Tag: internet
ThinkGeek shirts: the only good LOLcat is a dead LOLcat
Finally, it begins. I’ve been waiting for an anti-lolcats backlash since I first clapped eyes on ‘cheezeburger’, and since the ratio for genuinely funny lolcat pics is about 1:70 nowadays, I’m sure I am not alone. Think Geek is leading the revolution with ‘God kills a LOLcat’ – available for roughly £19 including international shipping.
Japanese Internet firms join forces to kill net connections of illegal file sharers
While the British Government’s plans to tackle illegal file sharing remain at the Green Paper stage, Japanese telecoms companies have jointly implemented a scheme to cut off the Internet supply from known offenders.
According to the Daily Yomiuri Online (one of my daily reads, don’t you know), Internet users who repeatedly use popular file sharing sites such as Winny to download music and video will be sent warning emails which, if unheeded, will result in a loss of Internet connection…
Seattle Spam King faces 26 year sentence
Spam… annoying isn’t it? Not quite as annoying as spending 26 years in the slammer though I’ll bet. That’s what Seattle man Robert Soloway, 28, faces after pleading guilty to electronic mail fraud, ordinary mail fraud, and not filing a tax return three years ago. The latter part doesn’t seem so exciting but this was believed to be when Soloway made over $300,000 from his nefarious internet practices.
Brits barely trust their personal data to anyone, survey suggests
British consumers, faced with so many stories of companies and organisations losing data, and with the ongoing threat of identity theft, really don’t have much faith left in the security of their personal information.
A recent survey by the GB Group found that even the most trusted organisations — banks and building societies — were only trusted by 52% of the respondents…
Opinion: Is it time for YouTube to be regulated?
Jonathan Weinberg writes… Regulation? On the web? You must be thinking I’ve swallowed some happy pills to make a statement like that. After all, the whole premise of the Internet has always been find anything you want, anywhere – hasn’t it?
But while it’s near on impossible to bring in blanket rules and laws to cover the whole of cyberspace, I do think it is time some sites were forced to put their hands up and take much more responsibility for their actions – and that starts with YouTube.
A poll out today found YouTube is the most popular user-generated site in the UK after attracting 10.4 million people in January. That is a 56 per cent increase in traffic compared to 2007 and just shows the reach it has.
The success of the video-sharing site has been phenomenal. Such fast growth over the years undoubtedly causes problems and makes it difficult for any company to keep up with the demands of hosting such a vast wealth of moving images…
PayPal advises Safari users to ditch their browser
Ever popular eBay has sent a warning to anyone using the Safari browser to access its PayPal service.
Apparently, because Safari currently lacks any form of “anti-phishing” and Extended Validation measures, it makes it a terrible security threat. Extended Validation is a system which turns the browser’s address bar green if the user is visiting a safe site.
Michael Barrett, PayPal’s chief information security officer, said that, “Apple, unfortunately, is lagging behind what they need to do, to protect their customers. Our recommendation at this point, to our customers, is use Internet Explorer 7 or 8 when it comes out, or Firefox 2 or Firefox 3, or indeed Opera.”
Opinion: Why I'm not surprised people are bored of Facebook!
Jonathan Weinberg writes…
You can have too much of a good thing, isn’t that how the saying goes. Who wants sex, chocolate and alcohol every minute of the day? Eventually you’re going to getting a little tired of the same old daily routine.
I speak as a self-confessed Facebook addict when it first launched. I spent ages on there, ensuring I had more friends than everyone else on my friends-list, updating my status every five seconds, adding new pictures and sitting there transfixed by what my increasing social circle was up to. It’s like voyerism, only legal, and without the naughty stuff.
Why did it bothered me X was visiting the farm, or Y was updating their profile from their mobile while sitting on the toilet? I’ll tell you why, because it was new, it was innovative and it was a distraction from everyday life.
But since Facebook has become my everyday life, my interest has waned. I’ve not changed my status in nearly a week, last put snaps up before Christmas and my Blackberry battery is staying juiced-up for longer as I neglect to check it while on the move.
So it doesn’t surprise me that Facebook’s user numbers are falling. So-called “Facebook fatigue” has been highlighted with a five per cent drop from 8.9 million unique visitors to the website in December to 8.5 million last month. But it’s still 712 per cent higher than a year ago and nine per cent higher than three months ago….
We Brits are a bunch of pirates… illegal downloaders, that is
With the Government planning to get tough on people who illegally download content from the Internet, a lot of Brits could be in trouble according to a recent survey by MoneySupermarket.com.
Nearly one in five have admitted to downloading illegally from the Internet, while nearly half say they’ve bought illegal discs, and two in ten have offered someone else a pirate disc.
12% of those surveyed were confused as to what exactly constitutes piracy.
Block your ears, Madonna's Filth and Wisdom film going straight to internet, possibly iTunes
We normally leave fluffy stories involving blond popstars up to our friends at Shiny Shiny, but in that instance, I just can’t resist poking fun at Madonna, with the news her film is going…straight to the internet!
She claims that her directorial debut Filth and Wisdom is bypassing the cinema because she is “a beginner so I think I should start off in an understated way. Just because I’m established in one field doesn’t mean that’s how I should approach anything else I do”. As much as she insists she doesn’t want her reputation as a pop goddess to give her an advantage over other film makers, the film got slated after it was premiered at the Berlin Film Festival last week.
“I’ve been speaking to iTunes…
MWC 2008: Don't wet yourself, but Tim McGraw has launched his own mobile internet site!
Possibly the most EXCITING news that’s come out of MWC, country singer Tim McGraw has confirmed exactly what all mobile users have been waiting for: his very own mobile internet site.
McGraw2go.mobi is the one-stop site for fans of his music (and aren’t we all), giving us amazing access to view BREAKING NEWS, tour dates, download photos, video and even pay for – get this – electronic media, in the form of wallpapers and ringtones no doubt. Don’t you just feel like all your Christmases have come at once?
“The mobile medium is the latest way in which Tim McGraw is reaching out to his fans, giving him access to them 24 hours a day and seven days a week,” said his manager, Scott Siman, no doubt forgetting that most people are probably accessing the mobile site in the hopes of seeing nekkid piccies of his hardbody wife, Faith Hill…
