internet « More shameless remarks by Larko

404 Page not found

Tuesday, September 16, 2008 at 15:04 | In internet | Leave a Comment
Tags: 404

All of us are familiar with the most annoying message of the Internet, i.e. the 404 error. Since it is irritating to land there the best thing a clever web master can do is to try to make us feel cool about it. Here is a very nice approach to the problem.

via Robin Gurney

Chrome not available for Linux

Wednesday, September 3, 2008 at 1:02 | In browsers, computer, google, internet, linux | 4 Comments
Tags: chrome

Google have launched their open source browser called Chrome. Or short of launched, at least. It is funny that an open source browser is not available for the true open source environment. I hear that Chrome is not going to support Linux until it leaves beta.

Judging from the history of other Google apps, it may well take months or even years before I am going to get a chance to acquire first hand user experience of Chrome. Which is a pity as much of what they have cooked sounds like a treat. Not that I would be unhappy with Firefox. It is the best browser in the World until proven otherwise.

This comic book tells you all you ever wanted to know about Chrome and probably a lot more as well.

Saddam scam

Tuesday, August 26, 2008 at 19:15 | In crime, e-mail, internet | 4 Comments
Tags: nigerian scam

All of us have received Nigerian scam e-mails, i.e. scam letters camouflaged as a request to assist in a shady transfer of a large sum of money. The legends of those letters usually tell a heart breaking story of a daughter or widow of a prominent oppositional politician in a country that the intended scam victim is unlikely to ever have heard of. I received another one of those scam letters today.

Normally I would not have bothered to read the letter before deleting it and reporting as spam. This one caught my eye, though. It looked somewhat different. The sender appeared to be one sergeant Frank Steve.

This scam is obviously intended to hit the US market. “Sgt. Steve” is playing with the patriotic feelings of Americans. According to the legend he serves in the 3rd Infantery Division of the US army, which does indeed have troops posted in Iraq. The bait is, as usual, a share of the imaginary sum of 25 million US$. The origin of the money sounds fun:

SOURCE OF MONEY: SOME MONEY IN VARIOUS CURRENCIES WERE DISCOVERED IN BARRELS AT A FARMHOUSE NEAR ONE OF SADDAM’S OLD PALACES IN TIKRIT-IRAQ DURING A RESCUE OPERATION, AND IT WAS AGREED BY STAFF SGT RICHARD BUFF AND I THAT SOME PART OF THIS MONEY BE SHARED AMONG BOTH OF US BEFORE INFORMING ANYBODY ABOUT IT SINCE BOTH OF US SAW THE MONEY FIRST.

So the international accountants chasing Saddam’s hidden assets should not bother to look for off shore bank accounts. All they need to do is to scan all farm houses around Saddam’s various retreats in Iraq. I would never have imagined that old Saddam used to rely on barrels for his banking.

Just in case the scam victims should have any doubts, the good “sergeant” admits that the transaction is not quite legal but what the heck, we are all patriots, aren’t we:

THIS WAS QUITE AN ILLEGAL THING TO DO, BUT I TELL YOU WHAT? NO COMPENSATION CAN MAKE UP FOR THE RISK WE HAVE TAKEN WITH OUR LIVES IN THIS HELL HOLE. OF WHICH MY BROTHER IN-LAW WAS KILLED BY A ROAD SIDE BOMB LAST TIME.

Some risk, sure! Somebody might even take the trouble of routing back the scam letter just to detect that it originates far from Iraq. The police might be knocking on the door. But do not worry, “serg”, I’ll just delete the letter. But somebody else might be shameless enough to dig deeper.

Oh yes, this is a cutie. To increase the credibility of the scam, a link to a Washington Post news story is provided. Unfortunately though, the Post news desk seems to have deleted the story:

Bad luck! It would have been so nice to catch Washington Post reporting about money that never existed.

