Keeping myself honest

Once again it has been a while since my last blog post but at this point that is par for the course here. So this blog focuses on this idea a little as I have found a trend in my own habits surrounding social media. Currently if I look on my computer I subscribe to 14 RSS feed, follow 50 people on twitter, have 136 friends on Facebook and have 11 podcasts streams in my ipod. Now this might not seem like a lot and I’m sure there are a ton of people out there with more friends, feeds and followers but that isn’t the point.

The point is that there is so much information out there these days and it’s almost a full time job to keep up with it. I know personally I use the weekend to catch up on news through RSS, usually skim the headlines and only read a few of stories that really interest me. U.S. President Obama recently addressed this during a convocation speech by saying all this technology turns information into a distraction.

“And with iPods and iPads, and Xboxes and PlayStations — none of which I know how to work — information becomes a distraction, a diversion, a form of entertainment, rather than a tool of empowerment, rather than the means of emancipation. So all of this is not only putting pressure on you; it’s putting new pressure on our country and on our democracy”

I’m not sure I would go that far but there is a good discussion about it on This Week in Tech #247 and I will say that I often find the amount of information I can get overwhelming and it looses some of it’s importance when there is so much of it. Also for a president who was going to have a white house jump through hoops so he could use his blackberry I’m not sure how much I believe the statement that he doesn’t know how to use an ipod, but thats another argument for another day.

So going back to the title of this blog I am bored with social media and don’t constantly check facebook or write blog posts as often as I used to. Part of this is obviously because of the amount of free time I have but a lot of has to do with the information overload as the smaller the amount of information the easier it is to engage with it. I wonder if this trend of having too much information to have meaningful discussion will continue to be a problem or if people will start to filter things out; or maybe it’s just a problem with the way I consume information by non traditional means.  I guess as the landscape changes it’s up to us to make sure this wealth of information (like all changes brought on by technology) becomes an advantage and doesn’t diminish the power that the technology can bring.

Scotty B Commentary, Technology

I’ve been meaning to blog for a while and have even missed my modest pace of blogging once a month that I’ve been on since the summer.  This week a few things caught my interest while catching up on news over the weekend and listening to this week’s episode of This Week in Tech (also know as TWiT and probably the best technology podcast around).

The stories that were most concerning were Facebook once again changing their privacy settings in such a way that if you haven’t looked at the settings before you could potentially now be sharing all of the information you thought was private to the world. If you really want to see a breach of what you thought was private try taking the What Do Quizzes Really Know About You? Facebook quiz and prepare to be shocked as to what you’re friends can give away without you knowing. The second somewhat infuriating story stems from comments by Google’s CEO.

Eric Schmidt said this last week in an interview: “If you have something that you don’t want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn’t be doing it in the first place, but if you really need that kind of privacy, the reality is that search engines including Google do retain this information for some time, and it’s important, for example that we are all subject in the United States to the Patriot Act. It is possible that that information could be made available to the authorities”.

This has prompted more than a little uproar including one Mozilla exec urges Firefox users ditch Google for Bing (Which I’ve done). Now either he is totally naive when it comes to privacy or actually believes that people don’t deserve to have any and Google’s motto of ‘Do no evil’ sounds more than a little glib after a statement like that. Google is quickly turning into a giant that seems to have little regard for the toes that they are stepping on and I am continually dumbfounded by the unconditional love they get from the public while Microsoft is often labelled as being an evil corporate empire.

Now people might say I’m overreacting to this but considering how much information Google has and how much they have the potential to save without user consent this could pose a huge risk. Imaging all your search results, IM conversations, email, news feed, photos, location of your cell phone, maps looked up and more all being used against for any number of reasons; and not just from yesterday this information could be saved for years. The point is this the majority of people who use the “If you’re not doing anything wrong you have nothing to worry about” defence are the heads of police states and those who want to spy on you all the time in order to use that information against you.

The bottom line is that even though the internet is a new frontier where we could easily monitor everything that someone does, privacy is still a basic human right that we should hold on to and not give up because some guy in a suit from Google thinks we should be ashamed of not wanting the world to know everything about us. Privacy is about trust and decency and Google apparently doesn’t deserve the former or have the latter.

