Tag: internet

Facebook drones

such nice technology being wasted on selfies and baby pictures.

Facebook, one of the primary backers of the Internet.org initiative, which aims to bring affordable Internet access to the 5B people in the world who still lack connectivity, is in talks with a company that could help further that agenda. Facebook is buying Titan Aerospace, makers of near-orbital, solar-powered drones which can fly for 5 years without needing to land.

House of cards loves deep web

Watching some house of cards. deep web, lol

So how believable is the whole House of Cards storyline? There are no egregious technical howlers, thanks to the technical advice of Internet activist Gregg Housh, whose participation can be seen part of a trend toward better technical accuracy since the days of Sneakers and Independence Day (in which the remarkably hackable alien computer features a giant status dialog that reads “UPLOADING VIRUS”). The Fifth Estate had more detail, but on purely technical terms, House of Cards holds up pretty well. As for the actual storyline, let me put it this way: It’s just as believable as House of Cards’ politics.

Gift from God

Not: The Internet is a source of temptations to be resisted. Not: The Internet is just the latest over-hyped communication technology, and remember when we thought telegraphs would bring world peace? Not: The Internet is merely a technology and thus just another place for human nature to reassert itself. Not: The Internet is just a way for the same old powers to extend their reach. Not: The Internet is an opportunity to do good, but be wary because we can also do evil with it. It may be many of those. But first: The Internet — its possibilities for encounter and solidarity — is truly good. The Internet is a gift from God.

This is not the language I would use. I’m an agno-atheistical Jew who lives in solidarity with an Orthodox community. (Long story.) But I think – you can never tell with these cross-tradition interpretations – that the Pope’s words express the deep joy the Internet brings me. “This is not to say that certain problems do not exist”. But still: The Internet is truly good. Why?

Good urls matter

~10 years ago, jon udell was one of my favorite thinkers about the web. after a long hiatus, he is coming back to form, here on why good urls matter.

In a 1997 keynote talk Andrew Schulman put up a slide that contained just a URL: UPS Tracking “Think about what this means. Every UPS package has its own home page on the web!” Also, potentially, every bank transaction, every calendar appointment, every book (or paragraph within every book), every song (or passage or track within every song), every appliance (or component within every appliance). If we needed to, we could create URLs for grains of sand, each as compact and easy to exchange as Andrew Schulman’s Fedex URL. The supply of web names is inexhaustible, and the universe of their meaning is unbounded.