On January 27th, Apple will unveil its latest creation which is widely expected to be a touchscreen tablet computer. With a screen size of perhaps 10 to 11 inches across it is a magazine-reader compared to the Kindle's paperback 6-inch screen. Indeed Apple is going head-to-head with Amazon's Kindle DX which has a similar sized screen.
Publishers around the world are hoping that they can finally start charging readers again as in the good old days of printing. "Both the iPhone and the Kindle have proven that people are willing to buy the devices, read on the devices, and pay for content," said Greg Hano of Bonnier Technology Group, which publishes Popular Science and other notable titles. "We already have a proof of concept." [Yahoo]
One potentially important advantage of the iSlate over the Kindle is the terms of service. Amazon does not allow its downloaded publications to be read on any other device, whereas Zinio, a digital publishing technology company, has recently released its eReader as an iPhone app that allows the user to read the same magazine on multiple devices whilst paying for just the one download. Yes, Kindle books can be viewed on other devices but only for another download fee.
People do seem to be more prepared to pay for content on their mobile devices than for web content. As computing becomes more mobile and communication devices become more powerful, it becomes difficult to justify these two contrasting consumer experiences. Perhaps this is just what publishers have been looking for.
Showing posts with label Internet. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Internet. Show all posts
How Has the Internet Changed the Way You Think?
The Edge's big question for 2010 is "How Has the Internet Changed the Way You Think?" In a quest for thoroughness it has enlisted 170 brains who have collectively produced 132,000 words.Quite a number of neuroscientists and psychologists took to sabotaging the question.
"How has the Internet changed the way I think? I can't really say, because I have no direct knowledge of what influences my thinking." says Emily Pronin, Associate Professor of Psychology, Princeton.
"The idea that my own mental processes are impenetrable to me is a tough one to swallow. It's hard to accept that, at a very basic level, I don't know what's going on in my own head. At the same time, the idea has a certain obviousness to it — of course I can't recount the enormous complexity of biochemical processes and neural firing that gives rise to my thoughts. The typical neuron in my brain has 1000s of synaptic connections to other neurons. Sound familiar?
[...]
My thinking may be influenced by unexpected search hits and extraneous words and images that are derived via a process beyond my comprehension and control. So while I have the feeling that it's me driving the machine, perhaps it's more the machine driving me. But wait, hasn't that always been the case? Same process, different machine." Well, that pulled the rug from under all those peddlers of motivational courses.
Back on message, Tor Norretranders (science writer) supplies us with a social web mantra,"The more you give, the more you get. The more you share, the more they care. The more you dare, the more is there for you. Dare, care and share."
But Marc D. Hauser (psychologist and biologist at Harvard) makes the point that for all the connections and social interactions one still can't hold hands in a chatroom. Touching is important in many cultures and Hauser thinks we may be in danger of losing something crucial in human interactions. For all those who like to accumulate online friends perhaps renaming them 'ipals' might give a better perspective on how many of them are true friends.
June Cohen (Director of Media at TED) is less worried about this and sees this mass of communications as the essentially human trait for storytelling - and that one-way mass media was an anomaly. Gone is the campfire and gone is the need to pick fleas off each other but the eternal gossip mill keeps turning.
Coming back to thinking rather than socializing, Michael Shermer's contribution is the kind of thing every blogger and struggling writer wants to hear. The internet saved him from the hard shoulder of academia and gave him the means through which to forge his own intellectual career as the founder of the Skeptics Society and Skeptic magazine.
"Starting with no money, no backers, and no affiliation with elite institutions, the Internet made it possible for us to succeed by making knowledge accessible and searchable to me and my editors and writers on a scale never previously available. The intellectual playing field was being leveled and the Internet changed the way I think about the very real possibility of fairness and opportunity in a world that has for too long been rigged to favor the elite." Shermer closes with,"This is real power, and I feel that power as never before."
What many have commented upon is that their own skills have moved away from acquiring knowledge, as that has become relatively easy to find, to manipulating knowledge. There is no longer the need to remember facts but rather to find previously unexpected connections between them. There may be a future of smart agents to make such connections but for the moment that's a very human skill.
For real insights or flashes of inspiration it has always been necessary to switch off for a while, relax and let the still somewhat obscure algorithms of our own unconscious do the searching. If thinking is about making connections then the wetware between our ears is our very own intranet. However, those connections haven't changed and the internet hasn't changed them either.
Indeed, a rare bit of insight comes from Daniel Haun (of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology). Humans believe what is repeated to them. This is the primary method of advertsing, be it in the name of consumer choice or political propaganda, repetition works. But most search engine algorithms include a weighting connected to the number of incoming links a particular webpage or website has - this is but codified repetition. The internet won't change the way you think because it is programmed to resemble it.
In contrast, physicist Nigel Goldenfeld feels that the sheer speed of using the internet to collaborate has increased the pace of new insights. "I'm starting to think like the Internet, starting to think like biology. My thinking is better, faster, cheaper and more evolvable because of the Internet. And so is yours. You just don't know it yet."
Many themes, however, seem to crop up with the annoying frequency of a viral retweet.
The internet is great.
The internet is full of stuff.
The internet is full of crap too.
Knowing what's crap and what's useful requires yogic mind training.
The internet has nothing on yogic mind training.
Go read a book, even an ebook.
Long live the internet!
You can read the whole thing at The Edge. Let me finish with the funniest quip I could find.
"Some people say the Internet has made us more efficient. I waste many hours each day being efficient." Emanuel Derman (financial engineer).
How Has the Internet Changed the Way You Think?
Using Pseudo-Scientific Surveys as Linkbait and Marketing
Pseudo-science is the linkbait of the future. In order to gain nationwide publicity for your brand, all you need is a survey, a 'scientist' and a 'formula'. The good people at Fuse Optimisation have compiled a list of their favourite experiments in social gullibility. Squirm at the inane formulas, from the perfect wiggle of the hips to how sexy someone looks when you're drunk. These wouldn't even qualify for the Ig Nobel Prize as they are merely puff pieces with a scientific cherry on top.
This has, of course, been going on for a long time - just take a close look at cosmetics adverts. Even real science is often held hostage by corporate interests as the bottom line over-rides the truth. So just sit back and enjoy these rather harmless ventures in the science of selling. Or not...