Links:

• John C. Dvorak has an interesting spin on this story saying that it is less about you and more about the people in power and their ability not to be blackmailed here: Eric Schmidt, Google and privacy
• There is also a good article here on the topic of privacy: Facebook and Google: Contrasts in Privacy
• And for those looking for one Ixquick is a great search engine that stores no information about you or your searches.

Stay safe out there because apparently you never know who is watching you.

Scotty B Commentary, Technology

Like usual it has been a while since I blogged but a few things came up this week (Now technically last week) that caught my attention enough to make me want to write up something here. The second issue is going to send me off on a rant so I’ll save that excitement for later in the week.

There were a few stories related to Net Neutrality this week which gave me a wide range of emotions from optimism, to disappointment, to pulling out my hair frustration. For those of you who have no idea what I’m talking about, Net Neutrality is basically the idea that all traffic on the internet should be treated equally and none of it should be blocked. This is somewhat of an oversimplification of terminology but also underscores one of the problems with Net Neutrality in that it means different things to different people but in general the IT community and end users are in favour of it and internet providers are against it.

The First article from Ars outlines the CRTC’s ruling that traffic shaping (the act of slowing down certain types of traffic or all traffic to a specific user) should be a last resort for ISPs who are having network issues. The ruling says that economic measures like investing in network infrastructure, data caps and discounts should be taken before any shaping occurs. While it doesn’t lay down strict net neutrality rules the ruling does set out a framework for traffic management measures which gives me optimism that the telecommunication companies won’t get free rain to do whatever they want if it isn’t in their best interest. Also this week the FCC announced that it had come to an agreement with most of the US ISP’s about implementing a new net neutrality proposal which is also great as it looked like everyone was coming to an agreement that would be mutually beneficial for both the users and the ISPs.

Then we get to the to the paragraph that should be titled “Don’t quit your day job Senator because you obviously don’t have any idea what you’re talking about here.” In the midst of all of this Senator John McCain introduces a bill that would ban all internet regulations (except when the government needed them for security). In his words the bill looks to:

“allow for continued innovation that will in turn create more high-paying jobs for the millions of Americans who are out of work or seeking new employment,” and that  “Keeping businesses free from oppressive regulations is the best stimulus for the current economy.”

This statement is more then a little absurd as one of the goals of net neutrality is to continue to allow for innovation that could be stifled if the ISPs get to control what traffic is allowed. It is true that up until now there has been no government regulations on ISPs but there also hasn’t been any traffic shaping and block (or not on a wide scale). Normally laws don’t get created until there is a problem as there is no way when something new (the the internet) is created to anticipate everything that may happen and to create a set of laws for proper usage.

I could go on about this but I’ll leave here with two final ideas. The reason why the internet has had so much creativity is because it is an open platform and letting the big telecommunication companies decide what works best for the internet will probably mean they decide to do what is best for them and not the end user. If Rogers (my internet provider) has the ability to block me from streaming TV shows on my xbox so the only way I can watch my shows is by buying their cable subscription that is an inherit conflict on interest and definitely not good for me as a consumer. Also it seems like McCain is doing the same and only looking out for himself as the reason he is backing this bill is most likely because AT&T (a large US ISP) is such a large contribute of his.

Nice to see politics never change even in the digital age.

Scotty B Commentary, Technology

Well once again my new blog post starts not with me writing but with me updating all of the software that runs the blog, such is the life of the once a month blogger. My last weekend was filled with the awesome nerdyness of the Fan expo in Toronto where I got all of the Gaming, SciFi, Anime and Cosplaying I could want with some hilarious cameos from the soup Nazi, Honkey Tonk Man and the Iron Shiek as well as a list of some SciFi regulars. I’m planning on getting into costume for next year but more on that later…

Even though I’m not in school anymore September is an interesting month were everything gets ‘back on track’ from T.V., work schedules and people not being on vacation every other week. Parliament also goes back in session and the fact that the Liberals are throwing about the idea of an election is absurd in my opinion. For a long time I tried to give Stephen Harper the benefit of the doubt that he didn’t eat children and was just getting a bad wrap because a lot of people hate conservatives. At the very least I thought he was a decent strategist who, even if he did have a crazy conservative agenda knew that in order to stay in power (especially with a minority) he would have to be a moderate. He was also the best leader to be PM at the time.

