is art either, that's a whole other subject!

Tag Day for Bill Gates?

Poor Bill - no longer the richest kid on the block anymore. This title has been usurped by some dude - from a developing country (I believe) none-the less!

On a side note, Mr. Bill is certainly one of those people that I would answer to the "if you could have dinner with 8 people, who would they be". Not only do I admire his business accumen, but even more-so, I have a great respect for the amount of good that he and his wife do with their fortune.

I'd be willing to bet that even half of the bajillion-aires made the same commitment to social programs, this world would be a better place.

The Future of Computing - Say What? Really?

There was an article recently by a Google big-wig who stated that in three years, conventional computers will be obsolete, replaced by nicely convergent smartphones.

Hogwash - say I. Perhaps (and probably more than likely) smartphones will be more prevalent - more powerful, and certainly more "strategic".

Until smartphones have the input and output capabilities of a notebook or desktop workstation (or even a netbook for that matter), I think that one need not dread the obsolence of any computer purchases. Let me qualify this - no matter the technology, any hardware that is purchased now will be effectively obsolete in three years anyways, so I doubt if we all have too much to worry on that end.

Spend hearty - and spend fast and make the most of the technology you have. Three years is an eternity in this business.

Microsoft - Spending the Bucks on R&D

Microsoft has announced that they're going to spend $9b on R&D in 2010. Maybe I should forward them my blog rant on the Samsung Internet Fridge and tell them not to spend the money this way :)

The Netbook vs Notebook Dilemma

Started a new job this week and I am seriously considering purchasing a portable device to help me keep track of things and to make it easier to take notes. Especially with meetings - my handwriting is horrible, it is messy and I am slow. Been pondering the purchase of a device to help with this as I am a much quicker typist.

My original thought was to get a netbook. My main rationale is that I want something super portable and light, and that I really don't need a ton of processing power at all - I don't plan on developing applications on it or really putting it through it's paces.

However, I'm being suckered into the siren's call of a sexy laptop. I did take a look at netbooks at Staples yesterday and I was thoroughly unimpressed with the display.

What's a fella to do? Do I drop $400 on a Netbook that I am certain will meet my needs today? I could see that in a year, I might have buyer's remorse as I'm locked into a pretty low-end technology. The alternative is to pony up $800-900 for something a little heavier, sexier and will give me more flexibility.

Shame on Me!

Only 4 blog entries in February! Sorry - things have been a little bit chaotic in the land-of-Rick in February as I changed jobs :)

And Now for Something Completely the Same...

Today, Samsung "announced" their new product, the Internet refrigerator. First of all, I'm getting a little sick and tired of these technologies for the sake of the technology itself - these "innovations" that are just all style - no substance (refer to previous blog entry on the WiFi dog tag that allows Fido to tweet - yes...really!).

But...if you're going to be the kind of company that just likes the technological bling-factor, then please at least be innovative. Internet refrigerator is SO the-end-of-last-century.