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Loading ...Facebook’s sneakiness
Well, it had to happen. With so many people flocking to Facebook, it was only a matter of time before retailers started trying to nose their way into the community and find out what its members’ buying habits are.
Although Facebookers like their openness and enjoy the idea of sharing their lives with those they’re hooked up with, it seems that the agreement between Facebook and some major retailers has gone even too far for them. Now, if users do not opt out of a program whereby details of purchases are sent to thier friends, everyone in their network will be notified what they bought. To prevent this from happening, users have to un-click a box. If they don’t happen to see that checked box, they are considered to be “with the program.”
That could potentially ruin a lot of Christmas surprises and has seemingly pushed the privacy boundaries for a large portion of users. The backlash, I’m sure, was not unexpected by the involved companies. What they’re most interested in will be the degree of the backlash. How far can we push initiatives like this? is the question they are no doubt trying to answer.
Everyone on Facebook should regognize that more of these types of intrusions, in the interests of identifying spending habits, will be carried out as long as Facebook is the social networking behemoth it is. But it’s safe to say that the use of such “negative-option” sign-up methods is nothing short of a sneaky and slimy tactic on the parts of Facebook and its conspirators. It should be brought to a halt immediately.
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(Rate This Article) Loading ...Russia’s hackers the stuff of Hollywood
What’s going on in Russia these days would make for a great tech-related movie. Think about it: you’ve got all kinds of organized crime groups running amok in what amounts to The Great Bear’s version of America’s 19th Century Wild West, salivating over the money to be made by way of Internet scams.
As analyst Chris Christensen points out in an article I wrote last week, the risk is minimal, the cost of entry negligible, and the monetary rewards can be about as big as…well…Russia.
These groups are offering young local IT brains the chance to make a boatload of cash in an otherwide depressed open economy currently experiencing some very painful adolescent growing pains.
If Hollywood can get it right, this would be a fascinating tableau for an international thriller. And it would go a long way to educating the general public about what’s happening on the Internet and why they have to download so many of those darn things called patches. Because few mediums have the ability to sway mass amounts of people today the way the movies still do.
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(2 votes, average: 8.5 out of 10) Loading ...The ‘Total Disclosure’ debate and Oracle OpenWorld
By Joaquim P. Menezes -
Oracle’s decision to invite bloggers to this year’s Oracle OpenWorld Conference that runs November 11 – 15 has sparked quite an animated discussion in the blogosphere about issues such as: transparency, disclosure, “press” freedom (as bloggers will be registered as press), compromise and so on.
But before we get to that, as there’s still some confusion about what types of privileges invited bloggers will enjoy, here’s a brief run down on what I’ve been able to glean so far:
- From a financial perspective, invitation means “free registration’ for bloggers. It apparently doesn’t mean Oracle will be picking up travel/hotel costs or expenses.
- While it’s called an “invitation”, apparently there’s no “invitees list.” Registration is “open” but to qualify you need to “blog about Oracle, enterprise software, Enterprise 2.0 or another loosely-coupled subject.” If you meet this criterion, you need to register as “Press.”
(As an aside, Oracle’s late-in-the-day decision has led to some interesting situations such as folk stating that they started blogging about Oracle about a month ago – but had registered for OpenWorld - and paid for it - before that, and now want a refund).
Okay, so now about the disclosure and “integrity” debate – one that incidentally, is as old as the hills.
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(2 votes, average: 9.5 out of 10) Loading ...Google’s Open Face Off with Facebook
By Joaquim P. Menezes
The blogsphere is abuzz today with news – and a ton of speculation – about OpenSocial, Google’s new social networking project set to go live Thursday.
OpenSocial is being dubbed Google’s retort to Facebook, the hugely popular social networking site founded in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg.
And yet OpenSocial isn’t a social networking site.
It’s a set of common APIs that software developers can use to write programs for several social networking sites – Google’s own Orkut, as well as others, including LinkedIn, hi5, Friendster, Plaxo and Xing.
So the value proposition – from the developer’s perspective – is the ability to write an application once, and have it used across multiple Web 2.0 sites.
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(2 votes, average: 10 out of 10) Loading ...Hung jury - RFID vs. bar code tags
By Joaquim P. Menezes -
On Friday, I attended a demo at Recall Canada’s Brampton facility – relating to the company’s recently rolled out RFID-based document-management system.
Speakers at the event gushed about the benefits of the new technology to customers.
Sean O’Brien, Recall’s General Manager of Canadian Operations spoke about how the rollout out would enhance the inventory audit process, without driving up customer costs significantly.
He contrasted that with the significant costs and problems associated with inventory audits conducted by conventional bar code scanning processes.
The barcode scanning process (that the Brampton facility has used until now) is labour intensive, time-consuming, costly and prone to error, he pointed out.
