Terry Lucy

Get your wallet out, Icann is opening the domain flood gates

From the Guardian: 

A special meeting of Icann’s board approved a plan to expand the number of possible internet domain name endings from the current 22 – such as “.com”, “.org” and “.net” (which are separate of the country-specific domain endings such as “.uk”) – to allow domains “in any language or script”, according to Rod Beckstrom, president and chief executive of Icann.

“Today’s decision will usher in a new internet age,” said Peter Dengate Thrush, chairman of ICANN’s board of directors. “We have provided a platform for the next generation of creativity and inspiration. Unless there is a good reason to restrain it, innovation should be allowed to run free.”

I am already trying to think of smart money spinners and websites. Are you? 

[Update] These domains will trickle down to us, right? 

LulzSec: This is the Internet, where we screw each other over

LulzSec’s 1000th Tweet Press Release: 

This is the Internet, where we screw each other over for a jolt of satisfaction. There are peons and lulz lizards; trolls and victims. There’s losers that post shit they think matters, and other losers telling them their shit does not matter. In this situation, we are both of these parties, because we’re fully aware that every single person that reached this final sentence just wasted a few moments of their time.

I really don’t know what to make of LulzSec. I don’t really know what to make of anything that doesn’t have a public face, and I suppose that’s what worrying about the whole scenario. 

Full release here.  

Should we all be using Tor to help protect ourselves online?

In the past few months, I have lost all faith in the ability to store my information online. This is mainly due to the epidemic of “hacktivism” which has seen web portals for some of the biggest and most powerful organisations in the world breached.

From the PlayStation Network attack to more recent attacks on the CIA, it is a lot clearer that the Internet isn’t as safe as we thought.

To tackle this, I have been looking at many ways of making the internet a more secure place for me to be. This ranges from using services like 1Password, to just being more aware of who exactly has my information on the Internet.

One service that made me take notice is Tor Project, which helps to protect the anonymity of its users to defend against network surveillance and traffic analysis. A step to far? A year ago I would have said yes, but not now.

I am sold on using the service, but wanted to know a little more about it, so I got in touch with Runa A. Sandvik, a Developer, Security Researcher and Translation Coordinator for Tor. She was happy to answer a few questions.

Having only just installed Tor, I am pretty new to it. How would you summarise the service and its ease of use to other new users?

Tor is a free software and open network that enables users all over the world to communicate anonymously and securely on the Internet. Tor prevents anyone from learning the location and browsing habits of the people who use Tor, and it enables users to evade many Internet censorship systems (even ones that specifically target Tor).

Tor is really easy to use, but picking the right package to download can be a bit tricky for new users. I recommend downloading the Tor Browser Bundle. The bundle has everything you need (including the Firefox browser), and it’s all pre-configured and ready to go.

The idea of Tor seems like a movement, a rebellion against the big brother society that we live in today. Can you tell me how many people use the service?

It’s a bit difficult to count anonymous users, but we estimate that we have somewhere between 300,000 and 800,000 daily users. We also have a graph showing the number of directly connecting users from all countries: https://metrics.torproject.org/direct-users.png

Why should the average Internet user install Tor?

The following page talks about why different groups of people use Tor: https://www.torproject.org/about/torusers.html.en

Average Internet users use Tor for various reasons; to protect their privacy, research sensitive topics on the Internet, prevent people from looking at what they are doing online, access Internet resources that are blocked in their country etc.

Are you worried at all that online organisations such as Lulzsec and Anonymous are using Tor for nefairious means, thus making Tor look less credible?

There are people who use Tor to do bad things on the Internet, but there are also thousands of people who use Tor because they care about their privacy, want to access censored websites and don’t want to be tracked while browsing online. We do not want to put any restrictions on how people can and cannot use Tor, and we cannot track the people who use our network.

So, to answer your question; am I worried? Not really. I think it’s sad that some people use Tor to do bad things, but I think it’s important to look at all the ways Tor can be used to do good things, and protect thousands of people, as well.

How many developers are on board with Tor and how many users are running relays?

We have a page listing core Tor people: https://www.torproject.org/about/corepeople.html.en

The number of relays in the Tor network keeps growing (especially now that EFF are running their Tor Challenge). At the moment, there are around 2500 relays in the Tor network: https://metrics.torproject.org/network.html

End of Questions.

If, like me, you guys are more concerned about what happens with the information that you put online, I would say that Tor is definitely something you should be looking at. It runs nicely in the background and is easy to set up. You can find out more information about the service here.

How to mend the Twitter trend

Everybody hates Twitter’s trending topics. They are often nonsensical and stupid. I hardly ever refer to them, but trending topics could become a powerful tool — if Twitter makes it happen. 

I would love the ability to pick a series of topics, companies or names that I want to be kept abreast of on Twitter without following a million people. 

Say I am interested in Sony, for instance. Setting up a personalised trend on Twitter that would notify me of a steep increase in discussion based around Sony would be an ideal way to make trends more relevant to me, the user. 

That way, I could jump over to trending topics, and see if a bunch of stuff I am interested in is being talked about — rather than seeing how people would name a movie to make it relevant to their genitals. 

In addition, it could really help Twitter make some more money by having promoted trends appearing to those who find it most relevant. The advertising would be more direct, allowing Twitter could have more than one promoted trend at any given time. 

