Commentary about those things I find interesting.
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A few basics of Search Engine Optimization came up at brunch a couple weekends ago. A few of the key points were that its not just important to have good information, but one has to have good metadata, good incoming links to raise authority, and no nefarious techniques.
When I saw this, I immediate thought of that conversation. (This is more or less a test to see if those people read my blog.)
(click image for larger)
Infographic by PPC Blog
The upgrade to WordPress 3.0 doesn’t appear to have broken anything? Good.
It pointed out my Tarski theme was a point revision behind. That has also been upgraded. No apparent problems.
No need to go mess with code. That makes me verrrry happy.
It’s like the Electronic Frontier Foundation is Captain Obvious? It says web-sites fingerprint browsers to identify the users.
The website anonymously logged the configuration and version information from each participant’s operating system, browser, and browser plug-ins — information that websites routinely access each time you visit — and compared that information to a database of configurations collected from almost a million other visitors. EFF found that 84% of the configuration combinations were unique and identifiable, creating unique and identifiable browser “fingerprints.” Browsers with Adobe Flash or Java plug-ins installed were 94% unique and trackable.
A login is supposed to belong to an individual. Web technologies wanting to honor transactions sent by web browsers which have sent a successful login typically do so by granting that browser a token. Don’t want to enable cookies? Fine. Go somewhere else. As long as you want to use my application, you’ll have a cookie I’ll associate with a username.
All this other stuff is for fingerprinting browsers without using a login. Or maybe to identify who is using the same login? I’ve got different browsers for different logins on the same sites.
One of the out of session discussions at the Georgia Baha’i School yesterday morning was on how bad online media are for us. (I’ve boiled down what was described to neurotransmitters.)
For those of us seeking to feel connected, online media provides a false sense of connectedness. We feel more connected, but this is an illusion. We need the oxytocin for a true connectedness which we don’t get enough through online media. The best use of online social media is to discover the connections necessary for quality face-to-face time with people so we can get what we need. I’d say most of my current face-to-face arose from being active online.
The problem is when our interactions devolve to only being through this. Lately I’ve been thinking I consume too much media which distracts me from trying to be around people. With 592 people on my Facebook friends list, I’m probably reading too many Facebook status updates, apps, etc. Between my RSS readers (yeah, plural), I have 277 subscriptions with at the moment around 1,600 items marked for me to read. With 76 TiVo subscriptions, I’m probably watching too much television. I feel so constantly behind with these technologies I feel like I need to work through them which means I’m spending less time with people.
This isn’t really new for me. My bad habit is to invest myself too much in media by not culling enough of the subscriptions. I’m also hesitant to assert myself in other people’s lives. Some call it reticent: “reluctant to draw attention to yourself”. I’m the person who is likely found hanging around the periphery of a party. This recipe for disaster is why my resolutions usually have something about participating more in social activities. Without such goals, my only social interactions would be through work.
My hosting service, Dreamhost, announced they would be upgrading every one off PHP4. Only people using old software would get bitten. I’ve kept my software current, so I wasn’t worried.
Only this of all eight domains started showing an HTTP 500 error (Internal Server Error). I dreaded having to go through and determine why. Turns out it was easier than I thought…. In Dreamhost’s panel, the domain was still configured to use PHP4. When I changed it to use PHP5, the WordPress started working again.
I would have thought part of an upgrade would be to change this configuration. At least it was just a simple change and not digging through code and logs.
I noticed today comment spammers are getting craftier. Some of the comments I approved I now believe to be comment spam. Perhaps they are probing to later deliver the real deal?
They use the name of people who legitimately commented. Because the scammer cannot see the real email commenter’s address, they use a different one but nothing drastically obvious as spam.
The IPs are 74.63.104.125 and 74.63.104.121. The legitimate comments have different IPs. These IPs belong to FDCServers, who provide colocation and dedicated servers. I’m tempted to send a message to the abuse email address for the company.
For now I’ve renamed the spam comments as ” (Fake)” and removed the web site. I’ll have to be more vigilant.
Michelle remarked my blog posts over the years have become technical. I wanted to say “too technical”, but I don’t think she actually wrote that. Instead of writing about the personal aspects of my work I only write about the mechanics.
