Tag: facebook

Posted on

Trying something a bit different…

I think I’m sort of surrendering to the dark side, but I’m working on increasing integration with Facebook on this blog. It is part science experiment and part art project. The science part is to see how useful these tools are in increasing both Facebook Page traffic and website traffic. If it seems promising I’ll move into trails with AHG and Raw Editorial. The art part involves seeing how much stuff I can push to Facebook before folks start finding all the coder prattle annoying and wander away.

Wish me luck.

Posted on

Guess What? Diaspora Not Bug Free and Totally Secure

The code release was accompanied by a warning that it is by no means bug free. “We know there are security holes and bugs, and your data is not yet fully exportable,” Diaspora said in announcing the Alpha release.
Even with that caveat, though, early reviewers have been unsparing in their criticism of Diaspora’s security features — or lack thereof.

via Facebook wannabe Diaspora hit on security issues – Computerworld.

OK, so the initial release of Diaspora for developers is out and it isn’t ready for prime time. Hmm, let’s take 4 college students give them $200K and 90 days and see if they can create a “better” Facebook. Really? C’mon, lighten up. This project is just in its infancy, of course the code is a bit dodgy. But remember it’s an open source project now, so don’t just complain, join the community and contribute.

Posted on

Are You Being Captured by the Tech Industry?

The moral of the story of the Facebook patent and all the recent news fromApple and Google: Tech companies are no better or worse than big companies in other industries.

They are all about keeping the stock price high, growing at the expense of their competitors, and the role of users is the same as customers in other industries, you’re a source of revenue.

via Scripting News: Big change in the tech world.

Dave has a number of good points in this article. He points out that the tech industry is becoming no different from the airline, insurance, and health care industries: large and motivated strictly by preserving profit and stock price. Users are merely a source of revenue, customer service falls away to a bare minimum, and you are locked in to their services.

Is there anything you can do? Sure. Get control of your data and services. Find providers that don’t lock you in and capture your data, pay them for their services. Keep local back ups on media you own. Remember, all those digital photo, videos, blog posts, emails, assorted documents, are your personal property. Treat them like you would physical artifacts.