While Harper hasn’t done anything I would consider part of a secret conservative agenda he has broken a few promises (Senate reform anyone) and tried to kick the opposition parties with the funding cuts (while also needed their support to stay in power) which was a major strategic error. Most of my goodwill has been eroded and now that the Liberals have a strong new leader I thought eventually Harper would be outed and we would get a Liberal majority. I was also happy to see them all realize that they needed to play nice and do their jobs instead of insulting one another and bringing down Parliament when Ignatieff took over.

So I was somewhat shocked when Michael Ignatieff said that he plans to topple the Conservatives at first chance. This will be 4 elections in 5 years (or the time span you normally find one, possible 2 normal elections) which is not only stupid it’s downright irresponsible given the current economic climate. Ignatieff was recently quoted as saying “It’s a question of principle, not a question of the polls” which is great on the level of keeping the government honest and being ideological, buts let’s be honest politics you can’t afford to be ideological when you don’t have support to back it up.

Now he’s says he won’t form a coalition which once again is a nice sentiment but I wonder if 1) He’ll stick to that plan and 2) If he does will it end up helping his cause. At the end of the day I could keep going on about this (and usually do) but the point here is that I question whether anything will change or if the whole process of politics has turned into a futile exercise where only the liars get anywhere and the few good ideas that surface are shot down from reasons that range from greed to ignorance. Guess we’ll have to wait and see how it all plays out, and that may be the scariest thing of all.

Scotty B Commentary

Before it becomes almost a month since I blogged last I decided to post a little rant here for all of you to enjoy now that I’m not so busy at work.

I was going to blog about this story about people protesting Dante’s Inferno (a new game based on the old stories) but then I found out it was all a PR stunt by the publisher, which I’m not sure is awesome or sad but should be commended as it got the game more press than anything else so far.

This post now will be concentrated on calling out the people in this news story (I apologize for anyone reading this and not interested in gaming but hopefully the rant is angry enough to give you something to be interested in).

Instead of just giving you a wall of text as to why this is moronic I’ve decided to to address each of the points one by one so here goes:

1. Significant content for L4D1 was promised, and never delivered
- Are you talking about content for the game or downloadable content for after release? Either way you are wrong. The game is multiplayer shooting so it wasn’t going to have a single player story and while there are only 4 campaigns you can play them Co-op or versus and they have almost infinite replay ability because of the AI director and the fact that you are playing with other people. Valve also just released an entire new mode not to long ago with a new map all for free. Most publishers don’t even think about doing this and start working on the next game right after the first one ships.

2. Valve put little faith in L4D1 since they almost certainly started working on L4D2 right after release
- See my previous point about them very recently bringing out a free add on for the game as well as frequent balance patches. If they didn’t care about they game they wouldn’t have bothered putting the effort in. Also this is not an exclusive proposition the people working on the DLC are probably also working on the second game, what a shocker people can multitask at work!

3. The fact that L4D2 is nearly identical to L4D1 will decimate the community for both games
- This one you may have a little bit of a point in, but that being said if the game is the same people won’t buy it and the original game will still thrive and if the new one is much better then the majority of the community will migrate over or (another shocker) play more than one game in a given time span. This is also a game in which a full server is 4 or 8 people, so they pool of players can shrink some without it being a huge problem.

4. The announced date is not nearly enough time to polish content or make significant gameplay changes
- Are you making the game? No? Then how the hell do you know? As a developer myself sometimes you don’t even know how long a project will take and the last person who would know is a fan on the internet. You can only tell this only by playing it (which you haven’t) and if it does turn out to be true then don’t buy the game because the quality isn’t there.

5. The new character designs seem bland and unappealing so far
- You saw a 5 minute cut scene which for most of the time was zombies walking around. Might I also remind you that the characters in the first game have maybe 100 lines of dialog (that’s being really generous) and the game isn’t trying to tell a narrative other than you need to get across the street and you need to shoot zombies to do it.

6. L4D2 is too bright to fit in with L4D1’s visual aesthetic
- Really? Were you trying to round out a top 10 list with this one? Because you only got to 9.