Signature to support Georgia

Sunday, August 10, 2008 at 20:57 | In internet, russia | 17 Comments
Tags: georgia, war

Image courtesy of 3dflags.com

I do usually not sign web petitions. There has to be a very good reason if I am going to make an exception. In a moment ago I made an exception of my general policy and signed a web petition to support Georgia. The petition reads as follows:

To: U.S. Congres, European Parliament, United Nations

The hereby signers, are making a statement to express our support to the Republic of Georgia, currently being attacked by the Russian Federation, we are making a call to the European Union, the United States of America, and all peoples and nations of the world to repulse the current aggressions being performed by the Russian military lead by president Dmitry Medvedev and prime minister Vladimir Putin; our plead is to call the nations of the world and all International Organizations, to demand an immediate ceasefire and the removal of Russian troops off Georgian territories; we also call the Russian people to reject the hostilities and urge their government to return to peace.

Sincerely,

The Undersigned

via Marko Mihkelson, MP in Estonia

Beijing cheated about free web access

Wednesday, July 30, 2008 at 13:53 | In China, Press freedom, censorship, internet | 2 Comments
Tags: Olympics

When the Chinese Olympic organizers promised that foreign journalists covering the games would have uncensored access to the Internet, I did not believe for a moment that this would actually happen. It was merely a lip service necessary to get their bid for the games approved. I am now being proven right: the Great Firewall of China curtails the Olympic media center.

Web sites like Amnesty International, Reporters Without Borders and Human Rights Watch are being blocked as well as a number of pro Tibetan sites and basically most contents critical of the pathetic rulers in Beijing. On this clip you can hear a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman spell out that sites related to Falun Gong are not going to be made accessible. The most outrageous statement is blaming some of the censored sites themselves for being off line. Just click on the links, folks, and see that they are on line.

more about “IOC probes China censorship claims | …“, posted with vodpod

Among many other sites all of WordPress.com is being censored in China which is why this post can not be read there. Oddly enough, it is possible to post to Blogger in China but not to read Blogger blogs as Blogspot.com is filtered but Blogger.com is not. Totalitarian governments are as inconsistent as they are unreliable.

Granting the Olympic games to China was a huge mistake. The IOC apparently reasoned that the Olympics would prompt China to give in on the human rights issue but we have all way long seen the contrary. It turns out that the IOC themselves have had to give in, according to the BBC:

In an interview with the South China Morning Post, IOC press commission chairman Kevan Gosper apologised for inadvertently misleading journalists over unfettered internet access.

“I’m not backing off what I said. There will be full, open and free internet access during Games time to allow journalists to report on the Olympics,” he told the daily.

“But I have also been advised that some of the IOC officials had negotiated with the Chinese that some sensitive sites would be blocked.”

Which is another reminder that there is no point in bargaining with totalitarian rezimes as they never keep their promises and always tend to cheat.

Edit: This post has also been published as a guest author’s post in China-Watchblog.

A public service announcement: China-Watchblog helps you improve your understanding of the German language and provides a comprhensive coverage of contemporary China before, during and after the Olympics.

Another public service announcement: A deep analysis on the basic nature of the Chinese society appears daily before and during the Olympics at Sex and Shanghai.

Cuil seems to like me

Monday, July 28, 2008 at 23:38 | In internet | 5 Comments
Tags: cuil, search engine

The new search engine Cuil seems to like me while I do not particularly like Cuil. The developers of the engine, all former Google employees, say they are out to capture Google’s leading position but I am less than impressed. The interface is somewhat confusing.

The engine misses what I like most about Google: Google’s search results are presented compactly and you get an idea with the first look about the relevance of the links and also where they come from. Cuil spreads the results allover the screen and you need to look real close to detect the source which is annoying for somebody who is critical about their sources, i.e. a journalist.

What did I mean by saying that Cuil seems to like me? Both Thomas and StoiBär have tried to search their own blogs in Cuil but all they get back is my references to them. Gosh, I had no idea I was so popular. Either I am over ranked at Cuil or it is because I cuiled myself early this morning and maybe that search somehow effected their statistics about popular searches.

Then again, that would obviously be a real bad bug and startups do not have such bugs undetected when they launch up. Or do they?

Edit: Bug or no bug, Cuil also seems to have a serious capacity problem. Does not look good at all.

Karadzic’s fake web site

Wednesday, July 23, 2008 at 17:26 | In internet | 2 Comments
Tags: karadzic

It turns out that the recently arrested war criminal Radovan Karadzic has maintained a web site under his fake identity of Dr. Dragan Dabic. The site is still online but I would not be surprised if it were to be closed any time soon.

