ZIZZY’s blog

After the abysmal ABC debate, most of the media as well as huge numbers of internet users attacked ABC, with talk of boycotting them (although that obviously won’t work)  and numerous sites writing about how and why it was a total failure. I noticed it most prominently on Digg.com because I spend so much time there, and there were multiple stories about the debate hitting the front page every day.

To put it simply, the ABC debate has become a huge topic of controversy and negativity, overshadowing many of the other more important current issues. Which is exactly what everyone is acting so mad about - “unimportant” issues being focused on instead of the ones we really need to know about. In the internet’s mostly collective effort to bash ABC and complain about the debate, it seems everyone has failed to notice that making such a big deal out of the ABC debate is, to a much lesser extent, exactly what ABC did - blowing specific, sometimes trivial events and details way out of proportion and focusing on them instead of the issues that really matter.*

If you look at the number of Digg stories on the economy or the Iraq war or torture since the debate I’d bet that they are outnumbered by those talking about the debate itself.

There are over 19,000 comments on ABC’s story about the debate, and stories on much more important issues rarely achieve that much discussion (in the short time I looked, I didn’t see a single story on ABC that even managed to get a quarter of that number of comments).

Google Trends shows what people seem to care about most even more clearly, with the search term “abc debate” outranking “iraq war,” “recession” and “torture” by a large margin for three straight days.

Granted, internet users and even some of the journalists who have criticized the debate do not have as much of a duty to be fair and focus on the important issues as those actually entrusted with running a crucial debate. So while it’s not near as bad and more expected, it’s still ironic for so many to treat the debate the same way ABC treated non-issues in their questioning. The media and plenty of internet users (myself included) need to make sure we’re not sinking to their level, and put most of our efforts into bringing attention to the real issues instead of dwelling on the media’s inadequacies. The debate sucked, the hosts handled it horribly and were biased, now can we please move on and do what ABC failed to do by focusing on the real issues?

*And I admit, I’ve been just as caught up in it, digging the stories like everyone else, but now I’m realizing there’s a problem

(And yes, I do realize the irony in posting a story about the debate criticizing people for posting stories about the debate, but someone had to say it)

There are plenty of Firefox plugins that do everything from blocking ads to helping you make grocery lists. However, this list focuses on plugins that do much simpler tasks, but can also be just as useful, if not more. Here they are, 5 plugins for the simple things.

Fission

If you’ve used Safari on Mac OS X, you’ll be familiar with this. Fission “makes the progress bar more visible and allows for a nice visual effect,” so as a page is loading the address bar fills up, and is basically just a loading bar for the page. It is useful to see how much more needs to load, and is a nice, simple, and unobtrusive way of doing it.

Smart Link

You know when someone posts a URL, but doesn’t actually make it a link? Instead of simply clicking on it you’re forced to copy and paste it into your address bar, making it more difficult than it should be. This solves that problem. If there is a plain text URL, you merely select it, right click, and Smart Link adds an option to either open it in a new tab or a new window. It can be quite useful, and saves a little bit of time and effort every once in a while.

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Jorge Romero, a man from Chicago, downloaded the first four episodes of 24 Season 6 because they had leaked onto the internet before they aired. However, once he had them he didn’t just watch them - he decided to re-distribute them an another site, LiveDigital.com. He uploaded the first two on January 6th, and the next two the following day.

Now, the FBI is charging him “in the criminal complaint with uploading copyrighted material to a publicly accessible computer network knowing the work was intended for commercial distribution.” The episodes he had uploaded were discovered by News Corp. (which owns FOX) on January 8th, only one day after he had finished uploading them all, and they eventually sent a subpoena to LiveDigital.com to find out who he was. On April 4th he admitted that he had uploaded the episodes, and now he could face up to three years in a federal prison.

Twentieth Century Fox TV sent a statement to the FBI and U.S. Attorney’s Office thanking them for putting piracy above more important issues:

“We hope it will serve as a powerful warning that uploading copyrighted TV shows and movies to the Internet can be a crime with significant penalties and will be prosecuted as such. Video-hosting sites such as LiveDigital.com and YouTube are not copyright-free zones, and individuals like Jorge Romero who post episodes of television shows, particularly before they are even broadcast for the first time, will face harsh civil and criminal sanctions.”