7. The fiddle-based horde music is extremely disliked, though the differently orchestrated music is otherwise welcome
- I thought the points couldn’t get more absurd than the last one but they have… I don’t know what to say, there is a volume slider for the music? The devil played the fiddle in that one Charlie Daniels song so it’s and evil instrument? I’m at a loss for how to respond because at this point I thought the post was actually a parody.

8. L4D2’s release will result in a drop in quality and frequency for L4D1 content, even compared to before
- This one is possible as I’m sure it would be a pain to keep making DLC for both games at once. I will say Valve has a reputation for supporting their games post release and not releasing anything that isn’t of high quality but only time will tell with this one. (Haters get only kinda valid point)

9. The community has lost faith in Valve’s former reputation for commitment to their games post-release
- Nothing like an untrue sweeping generalization to make you feel like a man at the end of your list. At the time of writing your group has 25,000 member (not a small amount) but my friend has a Steam groups that is 4 times that size for people who like to casually play mutiplayer games on Steam, so in the grand scheme you are vocal but a minority.

At the end of the day the haters may be right when the games comes out and it may be a cash grab, but Valve has for all the years it has been around only released high quality products and almost been unparalleled in free support for its games after launch so why would you believe this would be any different before seeing any of the facts, if all the free content they give away isn’t enough to get some goodwill from the fans I don’t know what is.

All I’m saying is that the world would be a better place in this (and a lot of other situations) if you sat down and waited for the facts before starting to bitch. Thank you, and goodnight.

Scotty B Commentary, Gaming

Just to quickly show what I mean about programming something that works vs programming something well this is a perfect example of something that should have been tested better.

(For those who don’t understand this is after I tell them I’m in Canada which only has 6 digit postal codes)

Scotty B Commentary, Technology

The name of this post may be misleading as I haven’t gotten a professional to write an entry on my blog, gotten a copy editor or even proof read this blog post any more than usual (Which I just noticed in the number of typos here). What I mean to say is that I’m going to talk about something that I am professionally knowledgeable about and therefore something that will not be interesting to most of you, but this is my blog so stop reading if you don’t like (Just kidding, no seriously just kidding I love you all for reading this. Please stay to keep me from being depressed that no one likes me).

In a recent episode of the excellent security podcast Security Now the host Steve Gibson had a good rant about Microsoft Windows and how it’s a “Steaming pile of crap” and there are better solutions. Now as someone who uses windows on my 3 computers and develops all of my personal and professional with Microsoft’s tools so I know that I’m definitely biased in my opinion of the company.

It was an interesting discussion of the use of windows and the problems associated with using it. On the one hand Windows is a marvel of technology that somehow works its magic to allow everyone to do the day to day activities they like. Everything from my mom doing her report cards and eBay to me programming new software and running applications that were created back in the 1980’s. At the same time Windows is a pain with programs crashing often for what seems like no reason and a legacy of bad or outdated decisions that haunt the product to this day.

As a programmer it is a fine line (especially with security) between getting something working out as fast as you can and at the same time getting the program to be robust. Code is interesting as that there is really no right or wrong way to do something as long as it works but at the same time there is definitely a good and bad way and most programmers make both types of programs.

Sometimes you want to make a quick and dirty program that just works as fast as you can get it out the door and other times you have a foundation layer that you want to build upon for years to come so it is planned out and implemented in a way to make it easy to work with and upgraded on the fly. The problem is that normally it isn’t so black and white and that quick and dirty program ends up becoming the foundation layer when it was never planned to be that.

To not make this a very long and technical rant, the easy way to explain it is that Windows suffers from many of the same problems and this means that there are continually major security concerns with the product. Microsoft recently released a locked down version of Windows XP for the US Air Force but that doesn’t solve the root of the problem which is the same problem that happens if you’ve ever seen an ATM or automated kiosk showing you a windows log in screen.

The problem is that Windows is a consumer product and as such has advantages and disadvantages associated with that. It still runs very old programs so that business users don’t have to rewrite legacy applications but that means that they can’t overhaul portions of the system that they know are wrong or outdated because they don’t want to break anything that already works. This combined with how ubiquitous Windows has become means that it is used in applications it was never originally designed for.