Ben Goldacre took a dim view of the "Jessica Alba has the perfect wiggle" research. He was initially asked to prostitute himself as the expert scientist for the study. Although he declined he kept a perverse interest in seeing who would swallow the bait. The story of how the PR company cobbled together the final story is a good example of how scientists should stay clear of lending their name to anything over which they do not have final editorial control. Salvaging one's shattered reputation can take more energy than the consultancy fee could ever cover.
This has, of course, been going on for a long time - just take a close look at cosmetics adverts. Even real science is often held hostage by corporate interests as the bottom line over-rides the truth. So just sit back and enjoy these rather harmless ventures in the science of selling. Or not...
Ben Goldacre took a dim view of the "Jessica Alba has the perfect wiggle" research. He was initially asked to prostitute himself as the expert scientist for the study. Although he declined he kept a perverse interest in seeing who would swallow the bait. The story of how the PR company cobbled together the final story is a good example of how scientists should stay clear of lending their name to anything over which they do not have final editorial control. Salvaging one's shattered reputation can take more energy than the consultancy fee could ever cover.
AVG Antivirus Detects iTunes as a Trojan Horse: What To Do.
The antivirus software AVG has caused a bit of a panic by warning its users that iTunes is a trojan horse that they are calling Small.BOG. This has led many iTunes users to uninstall the software. If one follows the AVG warning and quarantine the files iTunes.dll and iTunesRegistry.dll it will also make iTunes inoperable. Apple has said there is no problem with iTunes and there is no virus in their system.
It is totally possible that AVG has misdiagnosed the problem and there is a glitch in their own algorithm. This seems likely as other antivirus companies are not reporting the same problem. It is also possible that iTunes has changed something and although not a virus and not dangerous it has triggered AVG's Resident Shield.
If you are using AVG, as either a paid or free version, and use iTunes then to avoid the warnings popping up all the time just go to the Advanced Settings for the Resident Shield and click Exceptions. This is where you can specify files and folders that AVG can ignore. Add the path to your iTunes folder, usually C:\Program Files\iTunes\ and Save.
If you have accidentally quarantined the two dll files then just go to the Virus Vault section of AVG and you can recover them.
Do Not Panic!
It is totally possible that AVG has misdiagnosed the problem and there is a glitch in their own algorithm. This seems likely as other antivirus companies are not reporting the same problem. It is also possible that iTunes has changed something and although not a virus and not dangerous it has triggered AVG's Resident Shield.
If you are using AVG, as either a paid or free version, and use iTunes then to avoid the warnings popping up all the time just go to the Advanced Settings for the Resident Shield and click Exceptions. This is where you can specify files and folders that AVG can ignore. Add the path to your iTunes folder, usually C:\Program Files\iTunes\ and Save.
If you have accidentally quarantined the two dll files then just go to the Virus Vault section of AVG and you can recover them.
Do Not Panic!
Cybercrooks Increase Credit Crunch Scams
Perhaps not surprisingly cybercrooks are focussing the global economic crisis to create scams based on refinancing and unemployment. A survey by brand protection firm MarkMonitor reveals an increase since September 2008 on domain cybersquatting and phishing scams based on terms such as foreclosure and mortgage refinancing, with "credit crunch relief" getting particular attention.
It obviously needs to be stressed over and over again not to click links within emails and to look very carefully at whether you are on the correct website. If you find something claiming to be from a well-known brand with a special offer then just do a search and find their genuine website. If there is a special deal, it will be on their website. Phishing works because there are always enough dumb people to make it profitable.
It obviously needs to be stressed over and over again not to click links within emails and to look very carefully at whether you are on the correct website. If you find something claiming to be from a well-known brand with a special offer then just do a search and find their genuine website. If there is a special deal, it will be on their website. Phishing works because there are always enough dumb people to make it profitable.
Hackers Arrested in China After Gaming Feud Causes Major Outage
Four individuals have been arrested in China after an alleged denial-of-service "war" between underground gaming services spun out of control, according to Xinhua News Agency.
The suspects allegedly launched a distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack against the servers of DNSPod, a Chinese DNS provider and domain registrar. This was motivated by fierce competition between unauthorized online gaming service providers, which lure gamers from official providers with less limited and free access. In order to sabotage "competitors," the suspects began an attack against DNSPod, which provides access to some of those unauthorized gaming sites. Unfortunately DNSPod servers are also used by Baofeng, a very popular video streaming service. As video requests were denied they were passed on to higher level servers causing a chain reaction as these servers didn't know how to handle the requests.
This actually seems an odd story. The DDoS attack was one thing, but the outage was due to rubbish software of Baofeng - who have since recalled their junkware. The authorities are laughing as it will speed up the erection of China's private intranet so that Chinese citizens can sleep safely in the knowledge they will only be hacked by their compatriots.
The suspects allegedly launched a distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack against the servers of DNSPod, a Chinese DNS provider and domain registrar. This was motivated by fierce competition between unauthorized online gaming service providers, which lure gamers from official providers with less limited and free access. In order to sabotage "competitors," the suspects began an attack against DNSPod, which provides access to some of those unauthorized gaming sites. Unfortunately DNSPod servers are also used by Baofeng, a very popular video streaming service. As video requests were denied they were passed on to higher level servers causing a chain reaction as these servers didn't know how to handle the requests.
This actually seems an odd story. The DDoS attack was one thing, but the outage was due to rubbish software of Baofeng - who have since recalled their junkware. The authorities are laughing as it will speed up the erection of China's private intranet so that Chinese citizens can sleep safely in the knowledge they will only be hacked by their compatriots.
How To Get Your Twitter Account Suspended
I managed to get my Twitter account suspended! No idea why, and no big deal as I'd only recently started to use it, but has given me the opportunity to delve into the more unseemly side of Twitter. Every social networking site is full of antisocial behaviour and every website has systems in place to try and mitigate its effects on the average user. Twitter is no different, but the number of aggrieved people who have had their accounts suspended means that Twitter needs to have a long hard look at the systems they have in place. The issues below are a summary of some of the cases I have found online.
The first place to look to see what behaviour can get you banned is the Twitter Terms of Service. There are some fairly obvious things not to do, such as impersonating a real person (although satirical spoofs are accepted so long as it is obvious), publishing or linking to pornography or any other illegal activity, publishing people's private details and, of course, spamming. But it is this latter category that seems filled with potentially nebulous definitions that can get you labelled as 'antisocial' by the Twitter corporation.