Over the years I’ve read quite a bit about the trouble people get into by blogging. Rumors have spread based on reading way too much into ambiguously written posts. Friends writing about rumors or even frustrations regarding work resulted in huge dramatic, scary events where jobs could have been lost. A Microsoft employee posted pictures of Macintosh computers at his work which resulted in his termination. An airline employee posed for photographs in uniform was terminated for the photos and maybe statements about work. Blogging about work is like placing mines in a field while blindfolded. One really doesn’t know what will set one off.
The Electronic Frontier Foundation has an article called How to Blog Safely (About Work or Anything Else) which has a section called “Blog Without Getting Fired” which says,
The First Amendment protects speech from being censored by the government; it does not regulate what private parties (such as most employers) do. In states with “at will” employment laws like California, employers can fire you at any time, for any reason. And no state has laws that specifically protect bloggers from discrimination, on the job or otherwise.
Being the test case of a law which may or not protect me doesn’t strike me as the smartest move.
I have thought about abandoning the blogs. Blogging anonymously would require more subterfuge than I could muster. So my final recourse to keep blogging involves treading lightly and avoiding sensitive topics like anything which could possibly be construed as criticism of a coworker or the organization. That means pretty much not talking about people or organization. My posts focus on tools and processes. Things without feelings.
Hanging out with some friends earlier, got me thinking about this. I forget the circumstances of the discussion to start this post germinating in my head.
One of the tools people have for seeking a new job is their social networks and increasingly the online ones. LinkedIn seems to be the popular social network for this. (BTW, I’m glad to give recommendations for anyone I’ve worked with and seeking a job there.)
I can’t say that I would know what everyone in my Facebook “friends” list does. A possible solution is for Facebook to provide a filter displaying current employer and position similar to its phone book filter for the friends page. Users can only see phone numbers both entered and selected to be available, so similar permission-based exposing work information ought to apply.
Until then, it appears one can click on position and employer to search who else lists them. One can also edit the cp= variable in the URL. Change “System” in the example below to “Photographer”.
Example URL: http://www.facebook.com/search/?cp=System&o=2048
The o= appears to be the kind of page, so that should remain 2048 for “People”.
If your search term uses spaces, then use a plus sign (“+”) or ascii code (“%20″) to represent the space.
Example: System+Support+Specialist
I’m sure there are better ideas out there.
You’ve read my previous posts on Dunbar‘s Number, right?
Go on…. I’ll wait.
Remember the one on Scoble and Facebook? Good. For a while, I fastidiously ensured my number of friends stayed below 150 because I took the idea of Dunbar’s number as a life strategy. Then I let it slip to 200 which I pared back down to 150. My laziness let it hit 500.
It appears Robin Dunbar is now studying Facebook users to see ‘if the “Facebook effect” has stretched the size of social groupings.’ He says despite the large number of friends people only interact with about 150 of them. Maybe like most of psychology, the subjects are college students who supposedly are almost all on Facebook. In the real world, most of the people with which I have regular interaction, exactly those Dunbar’s number covers, are not my Facebook friends.
My Facebook friends instead are my information buffet. Social networks are how we keep in touch with what is happening in the world. My information technology friends provide me what is happening in my career field. My photography friends provide me with useful tips for a big hobby. Also, the bigger our social network, the more opportunities for help from or being consequential strangers. Social networks are a strategy not a replication of the brain.
The term “friends” used by Facebook, I think, is a brilliant marketing ploy. People would much rather show up as my friend than my contact.
The people I know on Facebook post fascinating things. [1] The people I count as my “Facebook friends” have something interesting to say. I enjoy reading the partisan politics, science, recipes, web comics, and even the celebrity gossip my contacts post. The status updates are one way. Links are another way.
Since Facebook copied the Twitter Retweet feature, I was looking for something worthy of letting all the others I know see. Somehow I was surprised to find my News Feed was missing about half the Links my contacts posted? My first reaction was to put My Friends’ Links in Thunderbird’s RSS Reader (where I put my feeds I don’t want strangers subscribing in Google Reader). Then it dawned on me.
At the bottom of the News Feed is an Edit Options link. A while back there were Facebook chain-statuses about editing the settings here because it controls which of my friends I see. On the first page, one can put how many of my friends I can see vs which I don’t. Also, there is an option for explicitly naming which I will see.
It seems I set specific names which at one time was everyone. However, as I added new people, I never went back and added the new people. All these new people were the ones posting the missing links. Doh! So, I’ve set Facebook to show me the top 9999 people. (The highest it will go.) I’m hoping this will fix it.
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