I feel that Twitter ignoring a good opportunity to allow users to make Twitter more of a tool than it already is, while making some extra buck at the same time. 

I’ve been up to some stuff

A few weeks ago, I left my friends over at the wonderful Game Rant so I could buy back a little time for myself. While this was nice for a short while I soon came to miss the buzz of having video games news published to the Internet. 

It was at this time where my buddy Calvin Robinson offered me the position of News Editor for GodisaGeek.com 

Now, this isn’t something any aspiring writer turns down, being News Editor for any site is a pretty big deal, in my opinion. Tiring it may be, but I absolutely love it. 

I have settled in with a fantastic bunch of people and already gotten to know some awesome industry people, not to mention attending an Activision pre-E3 press event and seeing 20 minutes worth of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 gameplay. That, for you non-gamers, is about as good as it gets. 

I was lucky enough to be able to write about Modern Warfare 3 in a preview post I did for GodisaGeek.

For the first time in my life I felt like a true journalist. Taking notes like a lunatic in a dark room and then making sense of them the next day is a natural high for me, and something I’m looking forward to doing again and again as the time passes. 

I know I still have a lot to learn before I have a chance of taking this stuff full time, but with GodisaGeek and my work at Macgasm — which I intend to do more of — I feel I am in the perfect place to learn from some great people which will help me to achieve my goal of leaving my shitty job. 

Right, I’m off to write some news. 

Microsoft needs to drop the silly Apple references

Microsoft’s Corporate Vice President, Joe Belfiore, recently demoed Windows Phone Mango, and I personally found it very impressive. The whole video was tarnished at around three minutes 51 seconds in for me. Here Belfiore is demoing Bing Vision with a book. The book is called This Will Change Everything and it appeared to me as an immediate reference to the competition, Apple.

Why? I don’t get it. Such a great product demo which had already shown Mango running at over 20 frames per-second more than the iPhone on an HTML 5 page didn’t need this reference. I found it distracting and childish. 

I’m behind Windows with their Windows Phone program. I think they are doing great things and I’m going to go out on a limb here and say that they will shake the market up in a big way in the next 18 months or so. 

So please Microsoft, drop the silly references, and place that energy into the good work that is obviously being done. 

I am aware that this post may be total bullshit, but it annoyed me enough to write about it, so I’d thought I’d see if anyone else felt the same. 

Less Is More: My MacBook Air

I’ve been enjoying posts by the likes of Stephen Hackett of Forkbombr and Ben over at The Brooks Review about using less software, and minimal computing in general. 

Those guys have some pretty minimal lists, but for me, a relative Mac newbie (though I did fix one today, sort of) those lists are scary to look at. MarsEdit, NVAlt and Reeder seem entirely unnecessary to me. I see them as friction.

As I talked about on an episode of the Minimal Mac podcast, Enough, I have very little in the way of third party applications on my Mac. I have all of the stock applications, such as iLife but can’t imagine wanting to install NVAlt. 

Here’s what I have installed on my MacBook Air:

Spotify — Music player. If it weren’t for iOS updates, I would delete iTunes. 

Twitter for Mac — Can’t find anything else as unobtrusive and easy to use.

Linkinus — IRC client whereby I talk to my fellow Macgasm contributors. 

Google Chrome — For Flash sites and for being logged into two WordPress accounts at the same time. 

Dropbox — Best Mac application. Period. 

Droplr — Currently trying it out, though it will be deleted soon due to lack of use. 

Skype — I’m a Podcaster, I need it. 

FaceTime — Because video calling on Skype is lame. 

That is literally it. Nothing else. Na-da. 

Some people say I’m missing out by not having Reeder or MarsEdit, but I generally disagree. I use Google Reader because it is in-browser, looks exactly the same at home, work and at my mothers house. I write in TextEdit or in-browser, I just make sure I save at regular intervals.

I’m new to this. I’m not branching out, not least until I’ve mastered the native applications that — from what I’ve read, seen and heard — many people simply ignore. 

If that’s because they are bad, then fair enough, but I’m going to use them and find that out for myself.

It’s worth noting that it really doesn’t matter what any of us say. Good advice is there to be had but computing is very much a one-to-one task. No one can tell you what you need or what you should like, you have to figure that out for yourself. 

For me, less is more. I enjoy my MacBook Air just how it is, and can’t see myself installing more software until it is entirely necessary to do so.

XYDO: A News Based Social Network

I have been a user of XYDO for a little while now. The site has gone public today and is a really interesting way of seeing what’s hot in the news that you care about. Users can follow a series of subjects and then the site pulls and prioritises the news on that subject from your social networks, as well as communities that you follow on the site.

The only way I can describe the experience at this moment in time is as follows: Digg gets drunk, has a threesome with Reddit and Newsboiler which results in XYDO. 

Anyway, I think this site is definitely worth keeping an eye on, especially with its attractive and modern UI. Previously, I have only checked it out on the odd occasion, just to observe and consume as I like to do with most new things, but I plan to be more active with XYDO in the future. 

One of the most interesting features with XYDO is that it allows you to create an original text post to spark a discussion of your own — no need to post to your own blog and then submit the story. This is great as it allows you to dip in and out of a limitless range of subjects without alienating anyone that reads your blog or follows you on Twitter.

So yeah, check it out.