Many users have found their accounts suspended for being antisocial. This is somewhat ironic for a social website but all Brothers and Sisters must conform or be banished from the social organism! But let's have a close look at what it takes to be a social outcast.
From Twitter's definition of spam: "If your updates consist mainly of links, and not personal updates." This is the most worrying one. Anybody who uses Twitter to send updates about their blog or website is going to fall foul of this, and yet, follow any mainstream website and all you get are links to their articles. This is a huge case of double standards. Are these corporate websites paying to send out their spam? Is any of it really spam if people are willingly following you? Sending out garbage that nobody reads is a waste of time. Many of the people I was following just sent out links to interesting stuff. Twitter demands that anybody who uses Twitter solely for marketing links must contact them to request to do so. Anybody who has not made such an official request is liable at some point to fall foul of this rule. To show how random this can be, one guy was accused of having all his links point to one site. When he told Twitter that was obviously because it was his blog they reinstated his account!
"If you have followed a large amount of users in a short amount of time." No numbers are given but this could mean anything. Getting followers is a long and sometimes tedious process of building a network from users you already follow. There is always someone who follows first, then the person followed can decide whether to follow their follower... or not. Following on Twitter is a one-way arrow and not the same as the two-way 'friends' thing on Facebook. It is easy to follow a trail of people each of whom follows the previous user. How many does one have to follow in one sitting to fall foul of the Twitter police? Nobody knows.
One consequence of the above rule is that anybody who doesn't like what you write about can flag you as a spammer just for accidentally joining them. I'm not saying most people act this way but I am saying that this can happen and from what I've read, Twitter acts first and then thinks about it in their own sweet time. The internet is full of low-level information warfare that many people are just not aware of. Whether it is Anonymous v $cientology or Christians v Atheists there are spam wars out there to remove or promote content on various social websites. In the instant world of Twitter's follow/unfollow it shouldn't be a sin to follow the wrong person. If after a few tweets you find someone isn't of interest it is a simple matter to unfollow. No ill feelings, no harm done.
However, if one combines the previous definition with the fact that "The number of spam complaints that have been filed against you" also count, then you can easily become a target for people who don't like you. "If a large number of people are blocking you" is also a way to flag an account without formally sending admins a spam report. The lesson here is perhaps to have a good long read of a user's tweets and not just look at their cryptic profile. For example, imagine you're an atheist geek and tweet about both. You follow someone because you've seen some interesting geeky tweets; he then follows you back. He suddenly reads your atheist tweets and gets offended because he's a Christian. Who's fault is that? Does that warrant being flagged as a spammer? Just unfollow and walk away.
I found one user accused of being part of a spam ring. Twitter did reinstate their account on this occasion but the reason is revealing. One spammer is less effective than a whole group. Following each other may, on the face of it, seem pointless but it does give each of them a veneer of sociability that a lone spammer needs to work hard to achieve. If you accidentally find yourself following a few of them Twitter's spam algorithm may well flag you as part of the ring. It may seem strange that someone would willingly join a spam ring but there are many areas in which legitimate information and spam can easily blend. Areas such as personal finance and health are filled with both information and spam. Again, don't just follow people for the sake of it - take a long hard look at how long they've been on Twitter and what their recent tweets look like.
"If you have a small number of followers compared to the amount of people you are following." This could be the profile of a spammer, but what use is it unless you send private messages to all those people, and then you will surely be blocked or flagged for spam. But if, for example, you've started using Twitter as a kind of aggregated RSS feed for lots of news channels then don't expect those accounts to follow you back. You could easily end up following over a hundred twitters without any of them following you back. The lesson here is to build up who you follow slowly and more or less in step with the number of people following you.
I'm sure Twitter doesn't take any one solitary condition as a trigger to suspend accounts - at least I hope not! But there are enough bemused users out there to show that the current system is far from perfect. A real spammer isn't going to bother to complain; they'll just open another account with a new name and fresh email address. Just be careful you're not the target of Twitter's shoot first policy.
The first place to look to see what behaviour can get you banned is the Twitter Terms of Service. There are some fairly obvious things not to do, such as impersonating a real person (although satirical spoofs are accepted so long as it is obvious), publishing or linking to pornography or any other illegal activity, publishing people's private details and, of course, spamming. But it is this latter category that seems filled with potentially nebulous definitions that can get you labelled as 'antisocial' by the Twitter corporation.
Many users have found their accounts suspended for being antisocial. This is somewhat ironic for a social website but all Brothers and Sisters must conform or be banished from the social organism! But let's have a close look at what it takes to be a social outcast.
From Twitter's definition of spam: "If your updates consist mainly of links, and not personal updates." This is the most worrying one. Anybody who uses Twitter to send updates about their blog or website is going to fall foul of this, and yet, follow any mainstream website and all you get are links to their articles. This is a huge case of double standards. Are these corporate websites paying to send out their spam? Is any of it really spam if people are willingly following you? Sending out garbage that nobody reads is a waste of time. Many of the people I was following just sent out links to interesting stuff. Twitter demands that anybody who uses Twitter solely for marketing links must contact them to request to do so. Anybody who has not made such an official request is liable at some point to fall foul of this rule. To show how random this can be, one guy was accused of having all his links point to one site. When he told Twitter that was obviously because it was his blog they reinstated his account!
"If you have followed a large amount of users in a short amount of time." No numbers are given but this could mean anything. Getting followers is a long and sometimes tedious process of building a network from users you already follow. There is always someone who follows first, then the person followed can decide whether to follow their follower... or not. Following on Twitter is a one-way arrow and not the same as the two-way 'friends' thing on Facebook. It is easy to follow a trail of people each of whom follows the previous user. How many does one have to follow in one sitting to fall foul of the Twitter police? Nobody knows.
One consequence of the above rule is that anybody who doesn't like what you write about can flag you as a spammer just for accidentally joining them. I'm not saying most people act this way but I am saying that this can happen and from what I've read, Twitter acts first and then thinks about it in their own sweet time. The internet is full of low-level information warfare that many people are just not aware of. Whether it is Anonymous v $cientology or Christians v Atheists there are spam wars out there to remove or promote content on various social websites. In the instant world of Twitter's follow/unfollow it shouldn't be a sin to follow the wrong person. If after a few tweets you find someone isn't of interest it is a simple matter to unfollow. No ill feelings, no harm done.