I read a story how the current worm going around is infecting MRI and other machines in hospitals because they had security updates disabled because the computer was restarting in the middle of surgery. Now why a mission critical system like this would be running windows is absurd and comes down to the same problem that usually happens in programming which is if it works then no one wants to take it to the next step and makes sure it works well. It was probably cheaper for the company to build their software on top of windows as apposed to trying to learn how to used a real time OS or something designed specifically for industrial devices.

Your car, phone, TV, gaming system and toaster don’t have Windows built into them (or shouldn’t) not because Windows is bad or is programmed poorly but because it isn’t designed for use in that situation. Nothing catastrophic will happen if the program you are using crashes on your desktop, it will be annoying for sure but wouldn’t be the same as a nuclear reaction or an airplane having to be reset while they are being used.

In closing I’m excited for the release of Windows 7 and will probably put it on all of my computers but I think the market needs to step back and realize that there is a better way to use this (and many other forms) of technology to make them and advantage to society and not a liability.

— Update After going through the post with a little bit more of a fine toothed comb I fixed a disturbing number of typos and grammatical error (which is what I get for Proof reading it late at night). So I apologize to anyone who had to suffer through that and will make sure to do a better job from now on —

Scotty B Commentary

I’m working on a ‘professional’ post to be posted soon but in the mean time I have some comments on the Star Trek movie that I saw, and tweeted about this evening.  As many trek fans were I was skeptical about JJ Abrams taking over the franchise and making it into an action movie.

Any errors in continuity were solved in the first 5 minutes with time travel so I can’t do a rant about any errors in canon. While the movie was more of an action movie that anything Star Trek it fit with what they were trying to do with the reboot. All in all it kinda seems like a comic book movie where you know where all of the characters are supposed to be and are just waiting for them to move through the story from their current places to where they belong.

In short the movie was great and i really enjoyed it, there were enough in jokes for the hardcore fans but doesn’t go on so long as to become one big inside joke for the entire movie to alienate people who don’t know everything about the series. Other than Chekov (who was kinda joke character) I thought all of the casting choices were good and the relationships made sense with a little bit of a stretch here and there to make things interesting.

The movie definitely goes big on what the antagonist wants to accomplish and how they want to accomplish it which in previous movies was a problem but works out well here as they don’t seem to over do it. The comedic aspecs were well done and tasteful and added to the overall flavor of the movie in the way that they should in this kind of sci fi.

Overall I was impressed and will be excitily awaiting the next one (more so than the new Transformers of GI Joe movie for sure).

Scotty B Commentary

Seeing as I just won a ‘Diplomatic’ victory in my game of Civilization 4, I decided I should sit down and do something productive (other than specing my new links management system) and write about something that has been on my mind to put on the blog for a while; and that is a question of how people use the internet and what their digital footprint is.

I first starting thinking about this a lot while listening to the first episode of the Out of the Game podcast entitled ‘Born Before Digital’ as one of the topics brought up is how life will be different for kids growing up in this age when a large chunk of their life will be recorded online for everyone to see indefinitely with things like myspace, facebook, blogs, twitter and message boards.

Like some of the member of the podcast I too did many a thing in my youth that I don’t think I’d want to be on the internet when they happened and certainly wouldn’t want to be reminded of now. That’s not to say there a great deal of things that I regret doing in my life but there are many things that people do (and some of the most entertaining) that you don’t want or need an exact record of.

I remember in late university cleaning up some files on my computer and coming  across some 5 year old msn conversations that I usually save so I can go back and find information I might have been sent. It was nostalgic and also weird as many of the conversation were very intimate and private and while I had a vague memory of them it was a much different thing to see them line by line completely correct and unbiased by the passage of time right in front of me.

This would be amplified if I had facebook from the time I was 10 and I (or anyone else) could look back and see the dates I started going out with (and then broke up with) past girlfriends, the social events I attended in high school, the fads I thought were cool and the people I used to associated with. Now I wouldn’t consider any of this information privileged and would tell it to almost anyone who asked me about it but there is a difference between that and it being right there for everyone to see.

This is probably only a matter of perception but that can make all the difference in the world. If I tell my grandmother about the crazy bachelor party I just attended (this is hypothetical, way to go Josh and James for having no strippers) she’ll probably just laugh and say that’s part of life, whereas if I post pictures of me on stage with a face full of boobs I’m guessing her reaction is along the lines of disowning me.

