Daily Bits

Internet

Is Your Geotag Function Disabled?

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Tech-savvy individuals would know all about geotags. Initially, the whole idea can make you overly excited. When you hear about what happened to Adam Savage (of Mythbusters fame), though, you might think twice about enabling thing function.

Basically, geotagging allows data to be embedded in different media such as photos and videos. For example, when you use your iPhone to take a picture, the longitude and latitude can be included in the file. When uploaded to a web site, anyone who views the file can extract that data.

That’s what happened to Adam Savage, who posted a photo of his ride to work on Twitter. As a caption, he wrote “Now it’s off to work in my beast. Wait…How’d that DOG get in there?”

Nothing’s wrong with that, right? Think again. The photo included details on the exact location of his home (where it was taken). His caption also revealed the information that the house might be empty in the next several hours. You see where I am going with this?

You’d think that someone like Adam Savage would have known better than to do something like this, but he salvaged the situation quite well by saying that he was not at all concerned about the issue as he is not famous enough to be stalked. Now I am not so sure about that…Oh, and yeah, he moved to another house.

Anyhow, even if you are not a public figure like Adam Savage, you might want to disable that geotag function. After all, you know how ingenious unscrupulous individuals can get.

Photo from The New York Times

The Internet’s Carbon Footprint Will Make You Think Twice

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If you are concerned for the environment, then this post just might make you think twice about spending so much time on your computer and on the Internet. According to The Guardian, the carbon footprint of the Internet is astounding: 300 million tones of carbon dioxide per year. Just to make that more understandable:

• Almost as much as all the coal, gas, and oil burned in Turkey or Poland
• More than half of the fossil fuels that the UK burns
• Imagine every person in the UK flying to the US and back – twice.

Astounding is the word, right? It makes you think – all the effort you’ve been putting into making the world a better place might be going down the drain. All because you spend so much time on the Internet. (Yeah, I am talking about myself here.)

Then again, the Internet does help cut back on energy consumption in so many ways. The same article outlines a couple of points:

• Smart grids are possible because of the Internet, and we all know they save energy.
• Tools such as video conferencing software help cut back on flights (read: higher carbon footprint).

More interesting are the ideas that Leo Hickman posted about a year ago. In his article, he posed the suggestion of cutting back on Internet usage:

Might we now have to ration our use of the internet to ensure its very survival? If so, what would be considering a fair share of the internet? Thirty minutes of browsing a day per person? Fifty megs of download a day? Just as we are being asked to “do our bit” for the environment by flying less, using public transport more, eating less meat and the like, might we now be asked to download fewer bulging multimedia files?

Call me biased and totally subjective, but just how accurate are these figures anyway? Isn’t it possible that the situation isn’t that bad? But yes, this post is making me think twice.

Photo credit: Green Office Projects

Netflix to Add More Films

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Movie enthusiasts will be happy to hear that they will be able to access more movies from Netflix soon. It’s not that the service has a shortage of choices. However, this move is necessary in order to remain at the head of the game. Internet streaming is definitely becoming the medium of choice for the average consumer, and Netflix is simply providing for the need.

How is Netflix going to manage this? They’ve struck a deal with Epix, a company that holds the rights to films from Lions Gate, MGM, and Paramount. This pretty deal is going to cost Netflix a hefty $900 million over the next five years, money that is sure to come rushing back to them.

What’s going to happen is that hit movies like “Iron Man” and “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” are soon going to be available for streaming. Netflix is offering a package that combines streaming access and DVD deliveries for only $8.99. If there are going to be a whole lot more big titles coming Netflix’s way, then customers just might be flocking to avail of their service more and more.

They’re not stopping here, though. It seems that they also have HBO (the main competitor of Epix) in sight. When this subject was brought up, Ted Sarandos (Netflix’s chief content officer) replied, “Every deal expires, and every deal has to be renewed.” Indeed. And, if they get the rights to HBO’s content, there really might be no stopping the company. As long as they’re offering reasonable packages, I don’t really see any problem.

Private Browsing Not So Private After All?

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How often do you use the private browsing capabilities of your chosen Internet browser? For one reason or another, I am sure that the average person will find this capability useful. While I am not going to prod as to why you would need to go incognito while browsing, you ought to know that there is supposed to be a flaw in the whole private browsing model.

Researchers from Stanford University and Carnegie-Mellon University have recently studied the private browsing model being used by major Internet browsers, and they say that it is not that foolproof; at least not as foolproof as we would like to believe. They released their findings in a paper titled An Analysis of Private Browsing Modes in Modern Browsers.

Their conclusions?

We analyzed private browsing modes in modern browsers and discussed their success at achieving the desired security goals. Our manual review and automated testing tool pointed out several weaknesses in existing implementations. The most severe violations enable a local attacker to completely defeat the benefits of private mode. In addition, we performed the first measurement study of private browsing usage in different browsers and on different sites. Finally, we examined the difficult issues of keeping browser extensions and plug-ins from undoing the goals of private browsing.

The next time you face the need to go incognito while browsing, make sure you take these things into consideration. Your best bet is to use your private computer and regularly take steps to ensure your security.

YouAndMeArePure: New Dating Site for Virgins

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In this day and age, many consider the subject of virginity to be outdated or preposterous. It is thus refreshing to hear about the new web site called YouAndMeArePure, which is dedicated to those who have managed to abstain from sex before marriage (whether by choice or due to circumstances, I have no idea). All sorts of dating web sites can be found online these days, why not one for virgins? (Check out the one for Apple geeks.) I know many of you are probably chuckling or shaking your heads in disbelief, but hey, each to his own!

So who came up with this idea? Husband and wife team Jose and Lety Colin decided to create the dating web site as they themselves met and got married when they were still, well, virgins. They believe that this plays an important role in their bonding as a couple, and they also believe that there are other people out there who hold the same belief.

If you think about it, they might not have such a big audience. Based on the press release of the web site, “current statistics show that about 30 percent of Americans say they have had one or no sex partners since turning 18.” Whether or not that is true, that’s not such a large figure.

Oh, the couple is not stopping at targeting the V-market (yeah, I made that up). They have a sister web site dubbed YouAndIAbstain.com, for people who are – well, you know what it’s about.

If this is your kind of thing, then check the web sites out. You never know what you will find. Then again, we know just how people can say/write anything online. Take the same precautions as you would on any other dating web site! 😉

Adios, Google Wave! Is Buzz Next?

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All things come to an end, even the good ones; or maybe, most especially the good ones. For the longest time now, Google seems to have had a golden touch. It has reached such great heights, but even such a big entity makes wrong judgment calls every now and then. With Google Wave, it seems like one of those things.

Yesterday, an announcement on The Official Google Blog finally put an end to speculation about Google Wave. Launched around a year ago in June 2009, Google Wave generated tons of interest and excitement – not so different with many other Google products. The interest did not prove to be enough, though, and even the most hardcore fan has to say goodbye.

Here’s a snippet of the announcement:

But despite these wins, and numerous loyal fans, Wave has not seen the user adoption we would have liked. We don’t plan to continue developing Wave as a standalone product, but we will maintain the site at least through the end of the year and extend the technology for use in other Google projects. The central parts of the code, as well as the protocols that have driven many of Wave’s innovations, like drag-and-drop and character-by-character live typing, are already available as open source, so customers and partners can continue the innovation we began. In addition, we will work on tools so that users can easily “liberate” their content from Wave.

There’s good news at least – fans will have till the end of the year to use the site. Users will also have the tools to extract all the content they’ve put in there.

Now I am wondering…will Google Buzz suffer the same fate?