However, if one combines the previous definition with the fact that "The number of spam complaints that have been filed against you" also count, then you can easily become a target for people who don't like you. "If a large number of people are blocking you" is also a way to flag an account without formally sending admins a spam report. The lesson here is perhaps to have a good long read of a user's tweets and not just look at their cryptic profile. For example, imagine you're an atheist geek and tweet about both. You follow someone because you've seen some interesting geeky tweets; he then follows you back. He suddenly reads your atheist tweets and gets offended because he's a Christian. Who's fault is that? Does that warrant being flagged as a spammer? Just unfollow and walk away.
I found one user accused of being part of a spam ring. Twitter did reinstate their account on this occasion but the reason is revealing. One spammer is less effective than a whole group. Following each other may, on the face of it, seem pointless but it does give each of them a veneer of sociability that a lone spammer needs to work hard to achieve. If you accidentally find yourself following a few of them Twitter's spam algorithm may well flag you as part of the ring. It may seem strange that someone would willingly join a spam ring but there are many areas in which legitimate information and spam can easily blend. Areas such as personal finance and health are filled with both information and spam. Again, don't just follow people for the sake of it - take a long hard look at how long they've been on Twitter and what their recent tweets look like.
"If you have a small number of followers compared to the amount of people you are following." This could be the profile of a spammer, but what use is it unless you send private messages to all those people, and then you will surely be blocked or flagged for spam. But if, for example, you've started using Twitter as a kind of aggregated RSS feed for lots of news channels then don't expect those accounts to follow you back. You could easily end up following over a hundred twitters without any of them following you back. The lesson here is to build up who you follow slowly and more or less in step with the number of people following you.
I'm sure Twitter doesn't take any one solitary condition as a trigger to suspend accounts - at least I hope not! But there are enough bemused users out there to show that the current system is far from perfect. A real spammer isn't going to bother to complain; they'll just open another account with a new name and fresh email address. Just be careful you're not the target of Twitter's shoot first policy.
Twitter Account Suspended? What to do next.
What To Do If Your Twitter Account Has Been Suspended
Your Twitter account has been suspended. You're confused and angry and want answers. You're not alone; this is becoming a frequent occurrence and Twitter admin like to hide behind some fairly nebulous terms of service.
The bottom line is that Twitter reserves the right “to refuse service to anyone for any reason at anytime.”. They can suspend your account for any reason without telling you why. If you know why you're account has been suspended then you probably won't need to read this and can merrily go ahead and create another account. If you're afraid of losing the network you have established and any reputation you feel you have gained then read on.
Twitter has gone from a lowly start-up to a major online presence in a short time, but their resources are just not keeping up with their new status. This seems to be affecting both their physical resources such as servers and bandwidth as well as their human resources such as their help system. If you feel that you need to use Twitter then you will have to protect yourself from account suspension and the consequences that arise from it, but that's for another article.
One example of this is that Twitter's help pages have a number of dead links. This look bad and means having to go the long way round to find out how to complain about your account suspension. There seem to be two ways to seek to get your account reinstated.
Twitter Support
Twitter Support currently uses the Zendesk platform to generate help tickets and (hopefully) answer them. This means they have two URLs that point to the same place:
http://help.twitter.com/entries
http://twitter.zendesk.com/entries
If they ever stop using Zendesk then the first URL should still work.
If your account has recently been suspended and has not been deleted then you can login to this helpdesk with the same details as your Twitter account. Some people have found it expedient to create another Twitter account and use those details to open tickets about their suspended account. This can be useful as some users have found they can no longer login to the helpdesk if their Twitter account was terminated. The downside is that if Twitter upholds the original account suspension then you may find your new account also targeted. This choice is yours.
Online companies often hide behind the anonymity the internet affords them and Twitter is no different. You will firstly receive an automated response, which merely means a human may eventually look at your case. Most people's reaction is to then send an angry reply. From reading some people's stories the best way to get your suspended account reinstated is to make a clear logical case that you have done nothing against Twitter's TOS.
Mistakes happen and there are unpleasant people out there who want to take you off the net just because they don't like your politics, religion, race, sexual orientation or whatever. There are also spam rings on Twitter and if you unfortunately follow one of them accidentally you may be flagged as part of the ring. Whatever the reason for your suspension you might, or might not, get to know and can then act upon it either with a new account or your reinstated account.
Get Satisfaction
The second place where you can complain about your Twitter account suspension is at Get Satisfaction. This is similar to Zendesk but has the advantage that it is also a forum and other users can comment on your case and share experiences. This means you're not alone in dealing with Twitter and can see who has been reinstated and who hasn't.
Get satisfaction also has a section of Twitter Known Issues. This lists known bugs on Twitter that have led to various account problems such as the inability to login, tweets or followers gone missing and accounts accidentally blocked. If you had a lot of followers you can try to get them to support your reinstatement here. That, however, assumes you've kept an offline list of your followers: how many people do that?
Will you get your Twitter account reinstated?
Maybe, maybe not.
How long will it take?
How long is an elastic band? They seem woefully under-staffed and have seen accounts reinstated after 2 months!
Is it worth the aggravation?
That really depends on how much effort you've put into your Twitter community. If you really feel you haven't done anything wrong then it is worth pursuing as otherwise you're likely to fall into the same trap with a new account.
Where can I find Twitter's Terms of Service?
Here are Twitter's Terms of Service and Rules Policies. The section that probably affects most people is their Twitter Rules page.
Good luck... just don't hold your breath waiting.
Your Twitter account has been suspended. You're confused and angry and want answers. You're not alone; this is becoming a frequent occurrence and Twitter admin like to hide behind some fairly nebulous terms of service.
The bottom line is that Twitter reserves the right “to refuse service to anyone for any reason at anytime.”. They can suspend your account for any reason without telling you why. If you know why you're account has been suspended then you probably won't need to read this and can merrily go ahead and create another account. If you're afraid of losing the network you have established and any reputation you feel you have gained then read on.
Twitter has gone from a lowly start-up to a major online presence in a short time, but their resources are just not keeping up with their new status. This seems to be affecting both their physical resources such as servers and bandwidth as well as their human resources such as their help system. If you feel that you need to use Twitter then you will have to protect yourself from account suspension and the consequences that arise from it, but that's for another article.