—- Woo once again almost at 500 words and not really into my main topic, so continuing on after a Call of Duty 4 break—-

My main thought for this blog is the idea of a person’s digital footprint and how it gets used both by that person and by the rest of the world.  For a long time I didn’t have a blog or get on facebook or twitter because it seemed ominous that the information could be out there for everyone to see until the end of time. As I’ve matured I’ve taken on an attitude of being very open and honest with everyone I meet as I found trying to satisfy everyone and change your attitudes in different situations was a recipe for disaster.

Earlier in the year I figured that as a programmer I should have a professional and public profile, hence the creation of my website and the blog along with it. While the website doesn’t have a lot of things on it right now I’m statisfied with what it is for now and I’m working on some Silverlight applications and a links manager to keep me busy. The blog is a more interesting entity as it exists and a lot of the time I’m not sure what I should be talking about (although when I come up with something it’s usually long) as I feel like I should be writing for a broad audience (anyone on the internet) and should say something both insightful worth reading.

It takes a certain kind of ego to start up a blog or twitter feed as you need to believe that you have something worth while to write and it it sometimes hard for me to get into that mindset as there is so much good writing out there that I often don’t have time read so why would any of my stuff be worth it for someone else. For anyone about to send me a ’snap out of depression’ email the last statement isn’t meant as a ‘woe is me’ statement but to bring some insight on how I view my writing.

So to bring this conversation full circle to make my blog something that I feel is worth reading I decided to use it for long form, more formal writing about topics that interest me or are important to and at the same time I feel I can talk intelligently about and bring something interesting into the conversation with the reader. Twitter is where I like to write quick little tidbits of information and opinion, while also trying to keep it interesting for anyone reader. I’m still learning the ‘performance’ part of writing online but I can’t be doing all that bad cause you just read to the end of this blog post.

Scotty B Commentary, Personal, Technology

Well because Mesh (a great free service for online file storage and web remote desktop from Microsoft) is down, I’m here watching curling  and internet so I thought I’d quickly make a rant blog post on a story I just read.

The story is this one Sperm bank sued under product liability law. No if you think the title is absurd enough, read the article I’ll wait for you to finish and come back. It will also give me time to get sufficiently angry to write a good rant.

Ok so I will start with the first thing that should be coming from everyone reading that article: WHAT THE HELL!!!!! I had a conversation over dinner last night with an old friend and my mother in which the topic of parenting was brought up. While my parents were somewhat strict when I was growing up I am glad that it taught me not to be an idiot and have some common sense  and respect for society and other people.

What continually amazes me is not the people who come up with the hair brained ideas to sue people for no reason and the people who will jump on the bandwagon for a quick buck. What amazes me is the courts who allow these moronic people to get something other than thrown out for how dumb their claims are. The idea of having judges and not computers deciding law is that it brings in the element of common sense and realizing that there are areas of gray to everything.

I’m not here to condemn lawyers or judges, because like every section of society they have those who are good and bad in their talent and common sense. It just baffles me that stuff like this can happen, if you look at it logically where can this go? Recently a Quebec man lost his appeal after he was sued by his daughter when she was grounded and couldn’t go on a school trip, once again common sense does not prevail even on a second chance.

So now you can be sued by your kids for grounding them and possibly having bad genes, something that my science friends will point out you can’t control. Next on the list you should sue over your hair colour, that fact that your mother didn’t have large breasts and you think you deserved a pair from birth. Can we take this the other way? Can society sue you for bringing up kids who get arrested, can parents sue their kids for the money they have to spend in order to feed and cloth them after they get a job? Do we not let people who have bad genes procreate as a public service so they don’t get sued by their kids later?

The answer is NO, I don’t know where this sense of entitlement came from and what happened to taking responsibility for your actions went but they seem to be gone from a lot of society. Guess what people, like if unfair, it sucks sometimes, deal with it. Dealing with it does not entitle you to a free ride by suing people because you feel like some tiny little detail in your life is somehow unfair in your opinion, you want to see people living with a life that is unfair go move to a third world country, I’m sure they would be happy to switch places with you.

In the mean time let the rest of us spend our time helping out those who actually might need it, sit in your room for the week your grounded and read a book, you might learn to have some common sense.

Scotty B Commentary