Provocations

Effect of new daylight saving times on your computer

I guess this is something of a public service announcement - utilizing an article by the CBC:

DAYLIGHT TIME CHANGE BRINGS MINI Y2K TO COMPUTERS
For three weeks this March and April, Microsoft Corp. warns that users of its calendar programs in Canada and the U.S. "should view any appointments ... as suspect until they communicate with all meeting invitees."

See also Inc.com's:  Y2K Redux? Daylight-Saving Time Could Wreak Havoc on Businesses

Identity theft checklist

From an article published today by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC)

The following are tips to safeguard your identity.

• Before you reveal any personal information, find out how it will be used and if it will be shared.
• Check your financial statements to ensure all purchases listed are yours.
• Use passwords that are not easily guessed on your credit card, bank and phone accounts.
• Shield your PIN when using automated teller machines.
• Carry only the identification information you need. Keep other documents such as your social insurance number, birth certificate and passport in a safe place.
• Never give out personal information on the phone, by mail or through the internet unless you initiated the contact or know with whom you are dealing.
• Guard your mail.
• Shred documents that contain personal financial information, such as statements, credit card offers, copies of credit applications, receipts and insurance forms, before throwing them out.

Getting creative types talking to each other - Pecha Kucha

Most would admit that - along with its liberating, inspiring and democratizing qualities - digital creation tends to be a solitary occupation; that is, solitary in the old-fashioned sense of being alone.  Onto the scene comes a way of using the energy of solo digital creation as a springboard into "face time" - being with real people to continue the creative flow. 

The key to the success of the Pecha Kucha evenings springing up across the world over the last two years - they now exist in around 30 cities, from Bogotá to Buffalo - is simplicity. Participants get a six-minute pitch in which they can show 20 slides, and talk for 20 seconds about each one.

Slides are submitted to the organizers a couple of weeks in advance, and sequenced into a tight, smooth keynote presentation. So when you're on the mike there's no chance to overrun - although conversations continue at the bar afterwards.

Read the full story in Slate (not stone)

Canadian universities avoid US web servers because of Patriot Act

As I look around for good-quality web site hosting, I start local and then look beyond to the rest of the country - but I prefer to avoid servers based in the USA because of the country's intrusive Patriot Act laws. Like most people, I have nothing to hide but I prefer not to support - or recommend my clients expose themselves to - this undemocratic law.  In this I know I'm not alone, so wasn't surprised to come across this in Canada's Globe and Mail.

Concerned about the U.S. government's prying eyes, a number of Canadian universities are changing the way their professors and students conduct online research.

Many university libraries subscribe to RefWorks, a popular U.S.-based Internet tool that allows academics and students to create personal accounts and store research information, as well as generate citations and bibliographies.

But the Patriot Act - which grew out of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and which potentially allows U.S. authorities to sweep through databases such as RefWorks - has prompted Canadian postsecondary institutions to abandon the American server for one housed at the University of Toronto.

Read on

Net Neutrality threat now faces Canada

Battle over 'net neutrality' arrives in Canada.  CBC

Thursday, November 2, 2006

The fight in the United States by major telecom companies to control web content has arrived in Canada with little fanfare — and could dramatically change the nature of the internet. It's being waged over something called net neutrality, dubbed the First Amendment of the internet in the United States. Net neutrality aims to ensure the public can view the smallest blogs just as easily as the largest corporate websites. "Right now, the internet is almost a perfect, universal democracy," says Pippa Lawson, the executive director of the Canadian Internet Policy and Public Interest Law Clinic. "The smallest bloggers can be accessed as easily and as quickly as the websites of major corporations."

Read on

Tips to decrease the chance of identity theft

. . . many companies who have been hacked fail to inform their customers about what has — or might have — happened to such private information, and there is no law that forces them to do so.

In other words, despite all your precautions, a careless move on the part of any company that holds your personal information compromises your security. However, there is a lot you can do. In an  excellent article by Terry Cutler, Keeping Your Identity on a Short Leash, you will learn about:

• what identity documents you really need to have with you
• how to safely dispose of old documents
• using ATMs wisely
• VOIP fraud
• safer online shopping
• credit records

. . .and more

Survey results tell US government to leave Internet alone

US government told to take its hands off internet
Request for comments produces stark results
By Kieren McCarthy, The Register
Published Saturday 15th July 2006

The United States government has been told to end its oversight role of the internet during its own consultation exercise over the future of net governance.

Read on

Today's protected children unfit and longing for privacy

One of the simple reasons why our children - in North America, at least - are out of shape (good term, that) is because, in our changed culture, they decreasingly simply  "go out and play". I remember doing that every evening.  The children living in our block of flats (= apartment block) would gather outside after supper and play together, in the process getting a good amount of exercise - pretty much every day. Take that away from today's children and no wonder they're putting on the pounds.

Another loss of freedom is the loss of privacy: fear of abductions, drugs etc. keep children - at least those from middle and upper-middle class backgrounds - on a pretty tight leash: not that much hanging out together these days - at the park, on the beach, on the street . . .   But, with the aid of the Web, many have found a way to be (relatively) safely at home and still have private time with friends. (Ironically - and understandably - parental fear is now focussed on their vulnerability to on-line predators.)

As the real world is perceived as more dangerous with child abductors lurking on every corner, kids flock online to hang out with friends, express their hopes and dreams and bare their souls with often painful honesty -- mostly unbeknownst to their tech-clumsy parents.

...........................

More than half of 15- to 20-year-olds who are on-line are using MySpace, according to the company's research. They use the site's design technology to create personal "spaces" that resemble a cross between a high school locker and a secret diary.

Jill Sargent, Reuters

No to net neutrality

Big corporations increase their control of the Internet:

NET NEUTRALITY PROVISION REJECTED
Committee votes down a provision that would prohibit ISPs from 
blocking or slowing customers' connections.
http://www.pcworld.com/news/article/0,aid,125567,tk,dn042706X,00.asp

Network neutrality under threat - US Congress to decide

According to Moveon.org:

Internet providers like AT&T and Verizon are lobbying Congress hard to gut Network Neutrality, the Internet's First Amendment. Net Neutrality prevents AT&T from choosing which websites open most easily for you based on which site pays AT&T more.

Moveon's message is addressed to US citizens because that's where this decision is being made. It seems that the rest of us just stand by and watch!  Please post here any information on how this affects other countries and what action might be taken there.

From the Washington Post:

. . . the nation's largest telephone companies have a new business plan, and if it comes to pass you may one day discover that Yahoo suddenly responds much faster to your inquiries, overriding your affinity for Google. Or that Amazon's Web site seems sluggish compared with eBay's.

- Consumer Groups Push for Network Neutrality Rules - PC World
- More about Network Neutrality - James Seng, Circle ID