One example of this is that Twitter's help pages have a number of dead links. This look bad and means having to go the long way round to find out how to complain about your account suspension. There seem to be two ways to seek to get your account reinstated.
Twitter Support
Twitter Support currently uses the Zendesk platform to generate help tickets and (hopefully) answer them. This means they have two URLs that point to the same place:
http://help.twitter.com/entries
http://twitter.zendesk.com/entries
If they ever stop using Zendesk then the first URL should still work.
If your account has recently been suspended and has not been deleted then you can login to this helpdesk with the same details as your Twitter account. Some people have found it expedient to create another Twitter account and use those details to open tickets about their suspended account. This can be useful as some users have found they can no longer login to the helpdesk if their Twitter account was terminated. The downside is that if Twitter upholds the original account suspension then you may find your new account also targeted. This choice is yours.
Online companies often hide behind the anonymity the internet affords them and Twitter is no different. You will firstly receive an automated response, which merely means a human may eventually look at your case. Most people's reaction is to then send an angry reply. From reading some people's stories the best way to get your suspended account reinstated is to make a clear logical case that you have done nothing against Twitter's TOS.
Mistakes happen and there are unpleasant people out there who want to take you off the net just because they don't like your politics, religion, race, sexual orientation or whatever. There are also spam rings on Twitter and if you unfortunately follow one of them accidentally you may be flagged as part of the ring. Whatever the reason for your suspension you might, or might not, get to know and can then act upon it either with a new account or your reinstated account.
Get Satisfaction
The second place where you can complain about your Twitter account suspension is at Get Satisfaction. This is similar to Zendesk but has the advantage that it is also a forum and other users can comment on your case and share experiences. This means you're not alone in dealing with Twitter and can see who has been reinstated and who hasn't.
Get satisfaction also has a section of Twitter Known Issues. This lists known bugs on Twitter that have led to various account problems such as the inability to login, tweets or followers gone missing and accounts accidentally blocked. If you had a lot of followers you can try to get them to support your reinstatement here. That, however, assumes you've kept an offline list of your followers: how many people do that?
Will you get your Twitter account reinstated?
Maybe, maybe not.
How long will it take?
How long is an elastic band? They seem woefully under-staffed and have seen accounts reinstated after 2 months!
Is it worth the aggravation?
That really depends on how much effort you've put into your Twitter community. If you really feel you haven't done anything wrong then it is worth pursuing as otherwise you're likely to fall into the same trap with a new account.
Where can I find Twitter's Terms of Service?
Here are Twitter's Terms of Service and Rules Policies. The section that probably affects most people is their Twitter Rules page.
Good luck... just don't hold your breath waiting.
Are the Trending Topics on Twitter a Waste of Time?
Twitter has been busy messing around with its user interface. It recently added the latest Trending Topics in its right-hand column, just below the Search box. The Trending Topics shows the top ten keywords currently in use. If one looks at a third-party application such as Twopular you'll get a more detailed view of the trends but it is fairly consistent with Twitter's own calculations. However, how useful is Twitter Trends and how does it compare to Google Trends?
Google's own Hot Trends is based on actual searches. The full algorithm is somewhat of a secret and the data given does not indicate how this calculation is performed. What one can assume is that the Hot Trends are those keywords whose search numbers are above their norm. They therefore tend to be news-related keywords and even a small but sudden increase in searches can lead to a listing in the Hot Trends. Apart from a serious burst of viral marketing it isn't easy to manipulate what Google is tracking. After all, once you click on a keyword there is absolutely no reason to then go and search for the same word unless you really want some further background information that is not available at the links already provided by Google.
In contrast, if you click on a keyword in Twitter's Trends what you'll see are dozens of identical tweets, often retweeting (RT) the same message over and over again. However, what you also find are lots of spammy tweets that have taken the trending keyword and then inserted it into a tweet about something completely different! On Twitter there are two types of keywords: one is a keyword string extracted from tweet texts, somewhat like Google does; and the other are hash tags such as #hottrends. The hash tags are useful for defining a subject across many tweets but what one finds is that most trending keywords on twitter are hash tags rather than contextual keywords.
Finding short-term trends can be useful to those writers who like to ambulance-chase the latest buzzy topics in the hope of increased traffic and earnings. But this somewhat relies on the trending data being genuine and not subject to mass manipulation. Tweets are so short that it is impossible to tell whether a message is really about the keyword or not. As often happens with any list across the web, such as social bookmarking lists, there is always a tipping point. If you can sneak into the bottom of the list this often gives you a leg up to the next level. Hover just below this cut-off point and you could easily fall back down again. people are lazy - they'll look at the most obvious thing first.
But on Twitter, getting a subject on its Trending Topics is liable to be swamped with spam and unrelated garbage. Yes, you will also find the original tweet being resent by lots of people but what you don't seem to get is a stream of any discussion that is taking place. Perhaps I'm the only one who thinks this is a problem, but what was supposed to be a good idea is just too easy to abuse.
Google's own Hot Trends is based on actual searches. The full algorithm is somewhat of a secret and the data given does not indicate how this calculation is performed. What one can assume is that the Hot Trends are those keywords whose search numbers are above their norm. They therefore tend to be news-related keywords and even a small but sudden increase in searches can lead to a listing in the Hot Trends. Apart from a serious burst of viral marketing it isn't easy to manipulate what Google is tracking. After all, once you click on a keyword there is absolutely no reason to then go and search for the same word unless you really want some further background information that is not available at the links already provided by Google.
In contrast, if you click on a keyword in Twitter's Trends what you'll see are dozens of identical tweets, often retweeting (RT) the same message over and over again. However, what you also find are lots of spammy tweets that have taken the trending keyword and then inserted it into a tweet about something completely different! On Twitter there are two types of keywords: one is a keyword string extracted from tweet texts, somewhat like Google does; and the other are hash tags such as #hottrends. The hash tags are useful for defining a subject across many tweets but what one finds is that most trending keywords on twitter are hash tags rather than contextual keywords.