“To any audit we would have to go to the rack, locate which bay the carton is in, pull it down, find the bar code, scan the carton, place it back – and then go to the next location to complete the audit.”
Such a manual, bar code, scan of (say) 280 cartons, he said, would normally take around 27 minutes. “With RFID, we can scan those 280 cartons in 30 seconds. We could audit this whole facility – which has 2.5 million cartons – in just five days. That’s how quick this works.”
Recall’s experience notwithstanding, the jury is still out on the question of RFID’s effectiveness versus bar code scanning – and industry observers say many variables should be considered when opting for one or the other technology.
For instance, firms such as Midland, Mich.-based Dow Chemicals have done several pilot tests on RFID and other location-oriented technologies – including traditional bar codes.
Early projects have shown that sometimes — such as when it’s paired with a sensor log to transmit environmental readings during shipments, for instance – the use of RFID makes sense.
But at other times bar codes still prove cheaper and easier.
Both the RFID technology and marketplace are fragmented and slow-moving, analysts say, and costs remain high.
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(2 votes, average: 10 out of 10) Loading ...What’s up doc? - The rise of specialized social networking
By Joaquim P. Menezes -
The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) has a report about how a radiation oncologist – Michael Tomblyn – was able to accurately determine the unusual condition of a patient, thanks to suggestions solicited and received on Sermo.com, a social networking site for physicians.
Tomblyn’s 21-year old patient’s eye was protruding out of its socket and scores of doctors proffered opinions on Sermo.com about possible causes – everything from fungal infection to a cocaine-associated sinus problem.
Eventually, one of those responses steered Tomblyn to the correct diagnosis – rhabdomyosarcoma, a relatively rare form of cancer of connective tissues (sarcoma) that’s most common in younger children.
Tomblyn’s case is not unique.
Like him, more than 25,000 doctors regularly visit Sermo.com to gain insights from colleagues, discuss new clinical findings, report unusual events, and collaborate to enhance patient care.
And Sermo.com itself exemplifies a growing trend – the rise of specialized, sector-specific social networking portals.
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(4 votes, average: 7.5 out of 10) Loading ...The past on an – online – platter
By Joaquim P. Menezes -
More than 15 years ago, when I was a reporter with the Mumbai (then called Bombay) edition of The Times of India (TOI) – India’s largest English language national newspaper – accessing newspaper issues going back more than two years could prove to be quite a longwinded and laborious task.
It involved visiting the paper’s microfilm library, which fortunately was located in the same building. The Times has done a fabulous job of capturing its entire archives going back 169 years (starting November 1838) on microfilm.
These microfilm reels store every item on every page of the paper: articles, news items, editorials, photographs, cartoons, graphics – even the ads, as they originally appeared.
But quite often accessing the solitary item or two I required from a vast stash of microfilm was quite a chore.
I would need to book an appointment, visit the library and then sift through reel after reel to locate the specific article or report I was interested in.
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(2 votes, average: 9.5 out of 10) Loading ...Stop complaining and start fixing unsatisfactory outsourcing
By Dan McLean
It’s a wonder that any Canadian company would even consider outsourcing, based on the startling IDC Canada research, which shows nearly half of those asked in a recent survey said they are neutral, dissatisfied, or very dissatisfied with their experience.
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(2 votes, average: 8 out of 10) Loading ...AMD’s latest release: a ‘We hate Intel’ page
This is talking the semicondcutor rivalry up a notch. Rather than focus on improving is product line and bolstering its go-to-market strategy, AMD is trying to draw users’ attention to its main rival, Intel.
The company has set up a page called “Break Free” on its Web site which lists in detail information about the European Commission’s antitrust investigation into Intel, including press releases, studies and video comments from CEO Hector Ruiz. Banner ads promoting the page are appearing on the New York Times Web site, among others. Not sure what Intel (or even AMD) customers are supposed to do in response to this attack — cheer? Recoil? One thing’s for sure: it’s not a great sales pitch for the latest Opteron chips.
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(2 votes, average: 9 out of 10) Loading ...Losing the Linksys label
Buzz this week that Cisco will be rolling in its Lynksys brand of home networking equipment under the mothership Cisco name. CEO John Chambers told a group of European reporters last week that the only reason the name was maintained when Cisco bought Linksys in 2003 was because the name was well-known in the U.S. Globally, he added, there was no such advantage.
The move seems to be a natural one, with the Cisco name becoming more recognized by home users more familiar with the Internet and the technology firms that help make it a reality. Chambers did not give an official timeframe for the “takeover” to happen, but don’t be surprised if the Linksys name goes the way of the dodo by the fall. The sooner the better, really, because the moniker doesn’t carry much cache any longer.
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