You may have played NewsBreaker before, where you destroy blocks and attempt to catch the falling news stories from MSNBC.com. Now, this game is coming to movie theaters where the audience will work together to play it. And as if a few loud, annoying movie goers who stand up in front of you, can’t seem to sit still, and generally disrupt your peaceful theater experience wasn’t bad enough, now the entire audience will be participating. The press release (found after the jump) explains:

“NewsBreaker Live combines live msnbc.com RSS newsfeeds, the movement of the audience as a human joystick, and the big screen as a game board to bust audiences out of their pre-movie doldrums with an interactive game that delivers real-time news headlines to kick start the moviegoing experience”

The audience will move as one to control the game and break the blocks, using “groundbreaking motion-sensor technology” they call “CrowdGaming.” The news headlines they try and catch will come in real-time from MSNBC.com, so not only are you trying to get points, but to “accumulate knowledge.”

While this does sound like it could be more interesting then the usual stream of repetitive advertisements and useless movie trivia (along with annoying songs in the background) that plasters most screens before the movie, it sounds like the kind of idea that might not actually work as well as it appears on paper (or in this case, on your screen). Even if the game actually picks up the crowd’s movements accurately, there will be groups of people who choose to play the much more entertaining game of ruining everyone’s fun by moving in the wrong direction and failing to catch anything.

[Via Kotaku]

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It has once again been proven that so many people these days really don’t know what’s bad for children. In a survey from March of this year, adult Americans rated 17 different health concerns for children. It seems to contain valid issues - until you reach number 7 on the list, “Internet Safety.” This “health issue” is apparently a bigger problem than school violence, sexual infections, abuse and neglect, depression, suicide, food contamination, childhood cancer, and others.

Seriously? It’s arguable that the internet should even be considered a health issue, and when it ranks as number seven over many much more troubling problems, something is wrong. Keeping children safe on the internet is as simple as not letting them chat with random strangers, blocking certain sites (say, blog.z1zzy.com), and a few other basic precautions, while most of the other items require much more to prevent.

Interestingly enough, one of the big issues facing children today wasn’t even included - adults who really have no idea what is best for children, and what they need to avoid (hint: Internet is pretty low on that list).

[Via Download Squad]

You can already hook up two screens to one computer, doubling your screen space. Now, Microsoft Research in India is working on doing the opposite, and splitting one screen into two. Each half of the screen would run it’s own operating system, with separate desktops, applications, cursors, keyboards, and everything else an operating system uses. The processor is split, so that two copies of Windows run on either half of the screen. That way, two people could use one computer simultaneously.

Each person can even move their cursor to the other side, so it is now much simpler to annoy the person working next to you or ruin/steal their work.

They hope to cut computer costs for schools and businesses, or even families that share one computer. Now instead of waiting your turn, you can look at porn on one side while your mother does her work on the other.

[Via Download Squad]

There are plenty of people with weird names, and a lot of them probably wish they were just called something ordinary. Not Karen though. While she may have a normal last name now, she’s planning on getting it changed. But she’s not going to choose it - instead, she has set up an Ebay auction and for $10,000 anyone can pick her new last name. Here’s what that $10,000 will get you:

For the winner of this auction, I will legally change my last name to the name of your choice. I will keep the name you choose for a term of no less than a year per grand, with a starting figure of 10,000 and a time period of 10 years. I will use your choice actively every day. This is a chance for a great amount of publicity. For your buisness [sic] there will be a surge of philanthropic publicity, followed by at least 10 years of people talking about it every time I fill out a form or show my ID. There were in excess of 2300 views of this auction when the originaly [sic] got pulled. If each of those people told only one person a piece, who told one person, who told one person.. invaluable advertising! The same concept would apply to every form I fill out, every time I give my name, etc. In addition you will be helping 3 beautiful, smart children! What could be better?

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While most countries are moving forward with the Internet, China is going backwards. The Internet could never be what it is today without the freedom it provides, the ability to access anything at any time. China doesn’t seem to understand this though, and censors much of what shows up on the Internet. They would like to “purify” it - and their idea of purification is spreading the Communist Party doctrine and anything that “adheres to correct propaganda guidance,” while censoring everything they don’t like. Their latest move (from CNN):

Chinese President Hu Jintao on Monday launched a campaign to rid the country’s sprawling Internet of “unhealthy” content and make it a springboard for Communist Party doctrine, state television reported.