Finding short-term trends can be useful to those writers who like to ambulance-chase the latest buzzy topics in the hope of increased traffic and earnings. But this somewhat relies on the trending data being genuine and not subject to mass manipulation. Tweets are so short that it is impossible to tell whether a message is really about the keyword or not. As often happens with any list across the web, such as social bookmarking lists, there is always a tipping point. If you can sneak into the bottom of the list this often gives you a leg up to the next level. Hover just below this cut-off point and you could easily fall back down again. people are lazy - they'll look at the most obvious thing first.
But on Twitter, getting a subject on its Trending Topics is liable to be swamped with spam and unrelated garbage. Yes, you will also find the original tweet being resent by lots of people but what you don't seem to get is a stream of any discussion that is taking place. Perhaps I'm the only one who thinks this is a problem, but what was supposed to be a good idea is just too easy to abuse.
Twitter Tweak Ruffles Feathers
A small tweak in Twitter's default settings has many users up in arms. Most newbies will probably not even know what all the fuss is about.
Before the recent change, the default setting for what you could see included tweets between two people if you were already following both of them, but not if you were just following one of them. However, Twitter did include the option of changing this default to allow users to see all the correspondence sent out by those they were following. For many, this was too much stream of consciousness, but others enjoyed watching a whole debate develop. This latter option has been removed!
What this also does is remove the more serendipitous nature of finding people with common interests and views. It is often the case that seeing a reply from A to B - where you're following A - will lead to looking at B's profile and possibly thereby following B as well. The new changes mean this will happen less. The full feed is available if one goes to A's user profile or the global timeline, but that isn't the best way of using Twitter.
Nobody seems entirely sure why Twitter has done this. Bandwidth problems?! But the Twitter management is now finding their communication tool being directed at them.
Before the recent change, the default setting for what you could see included tweets between two people if you were already following both of them, but not if you were just following one of them. However, Twitter did include the option of changing this default to allow users to see all the correspondence sent out by those they were following. For many, this was too much stream of consciousness, but others enjoyed watching a whole debate develop. This latter option has been removed!
What this also does is remove the more serendipitous nature of finding people with common interests and views. It is often the case that seeing a reply from A to B - where you're following A - will lead to looking at B's profile and possibly thereby following B as well. The new changes mean this will happen less. The full feed is available if one goes to A's user profile or the global timeline, but that isn't the best way of using Twitter.
Nobody seems entirely sure why Twitter has done this. Bandwidth problems?! But the Twitter management is now finding their communication tool being directed at them.
Would you pay to read online newspapers?
Rupert Murdoch expects to start charging for access to News Corporation's newspaper websites within a year. 'The current days of the internet will soon be over,' he said, as the media strived to fix a 'malfunctioning' business model. Would you pay to read papers online?
The sub-headline from The Guardian says it all. For Murdoch 'free' is a nasty four-letter word and he will do everything in his power to turn the internet into a money-grabbing mirror of his off-line businesses. Just have a look at his media interests, from The Times, The Sun and Sky in the UK to Fox Network and Dow Jones in the USA, and many many more. Oh yeah, he owns MySpace too.
Just don't become dependent on any one platform in case you're suddenly trapped into paying for the privilege or closing your account. The internet is changing from the idealist information superhighway to the social web 2.0 to the corporate pay-per-net. But without users these sites have no influence and hence little advertising. This will be a great test to see how fast people will flee from a subscription news site. But, what if they don't?
Would you pay to read the news online? As newspapers have always sold a particular political spin, rather than any raw news, would you pay to read news that's spun to your liking?
Take our TrendWagon poll at the top-right corner of this page. (Closes 15 May 2009)
The sub-headline from The Guardian says it all. For Murdoch 'free' is a nasty four-letter word and he will do everything in his power to turn the internet into a money-grabbing mirror of his off-line businesses. Just have a look at his media interests, from The Times, The Sun and Sky in the UK to Fox Network and Dow Jones in the USA, and many many more. Oh yeah, he owns MySpace too.
Just don't become dependent on any one platform in case you're suddenly trapped into paying for the privilege or closing your account. The internet is changing from the idealist information superhighway to the social web 2.0 to the corporate pay-per-net. But without users these sites have no influence and hence little advertising. This will be a great test to see how fast people will flee from a subscription news site. But, what if they don't?
Would you pay to read the news online? As newspapers have always sold a particular political spin, rather than any raw news, would you pay to read news that's spun to your liking?
Take our TrendWagon poll at the top-right corner of this page. (Closes 15 May 2009)
RSS RIP, Hail Twitter!
I get the feeling that TechCrunch must have some pecuniary interest in Twitter as there is an almost daily propaganda piece. This article suggests the demise of RSS feeds as they will be overtaken by following tweets.
I think this is complete crap. Ever tried reading tweets? the joy of an RSS reader is being able to scan articles and pick what to read. If a full RSS feed you never even have to go to the originating site. Very unlike Twitter where one has to forever click to open a new page only to then discover whether it was worth reading or not.
What RSS doesn't do is facilitate a two-way (or group) chat on a topic. Then again, RSS is a syndication service and never designed to be a text messaging service. But I, for one, am not closing my RSS reader, whatever TechCrunch might believe.
I think this is complete crap. Ever tried reading tweets? the joy of an RSS reader is being able to scan articles and pick what to read. If a full RSS feed you never even have to go to the originating site. Very unlike Twitter where one has to forever click to open a new page only to then discover whether it was worth reading or not.
What RSS doesn't do is facilitate a two-way (or group) chat on a topic. Then again, RSS is a syndication service and never designed to be a text messaging service. But I, for one, am not closing my RSS reader, whatever TechCrunch might believe.
Stephen Wolfram on Wolfram Alpha Knowledge Search Engine
Wolfram Alpha will go public in May 2009. It has already been hyped as the first serious challenge to Google and traditional search engines. This may be true in the future but for now Wolfram has set his sights on making his computational knowledge engine do precisely what it claims to do - to turn the raw information on the web into real understandable knowledge.
Wolfram Alpha brings together two of Stephen's most famous products: Wolfram's Mathematica software and his work on cellular automata published in A New Kind of Science. Both are fundamentally about performing computations on formally defined structures - be they mathematical integrals or chaotic cellular systems. What would be really useful is to perform computations on knowledge structures as written in human language. After all, isn't this what computers were supposed to do?
This is where Wolfram Alpha is very different to our current batch of search engines. Rather than being just a sophisticated concordance of the web, this knowledge engine will turn plain text into human language structures, then convert these into computational language structures that can be queried, and finally turn the output back into a readable human form. Answering simple questions has never been so difficult!