Edit: As Thooby points out in a comment, the web site may not be actually created by Mr. Karadzic but by somebody acting as him. A WHOIS inquiry reveals that the domain was anonymously registered as late as 22nd July 2008, i.e. at a time when Mr. Karadzic was already in custody:

Domain Name: DRAGANDABIC.COM
Registrar: ENOM, INC.
Whois Server: whois.enom.com
Referral URL: http://www.enom.com
Name Server: NS1.DREAMHOST.COM
Name Server: NS2.DREAMHOST.COM
Name Server: NS3.DREAMHOST.COM
Status: clientTransferProhibited
Updated Date: 22-jul-2008
Creation Date: 22-jul-2008
Expiration Date: 22-jul-2009

I am not going to speculate whether this is work of a regular stalker or somebody trying to mess the trail of evidence. Or a search engine booster.

R.I.P Olive Riley

Monday, July 14, 2008 at 16:34 | In Blogosphere, internet | 2 Comments

World’s oldest blogger Olive Riley passed away on Saturday in Woy Woy, New South Wales, Australia. She was 108. Her blog tells a story of the 20th century and a life well lived.

R.I.P Olive!

Belgium sues Sweden for Big Brother law

Sunday, June 22, 2008 at 5:38 | In Sweden, internet, privacy | 2 Comments
Tags: big brother

The Belgian Privacy Commission intends to sue Sweden in the European Court after Sweden adopted legislation allowing their military intelligence service FRA to monitor without explicite court order all phone and web communications passing the Swedish borders. Here is a Belgian TV news story about the Swedish legislation and the outrage it has prompted among Belgian privacy advocates (via projO).

more about “Belgium sues Sweden for Big Brother law“, posted with vodpod

Finland’s largest e-mail service provider Sonera Finland moved in April 2008 the accounts of their Finnish customers back to Finland from the joined Sweden based servers of Telia-Sonera. “We decided to move Sonera’s e-mail services back to Finland in order to protect the privacy of our Finnish customers. After the migration, e-mails sent from one Finn to another will not cross Finland’s borders at any stage”, says Juha-Pekka Weckström, Senior Vice President of TeliaSonera Broadband Services Finland.

A major part of international calls and web connections in Finland and Estonia are routed through Sweden. While the Swedish legislation has passed almost unnoticed and undebated in Estonia, Finnish MP Jyrki Kasvi tabled a written parliamentary question to the Minister of Telecommunications asking what the government intend to do to protect the privacy of Finnish citizens, residents and businesses. The freshly adopted Swedish legislation provides the Swedish military intelligence a multitude of access to telecommunications of Finns and Estonians that the Finnish and Estonian intelligence agencies dare not even dream of.

Sweden’s Pirate Party leader Rick Falkvinge has a good post in English explaining the details of the Swedish Big Brother law.

A collapsing World record

Tuesday, June 17, 2008 at 20:46 | In firefox, internet | 2 Comments
Tags: fuzz

Firefox 3 was allegedly launched about 45 minutes ago. The launch has been marketed as a bid to make a World record on number of downloads during 24 hours.

Just as I suspected, I have been unable to even access the site for the last half hour, much less downloading anything. It does not matter whether I try firefox.com, mozilla.com or click to the e-mail link the campaign sent me. Linking to the site would be pointless right now.

If you want to make a World record as a marketing fuzz, you need to have a World record holding server park. Otherwise you just create a World record of collapse and customer frustration.

Edit: I just managed to access the Mozilla blog. Melissa Shapiro writes that the 24 hours will be clocked at the moment they consider their servers hold up. Those fortunate souls who have managed to get the goody through mirror sites apparently do not count for the record but everybody trying desperately to access the official site certainly count for a frustration World record.

Finglish according to Google

Monday, May 12, 2008 at 3:38 | In google, internet, languages | 3 Comments
Tags: google translate

Google Translate has added Finnish to the supported languages. That is great. All they need to do now is to figure out how the bot could produce understandable translations.

This is what Google Translate returns as I feed in a passage of my own text:

The proposal is a positive, the fact that it would mean a confessional religious education end of the story. At that time, however, the question arises as to whether it is religion in your subject no longer make any sense. The different religions and their ethical views could be presented as part of the history and civic education. Säästyisi scarce resources; religion is not now such an important asia is not that it will complete a subject taught to justify.