With Hu presiding, the Communist Party Politburo — its 24-member inner council — discussed cleaning up the Internet, state television reported. The meeting promised to place the often unruly medium more firmly under propaganda controls.

[Via Download Squad]

It seems like every day there is a new website for getting stuff done over the internet. From buying someone a drink to having pretty much any task performed, you no longer need to interact with a person beyond a virtual acquaintance over the internet. However, the newest addition, while based on the same principle of connecting over the internet for non-internet purposes, actually involves meeting and interacting with a person.

Called GoLoco, it’s a recently launched company which aims to make car pooling much easier and more efficient. On their website, you post where and when you will be driving. Others who are going the same place as you and need a ride can find your listing by searching, and if you agree they will travel along with you. This isn’t just for simplifying rides though. It could also be great for the environment, since the more people sharing rides the less overall cars getting driven around.

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Everyone is going on about Web 2.0 or Web 3.0. Why not Internet 2.0? That’s what some university researchers want (with the government’s backing). They believe we need a clean slate, and should get rid of the established internet and start from scratch.

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A recent survey of media and entertainment executives reveals that they see user created content as somewhat of a threat. Of those surveyed, 57 percent cited it as one of the top “issues” they currently face. Over 70 percent believe social media will only continue to grow, while 3 percent seem to be in denial and think it is nothing more than a fad. There is a simple solution to this though, which is creating quality content.

There are so many low quality films, movies, TV shows and games being pumped out that it doesn’t surprise me they are worried they can’t keep up with the users. There is so much new content made available every day completely free, and so when you’re being charged for what they do it better be good. They should be helping users create what they want - and some do, through contests an things like that. Not only do they get something out of that, but it can give the creator a much vaster array of resources. Let’s hope they realize that it’s not just being a big company that gets you recognized, but instead making something awesome whether you have a background or not.

It’s obvious to me that the internet is the future of media. Most internet users realized it long ago, and the popularity of file sharing proves that it definitely works. Most networks make some of their most popular shows available to be streamed from their sites soon after they air, which is a start.

Some companies have decided to skip television all together though, and have made new shows specially for the web. Comedy Central’s website has a bunch “Web Shows”, and there are various others whose success is based solely on what they’ve created for the internet. The newest addition: Fox Reality’s new TV show “Nightclub Confessions.”

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You know how it goes: You’re busy surfing the web, when suddenly your peaceful experience is interrupted by an obtrusive ad for something you obviously don’t want. Or maybe you do, and are tempted to take the offer for once, but know it will only end up to be a scam like so many others. Either way, you probably wish it would get out of your face and let you read what you want. While ads in websites have almost become a way of life and I don’t have a problem with them, there are some that are too much and stop you from doing what you’re trying to do. Presented below, the 4 worst web advertising techniques.

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Ever since the 300 trailer came out, people have been editing and splicing it with various other movies. So you don’t have to, I’ve weeded through many worthless and repetitive mashups to find the best. Here it is, the 300 trailer - re-cut.

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According to a CNN article, every second there are around 28,258 internet users watching porn. That means that every second, about 1,130,320,000,000 potential children are dying.

Disturbing statistics aside, the CNN article goes on to describe the efforts of Christian groups in helping people with a porn addiction. Take, for example, the Pure Life Christian Ministries located Williamstown, Kentucky. For six (torturous) months, they live there, learning how to give up their so called addiction. However, it appears they are trying to make it incredibly hard not to indulge in “outside stimulation.” The men are completely cut off from the rest of the world, and there isn’t any television, Internet or cell phones. Even their mail is “screened for clothing catalogues with what could be considered inappropriate images.” I’d imagine it would become excruciatingly boring, and we all know what one of the best things to do is when bored. They supposedly want to help, but all I can see it doing is increasing the mens urges to watch porn.

While I can accept (but not quite understand) if someone chooses to avoid porn, this group takes it a little bit too seriously - the facility’s head counselor, Jeff Col�n (Haha) believes that “their soul’s in danger.” If you have something against porn that’s fine, but isn’t that kind of extreme?

Well, I’ve got nothing more to say, so I’m going to go and make that number 28,259.