Some techie websites have had access to this new Wolfram Alpha and are generally impressed, although keen to stress that this engine will have some limitations at first. The data it uses has been curated and will therefore expand only as fast as this process allows. Because of this, some think this is more likely to be a challenge to the likes of Wikipedia than to Google.
Now, this bit is impressive:"Another query with a very sophisticated result was "uncle's uncle's brother's son." Now if you type that into Google, the result will be a useless list of sites that don't even answer this specific question, but Alpha actually returns an interactive genealogic tree with additional information, including data about the 'blood relationship fraction,' for example (3.125% in this case)."
I, for one, look forward to tryin it out.
Wolfram Alpha brings together two of Stephen's most famous products: Wolfram's Mathematica software and his work on cellular automata published in A New Kind of Science. Both are fundamentally about performing computations on formally defined structures - be they mathematical integrals or chaotic cellular systems. What would be really useful is to perform computations on knowledge structures as written in human language. After all, isn't this what computers were supposed to do?
This is where Wolfram Alpha is very different to our current batch of search engines. Rather than being just a sophisticated concordance of the web, this knowledge engine will turn plain text into human language structures, then convert these into computational language structures that can be queried, and finally turn the output back into a readable human form. Answering simple questions has never been so difficult!
Some techie websites have had access to this new Wolfram Alpha and are generally impressed, although keen to stress that this engine will have some limitations at first. The data it uses has been curated and will therefore expand only as fast as this process allows. Because of this, some think this is more likely to be a challenge to the likes of Wikipedia than to Google.
Now, this bit is impressive:"Another query with a very sophisticated result was "uncle's uncle's brother's son." Now if you type that into Google, the result will be a useless list of sites that don't even answer this specific question, but Alpha actually returns an interactive genealogic tree with additional information, including data about the 'blood relationship fraction,' for example (3.125% in this case)."
I, for one, look forward to tryin it out.
Geocities and Compuserve to Close - do you care?
Yahoo has finally decided to bury its dreadful Geocities free websites. Finally! If I see a URL with geocities in it I generally avoid it. To be assaulted by their crappy adverts and pop-ins on every page is just no fun. With the growth of blogs there really is no excuse for anyone to use such a user-unfriendly service. Surprised it has taken Yahoo so long to bury this great idea from the 1990s.
Compuserve is also adding itself to the dinosaur graveyard. I'm not even sure what their primary objective is these days. I remember it from the days of private networks like AOL, CIX (even the URL cix.com is parked!) Claranet and so on. The idea was to dial into the network and you then got access to whole internet as part of the package. I never saw the point. perhaps London has been fortunate in always having cheap no-thrills direct internet access. These companies should have gone into managing corporate intranets.
I can't say I'll miss either Geocities or Compuserve. Will you?
Product Planner Maps Out How Popular Sites Function
When it comes to building a website, one of the key factors in establishing a sizable user base is your site’s ability to ‘go viral’. While there isn’t any magic secret to accomplishing this, there are a few things that can help - namely, making it as easy as possible for your users to sign up, and helping them invite their friends. But this is easier said than done, and determining exactly how to implement these seemingly obvious steps can play a huge role in a site’s success.
Product Planner, a new site that launched this week, is looking to help companies tackle this issue. The site has visually mapped out over 100 ‘flows’ that visually depict exactly how many of the web’s most popular services operate. For example, Gmail’s signup flow consists of inviting a visitor to first click ‘Sign Up for Gmail’, followed by a form asking for information, and finally a confirmation button that says ’show me my account’. It may sound simple, but being able to see each of these side by side can be invaluable when it comes to actually building your site. (TC)
Easy! A great tool for webmasters. However, what is more important than knowing the flow structure is that the user actually has that flow visibly available. Hugely irritating signing up for something to then find there is another page of crap to fill in! Knowing it in advance means one can decide whether to go ahead. Of course, for some sites getting the user stuck in the flow is part of their... erm... charm.
Having said that, Product Planner does little to show its depths. Navigation is largely iconic and only by clicking deeper do you find out that there links to useful articles about specific aspects of the flow; be it about viral marketing or click through rates. So, ironically, it's not just about flow, but also about looking down at the plumbing.
The Pirate Bay Found Guilty
The four co-founders of website The Pirate Bay have been found guilty of assisting the distribution of illegal content online by a Swedish court today and have been sentenced to a year in jail and a $3.6m (£2.4m) fine.
"Stay calm – nothing will happen to TPB, us personally or filesharing what so ever. This is just a theatre for the media," said one of the founders. They all plan to appeal. This seems like the kind of verdict where everyone claims some kind of victory and yet nobody is entirely happy.
Thing is, can't the charge of "assisting making available copyrighted content" be levelled at search engines too? What about Usenet? Anyway, with servers in Russia it is unlikely the corporate media will try a similar trial there. They actually held a party in Moscow to "celebrate". Why were they celebrating?
A nice timeline of the whole Pirate bay trial is here at Dipity.
Ashton Kutcher Overtakes CNN on Twitter
A marketing dream for Twitter, for Ashton Kutcher and, almost by accident, for CNN. With prizes now on offer to the millionth follower of either Kutcher or CNN, what was a genuine phenomenon has been turned into a manufactured competition. Thing is, one cannot now unfollow either of them.
This last aspect just illustrates how artificial the race has become. Many commenters at TechCrunch seem to think this is a good idea and that by not allowing users to unfollow these Twitts it avoids a mad frenzy of people quickly following and unfollowing in the desperate hope of being that one millionth follower. But this is completely dumb! All that will happen - and most probably already is - is that people will create multiple user accounts and follow both with each new account. Watch the followers plummet after the competition is over.
Surely Twitter's database is not so fragile that they can't figure out the millionth user from a simple query, even if people follow and unfollow quickly? It smells to me like a way to speed up reaching the million mark before people get bored. Twitter might have a problem counting up to a million as one screenshot shows CNN already having 1,963,482 followers, which one assumes is a million too many but also highlights a counting issue.
Why is Ashton Kutcher so popular? Yeah, I looked up who he is in the vain hope of an interesting celebrity. I guess one moral lesson is to use your psychological problems to make a career in the media rather than in prison.
