| UK gov't promises to allow telcos to hold Brits hostage on "two-speed" Internet |
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I'd like to talk a bit about a little known, less understood, but very important subject: Net Neutrality. Net Neutrality is the concept that all communication over the internet should be considered the same in terms of priority. Your cell phones use a similar model. If I make a phone call to Dominos or to a friend my call will reach each destination in about the same amount of time. There's no fee Domino's can pay to have my call reach them faster than to someone who has not paid such a fee. Similarly when I get on my computer and visit somerandomguy'sblog.com my speed to his site is not much different than my speed to giantcorporationwithlotsofmoneytospend.com.
Internet service providers like Comcast and AT &T would love to change this. They see great profit potential in creating a two tiered internet system. In this system the websites your pc would quickly go to would have paid a fee for that privilege. Websites that don't pay the premium fee will take longer to load on your computer screen.
If internet service providers are allowed to charge a premium to website owners so that their pages will load faster on your pc than website owners who have not paid the premium several bad things will happen.
- Any webpage that is not tied to a profit model will load very slowly on your pc. Someone likes Tiffany lamps and posts a database of every Tiffany Lamp ever made. You try and hit that website and it takes forever. This is because the Tiffany lamp website owner is only doing this as a hobby and is not willing or can't afford the premium to speed up his page. Now substitute Tiffany lamp for important political or artistic speech and you can see how important an issue this is.
- Any small business or startup will have less net access than any larger company. Right now I can start a company and you could access that company's website at the same speed as any other. If, however, two speeds are offered to companies instead of just one, the larger companies will have a real advantage over startups and small companies. Go to giantconglomco.com and their site loads in a second. Go to tinyinnovativecorp.com and wait for a minute before getting to their site. The demise of net neutrality, therefore, represents a blow to entrepreneurship and innovation and tips the scales to larger companies who will be less likely to deliver the next great idea.
- The thing from left field. There have been many technological innovations that could not have grown if it were not for equally fast access to every website on the net. The thing is that people are pretty bad at predicting what the next great thing is going to be. For that reason we need to be applying fewer restrictions on the internet, not more. The next Google, Facebook and Skype are in development right now. We need to ensure that when they launch we can access them at the same speed we can burgerking.com, exxon.com etc. etc. ad nauseam.
The ISPs cry that their costs are up and that people are using more bandwidth now than ever. While this is true these companies have received billions of dollars in public subsidies and private incentives to support network build-out and in many cases have a de facto monopoly of service. In Memphis there are really only two choices for service, Comcast and AT &T. Further, these companies are already getting paid by subscribers.
Stand up for this obvious attempt by telecom companies to wreck your internet in the name of a few more bucks. Call or write your congressman and tell them that Net Neutrality is a good thing, a necessary thing and that you support it.
Here are some web articles on this subject:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Network_neutrality
http://www.savetheinternet.com/net-neutrality-101
http://www.commoncause.org/site/pp.asp?c=dkLNK1MQIwG&b=4773657#
If you are not into reading here is a funny video that pretty much sums it up as well:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H69eCYcDcuQ
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Google wants to help dress you
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Ok, so in Google's never ending attempt to be a part of everything that happens on the internet they are starting a website that can help you stay fashion forward. I am still dressing as I did in early high school so none of this affects me, but you folks who are into this sort of thing check out a snipet of the article: "What kind of turban would Ashley Olsen wear?
Google's computers know. And they desperately want to tell you. The search-engine company on Wednesday launched a fashion site -- Boutiques.com -- that aims to use algorithms to help the world's internet users dress a bit more awesomely. Among the features: a celebrity fashion guide and personal shopping profiles that help Google's computers learn your style over time, so the site can make recommendations about what you should wear.
Users who click on Olsen's boutique store, for example, see a list of items that the former child star deems appropriate for the masses. People can shuffle through these items one by one, clicking a button to indicate if they "love" or "hate" the clothing.
Here is a link to CNN's full article:
Google is getting in fashion
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| 20 Windows 7 Tips and Tweaks |
Here's an interesting list of nifty things Windows 7 can do that aren't in any of your manuals. Enjoy! Windows 7 Tips--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