Unlike my original post in Finnish, this does absolutely not make any sense. It does not work any better from English to Finnish either as you can see here and here.

Carnegie students ask for your help

Friday, May 2, 2008 at 7:18 | In computer, internet | Leave a Comment
Tags: Education

If you have 15-20 minutes to spare during this weekend and you want to help a group of Carnegie students, they would appreciate if you took the time to completing an on line survey about your communication habits. I did it yesterday. As you can see in comments to Jaanus’s blog post, there are minor issues with some of the questions but the survey is overall good. You will help a bunch of very talented post grad students to develop user interfaces.

By the way, did I mention that you have a decent chance of winning a $50 Amazon gift certificate?

A transparency statement: I am by no means affiliated with Carnegie University and I have no personal interest in promoting this survey but Jaanus is a long time on line friend of mine.

Skipping the “irrelevant”

Saturday, April 12, 2008 at 17:00 | In China, censorship, internet | Leave a Comment
Tags: google, sina.com, tibet

A regular Google search for Tibet crackdown returns about 1.810.000 links. The same search filtered through Sina.com returns 110 links. You do not need to click on any of the links to conclude that the approach in the web contents linked to through each of the two searches are different like day and night.

Since nobody could possibly read 1,8 M web pages anyway, I guess the Chinese Internet users should be grateful that their government spares them the trouble of browsing through all that “irrelevant information”.

Firefox 3: first impressions

Saturday, March 22, 2008 at 5:52 | In browsers, computer, internet, ubuntu | 2 Comments
Tags: firefox

I installed Firefox 3.0b4 the other day and have been using it in parallel with 2.0.0.12. I must say that I am not very impressed. There is not much visible difference between the two.

To install Firefox 3.0b4 to my Ubuntu 7.10 I first fetched the tarball file here and extracted it to my desktop. I then navigated in Nautilus to the freshly created Firefox folder, double clicked the Firefox file and chose Run. I found these instructions here.

All my settings, including bookmarks and saved passwords, were neatly imported but I suddenly discovered that I was unable to play flash video and audio files because the plug-ins were not imported. To fix this I ran this command line in Terminal:

sudo ln -s /usr/lib/mozilla/plugins/* Desktop/firefox/plugins/

Now that it was all settled for surfing I started to compare the two. I soon noticed that while switching between 3.0b4 and 2.0.0.12 I was logged out of many places that I never log out of. That is a small inconvenience which will eventually go away as I am going to use Firefox 3 exclusively. I was glad to notice that bookmarks added or deleted in one version were updated when the other was turned on.

The most hype around Firefox 3 has been about its supposedly faster speed. I do not detect a difference but that might very well be bacause I have taken these steps for ages ago so my Firefox runs fast as it is, much faster than with default settings.

Some buttons in the navigation toolbar look different but other than that, I do not detect much of a difference. I do not complain, though. It is a good idea to use the latest software versions. Many improvements are not visible but they are there, nevertheless.

I am probably going to use Firefox 2 and 3 in parallel as long as 3 is in beta. As soon as the first regular release becomes available, it is going to be goodbye to Firefox 2.

Russia plans to censor Internet

Tuesday, March 18, 2008 at 7:32 | In Freedom of speech, censorship, internet, russia | 8 Comments

Russia has so far not bothered very much to regulate the Internet. The low Internet penetration in Russia has guarded most citizens from the harmful effects of free speech. Since the traditional media is under heavy government control, access to independent sources of information has has been kept on a suitable level without special measures targeted against the web.

However, this is likely to change soon. According to The Other Russia, the Prosecutor-General’s Office has filed legislative proposals about web censorship to both houses of the Parliament and the presidential administration. The prosecutors want to make ISP’s and telecoms responsible for “objectionable and extremist material” in the Internet.

Aleksey Zhafyarov, the deputy head of Directorate to supervise enforcement of laws on federal security, interethnic relations and countering extremism was frank with the agency:

“We have a paradoxical situation on our hands: there is a whole group of companies that maintain the internet and derive a profit, yet take no responsibility for the impact on society of the content they host.”

Internet related bills have previously been tabled in both houses, among others one that would require all web sites with more than 1000 daily visitors to register as mass-media outlets and another one limiting foreign investments to telecom and internet industries.

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