This last aspect just illustrates how artificial the race has become. Many commenters at TechCrunch seem to think this is a good idea and that by not allowing users to unfollow these Twitts it avoids a mad frenzy of people quickly following and unfollowing in the desperate hope of being that one millionth follower. But this is completely dumb! All that will happen - and most probably already is - is that people will create multiple user accounts and follow both with each new account. Watch the followers plummet after the competition is over.
Surely Twitter's database is not so fragile that they can't figure out the millionth user from a simple query, even if people follow and unfollow quickly? It smells to me like a way to speed up reaching the million mark before people get bored. Twitter might have a problem counting up to a million as one screenshot shows CNN already having 1,963,482 followers, which one assumes is a million too many but also highlights a counting issue.
Why is Ashton Kutcher so popular? Yeah, I looked up who he is in the vain hope of an interesting celebrity. I guess one moral lesson is to use your psychological problems to make a career in the media rather than in prison.
Goldman Sucks Blog Threatened With Legal Action
Good to see that bankers Goldman Sachs has its priorities in order. Not satisfied with needing to beg the US government for taxpayer money to stop it from becoming history, it has chosen to use some of those funds to attack a blogger.
Mike Morgan is a registered investment adviser who just a few weeks ago opened the site goldmansachs666.com to push Goldman gripes and a selection of conspiracy theories. In response, Goldman Sucks has employed its rather expensive lawyers to send a cease and desist notice warning Morgan that he faces legal action if the blog is not taken down.
Although the blog has a huge disclaimer at the top, Goldman insists that the use of their name will cause confusion amongst its clients. This shows in what high regard Goldman holds its own clients. There are a few good posts and links on the blog - grab them before they disappear.
Mike Morgan is a registered investment adviser who just a few weeks ago opened the site goldmansachs666.com to push Goldman gripes and a selection of conspiracy theories. In response, Goldman Sucks has employed its rather expensive lawyers to send a cease and desist notice warning Morgan that he faces legal action if the blog is not taken down.
Although the blog has a huge disclaimer at the top, Goldman insists that the use of their name will cause confusion amongst its clients. This shows in what high regard Goldman holds its own clients. There are a few good posts and links on the blog - grab them before they disappear.
Aggregated Assault by Online Newspapers
It's difficult to compete with free! But this is the challenge facing newspaper owners. William Dean Singleton, a newspaper publisher and chairman of the Associated Press, says online news aggregators are making him "mad as hell and we are not going to take it any more." reports MarketWatch. Such targets include the likes of Google and Digg, who are accused of linking to news stories without paying.
Firstly, news websites have RSS feeds for free. Why don't they just remove them? If Google is such a menace then they could block their spiders in their robots.txt file. But Google claims to send a billion clicks a month to originating news sources from their news aggregator. I guess Singleton and his rags could go get that traffic elsewhere. News aggregators are straw men set up by stuffed men. The real problem is supposedly the whole business model of paying for news.
Before the internet most people would buy a daily newspaper. If you worked or frequented a place that would buy all that day's newspapers then you could read a variety of versions of the same story and then make up your own mind. But for most people this wasn't the case. Over time they would stick to one, or maybe two, papers that they liked - newspapers that had the same world view as the reader. But this is the point: it is an illusion that newspapers sell news - what they sell is a social perspective on the news.
What newspapers sell is a spin on the news to further a particular social and political, even economic, point of view. News aggregators obviously in no way dilute the news; if anything they magnify what is popular. But what aggregators are doing is diluting the spin. A single reader may end up on a dozen different originating news websites, each for a different story. The coherent spin is thereby lost. That's what newspapers want back - their spin-wagon.
Let's see how their "business model" will adapt to this internet landscape whilst reclaiming their influence as propaganda organs. I've said this before, but it puts a new light on why newspapers, in the shape of media companies, are buying into the social networking model. It also shows why the ultimate owners of many media companies have nothing to do with entertainment per se. It is not just the obvious advertising to get you to buy products, but the content itself is advertising to make you buy into their world view.
Firstly, news websites have RSS feeds for free. Why don't they just remove them? If Google is such a menace then they could block their spiders in their robots.txt file. But Google claims to send a billion clicks a month to originating news sources from their news aggregator. I guess Singleton and his rags could go get that traffic elsewhere. News aggregators are straw men set up by stuffed men. The real problem is supposedly the whole business model of paying for news.
Before the internet most people would buy a daily newspaper. If you worked or frequented a place that would buy all that day's newspapers then you could read a variety of versions of the same story and then make up your own mind. But for most people this wasn't the case. Over time they would stick to one, or maybe two, papers that they liked - newspapers that had the same world view as the reader. But this is the point: it is an illusion that newspapers sell news - what they sell is a social perspective on the news.
What newspapers sell is a spin on the news to further a particular social and political, even economic, point of view. News aggregators obviously in no way dilute the news; if anything they magnify what is popular. But what aggregators are doing is diluting the spin. A single reader may end up on a dozen different originating news websites, each for a different story. The coherent spin is thereby lost. That's what newspapers want back - their spin-wagon.
Let's see how their "business model" will adapt to this internet landscape whilst reclaiming their influence as propaganda organs. I've said this before, but it puts a new light on why newspapers, in the shape of media companies, are buying into the social networking model. It also shows why the ultimate owners of many media companies have nothing to do with entertainment per se. It is not just the obvious advertising to get you to buy products, but the content itself is advertising to make you buy into their world view.
Demi Moore Twitters to Avoid Suicide
Twitter has been credited with potentially saving somebody's life, after actress Demi Moore used it to intervene in the case of a woman who claimed she was suicidal.Moore picked up a message from a Californian woman who said she was planning to kill herself and rebroadcast it to more than 350,000 fans. As a result, Twitter users began to contact police to warn them of what was happening. Police later confirmed that the suicidal lady was taken into custody for evaluation.
Moore, who is one of the most high-profile celebrities to use Twitter, said she did not know the woman. In a response on the site, she said that the incident was a "prime example of the power of collective consciousness".
The miracle of Twitter! Is there anything it cannot do?! This does sound like a bit of puff care of Twitter's press office. People have been using forums, email lists and instant messaging services to air their problems for many years. Here, however, we see the power of the distributed network. With 350,000 other people listening in that lonely plea for help became amplified into real world action.
If only someone could figure out how to use this to solve so many other global problems.
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